INTRODUCTION
1. An Inquiry into the understanding, pleasant and useful. Since it is
the understanding that sets man above the rest of sensible beings, and
gives him all the advantage and dominion which he has over them; it is
certainly a subject, even for its nobleness, worth our labour to inquire
into. The understanding, like the eye, whilst it makes us see and perceive
all other things, takes no notice of itself; and it requires art and pains
to set it at a distance and make it its own object. But whatever be the
difficulties that lie in the way of this inquiry; whatever it be that keeps
us so much in the dark to ourselves; sure I am that all the light we can
let in upon our minds, all the acquaintance we can make with our own understandings,
will not only be very pleasant, but bring us great advantage, in directing
our thoughts in the search of other things.
2. Design. This, therefore, being my purpose- to inquire into the original,
certainty, and extent of human knowledge, together with the grounds and
degrees of belief, opinion, and assent;- I shall not at present meddle
with the physical consideration of the mind; or trouble myself to examine
wherein its essence consists; or by what motions of our spirits or alterations
of our bodies we come to have any sensation by our organs, or any ideas
in our understandings; and whether those ideas do in their formation, any
or all of them, depend on matter or not. These are speculations which,
however curious and entertaining, I shall decline, as lying out of my way
in the design I am now upon. It shall suffice to my present purpose, to
consider the discerning faculties of a man, as they are employed about
the objects which they have to do with. And I shall imagine I have not
wholly misemployed myself in the thoughts I shall have on this occasion,
if, in this historical, plain method, I can give any account of the ways
whereby our understandings come to attain those notions of things we have;
and can set down any measures of the certainty of our knowledge; or the
grounds of those persuasions which are to be found amongst men, so various,
different, and wholly contradictory; and yet asserted somewhere or other
with such assurance and confidence, that he that shall take a view of the
opinions of mankind, observe their opposition, and at the same time consider
the fondness and devotion wherewith they are embraced, the resolution and
eagerness wherewith they are maintained, may perhaps have reason to suspect,
that either there is no such thing as truth at all, or that mankind hath
no sufficient means to attain a certain knowledge of it.
3. Method. It is therefore worth while to search out the bounds between
opinion and knowledge; and examine by what measures, in things whereof
we have no certain knowledge, we ought to regulate our assent and moderate
our persuasion. In order whereunto I shall pursue this following method:-
First, I shall inquire into the original of those ideas, notions, or
whatever else you please to call them, which a man observes, and is conscious
to himself he has in his mind; and the ways whereby the understanding comes
to be furnished with them.
Secondly, I shall endeavour to show what knowledge the understanding
hath by those ideas; and the certainty, evidence, and extent of it.
Thirdly, I shall make some inquiry into the nature and grounds of faith
or opinion: whereby I mean that assent which we give to any proposition
as true, of whose truth yet we have no certain knowledge. And here we shall
have occasion to examine the reasons and degrees of assent.
4. Useful to know the extent of our comprehension. If by this inquiry
into the nature of the understanding, I can discover the powers thereof;
how far they reach; to what things they are in any degree proportionate;
and where they fail us, I suppose it may be of use to prevail with the
busy mind of man to be more cautious in meddling with things exceeding
its comprehension; to stop when it is at the utmost extent of its tether;
and to sit down in a quiet ignorance of those things which, upon examination,
are found to be beyond the reach of our capacities. We should not then
perhaps be so forward, out of an affectation of an universal knowledge,
to raise questions, and perplex ourselves and others with disputes about
things to which our understandings are not suited; and of which we cannot
frame in our minds any clear or distinct perceptions, or whereof (as it
has perhaps too often happened) we have not any notions at all. If we can
find out how far the understanding can extend its view; how far it has
faculties to attain certainty; and in what cases it can only judge and
guess, we may learn to content ourselves with what is attainable by us
in this state.
5. Our capacity suited to our state and concerns. For though the comprehension
of our understandings comes exceeding short of the vast extent of things,
yet we shall have cause enough to magnify the bountiful Author of our being,
for that proportion and degree of knowledge he has bestowed on us, so far
above all the rest of the inhabitants of this our mansion. Men have reason
to be well satisfied with what God hath thought fit for them, since he
hath given them (as St. Peter says) pana pros zoen kaieusebeian, whatsoever
is necessary for the conveniences of life and information of virtue; and
has put within the reach of their discovery, the comfortable provision
for this life, and the way that leads to a better. How short soever their
knowledge may come of an universal or perfect comprehension of whatsoever
is, it yet secures their great concernments, that they have light enough
to lead them to the knowledge of their Maker, and the sight of their own
duties. Men may find matter sufficient to busy their heads, and employ
their hands with variety, delight, and satisfaction, if they will not boldly
quarrel with their own constitution, and throw away the blessings their
hands are filled with, because they are not big enough to grasp everything.
We shall not have much reason to complain of the narrowness of our minds,
if we will but employ them about what may be of use to us; for of that
they are very capable. And it will be an unpardonable, as well as childish
peevishness, if we undervalue the advantages of our knowledge, and neglect
to improve it to the ends for which it was given us, because there are
some things that are set out of the reach of it. It will be no excuse to
an idle and untoward servant, who would not attend his business by candle
light, to plead that he had not broad sunshine. The Candle that is set
up in us shines bright enough for all our purposes. The discoveries we
can make with this ought to satisfy us; and we shall then use our understandings
right, when we entertain all objects in that way and proportion that they
are suited to our faculties, and upon those grounds they are capable of
being proposed to us; and not peremptorily or intemperately require demonstration,
and demand certainty, where probability only is to be had, and which is
sufficient to govern all our concernments. If we will disbelieve everything,
because we cannot certainly know all things, we shall do muchwhat as wisely
as he who would not use his legs, but sit still and perish, because he
had no wings to fly.
6. Knowledge of our capacity a cure of scepticism and idleness. When
we know our own strength, we shall the better know what to undertake with
hopes of success; and when we have well surveyed the powers of our own
minds, and made some estimate what we may expect from them, we shall not
be inclined either to sit still, and not set our thoughts on work at all,
in despair of knowing anything; nor on the other side, question everything,
and disclaim all knowledge, because some things are not to be understood.
It is of great use to the sailor to know the length of his line, though
he cannot with it fathom all the depths of the ocean. It is well he knows
that it is long enough to reach the bottom, at such places as are necessary
to direct his voyage, and caution him against running upon shoals that
may ruin him. Our business here is not to know all things, but those which
concern our conduct. If we can find out those measures, whereby a rational
creature, put in that state in which man is in this world, may and ought
to govern his opinions, and actions depending thereon, we need not to be
troubled that some other things escape our knowledge.
7. Occasion of this essay. This was that which gave the first rise to
this Essay concerning the understanding. For I thought that the first step
towards satisfying several inquiries the mind of man was very apt to run
into, was, to take a survey of our own understandings, examine our own
powers, and see to what things they were adapted. Till that was done I
suspected we began at the wrong end, and in vain sought for satisfaction
in a quiet and sure possession of truths that most concerned us, whilst
we let loose our thoughts into the vast ocean of Being; as if all that
boundless extent were the natural and undoubted possession of our understandings,
wherein there was nothing exempt from its decisions, or that escaped its
comprehension. Thus men, extending their inquiries beyond their capacities,
and letting their thoughts wander into those depths where they can find
no sure footing, it is no wonder that they raise questions and multiply
disputes, which, never coming to any clear resolution, are proper only
to continue and increase their doubts, and to confirm them at last in perfect
scepticism. Whereas, were the capacities of our understandings well considered,
the extent of our knowledge once discovered, and the horizon found which
sets the bounds between the enlightened and dark parts of things; between
what is and what is not comprehensible by us, men would perhaps with less
scruple acquiesce in the avowed ignorance of the one, and employ their
thoughts and discourse with more advantage and satisfaction in the other.
8. What "Idea" stands for. Thus much I thought necessary to say concerning
the occasion of this Inquiry into human Understanding. But, before I proceed
on to what I have thought on this subject, I must here in the entrance
beg pardon of my reader for the frequent use of the word idea, which he
will find in the following treatise. It being that term which, I think,
serves best to stand for whatsoever is the object of the understanding
when a man thinks, I have used it to express whatever is meant by phantasm,
notion, species, or whatever it is which the mind can be employed about
in thinking; and I could not avoid frequently using it.
I presume it will be easily granted me, that there are such ideas in
men's minds: every one is conscious of them in himself; and men's words
and actions will satisfy him that they are in others.
Our first inquiry then shall be,- how they come into the mind.
BOOK I: Neither Principles nor Ideas Are Innate
Chapter I: No Innate Speculative Principles
1. The way shown how we come by any knowledge, sufficient to prove it not
innate. It is an established opinion amongst some men, that there are in
the understanding certain innate principles; some primary notions, koinai
ennoiai, characters, as it were stamped upon the mind of man; which the
soul receives in its very first being, and brings into the world with it.
It would be sufficient to convince unprejudiced readers of the falseness
of this supposition, if I should only show (as I hope I shall in the following
parts of this Discourse) how men, barely by the use of their natural faculties,
may attain to all the knowledge they have, without the help of any innate
impressions; and may arrive at certainty, without any such original notions
or principles. For I imagine any one will easily grant that it would be
impertinent to suppose the ideas of colours innate in a creature to whom
God hath given sight, and a power to receive them by the eyes from external
objects: and no less unreasonable would it be to attribute several truths
to the impressions of nature, and innate characters, when we may observe
in ourselves faculties fit to attain as easy and certain knowledge of them
as if they were originally imprinted on the mind.
But because a man is not permitted without censure to follow his own
thoughts in the search of truth, when they lead him ever so little out
of the common road, I shall set down the reasons that made me doubt of
the truth of that opinion, as an excuse for my mistake, if I be in one;
which I leave to be considered by those who, with me, dispose themselves
to embrace truth wherever they find it.
2. General assent the great argument. There is nothing more commonly
taken for granted than that there are certain principles, both speculative
and practical, (for they speak of both), universally agreed upon by all
mankind: which therefore, they argue, must needs be the constant impressions
which the souls of men receive in their first beings, and which they bring
into the world with them, as necessarily and really as they do any of their
inherent faculties.
3. Universal consent proves nothing innate. This argument, drawn from
universal consent, has this misfortune in it, that if it were true in matter
of fact, that there were certain truths wherein all mankind agreed, it
would not prove them innate, if there can be any other way shown how men
may come to that universal agreement, in the things they do consent in,
which I presume may be done.
4. "What is, is," and "It is impossible for the same thing to be and
not to be," not universally assented to. But, which is worse, this argument
of universal consent, which is made use of to prove innate principles,
seems to me a demonstration that there are none such: because there are
none to which all mankind give an universal assent. I shall begin with
the speculative, and instance in those magnified principles of demonstration,
"Whatsoever is, is," and "It is impossible for the same thing to be and
not to be"; which, of all others, I think have the most allowed title to
innate. These have so settled a reputation of maxims universally received,
that it will no doubt be thought strange if any one should seem to question
it. But yet I take liberty to say, that these propositions are so far from
having an universal assent, that there are a great part of mankind to whom
they are not so much as known.
5. Not on the mind naturally imprinted, because not known to children,
idiots, &c. For, first, it is evident, that all children and idiots
have not the least apprehension or thought of them. And the want of that
is enough to destroy that universal assent which must needs be the necessary
concomitant of all innate truths: it seeming to me near a contradiction
to say, that there are truths imprinted on the soul, which it perceives
or understands not: imprinting, if it signify anything, being nothing else
but the making certain truths to be perceived. For to imprint anything
on the mind without the mind's perceiving it, seems to me hardly intelligible.
If therefore children and idiots have souls, have minds, with those impressions
upon them, they must unavoidably perceive them, and necessarily know and
assent to these truths; which since they do not, it is evident that there
are no such impressions. For if they are not notions naturally imprinted,
how can they be innate? and if they are notions imprinted, how can they
be unknown? To say a notion is imprinted on the mind, and yet at the same
time to say, that the mind is ignorant of it, and never yet took notice
of it, is to make this impression nothing. No proposition can be said to
be in the mind which it never yet knew, which it was never yet conscious
of. For if any one may, then, by the same reason, all propositions that
are true, and the mind is capable ever of assenting to, may be said to
be in the mind, and to be imprinted: since, if any one can be said to be
in the mind, which it never yet knew, it must be only because it is capable
of knowing it; and so the mind is of all truths it ever shall know. Nay,
thus truths may be imprinted on the mind which it never did, nor ever shall
know; for a man may live long, and die at last in ignorance of many truths
which his mind was capable of knowing, and that with certainty. So that
if the capacity of knowing be the natural impression contended for, all
the truths a man ever comes to know will, by this account, be every one
of them innate; and this great point will amount to no more, but only to
a very improper way of speaking; which, whilst it pretends to assert the
contrary, says nothing different from those who deny innate principles.
For nobody, I think, ever denied that the mind was capable of knowing several
truths. The capacity, they say, is innate; the knowledge acquired. But
then to what end such contest for certain innate maxims? If truths can
be imprinted on the understanding without being perceived, I can see no
difference there can be between any truths the mind is capable of knowing
in respect of their original: they must all be innate or all adventitious:
in vain shall a man go about to distinguish them. He therefore that talks
of innate notions in the understanding, cannot (if he intend thereby any
distinct sort of truths) mean such truths to be in the understanding as
it never perceived, and is yet wholly ignorant of. For if these words "to
be in the understanding" have any propriety, they signify to be understood.
So that to be in the understanding, and not to be understood; to be in
the mind and never to be perceived, is all one as to say anything is and
is not in the mind or understanding. If therefore these two propositions,
"Whatsoever is, is," and "It is impossible for the same thing to be and
not to be," are by nature imprinted, children cannot be ignorant of them:
infants, and all that have souls, must necessarily have them in their understandings,
know the truth of them, and assent to it.
6. That men know them when they come to the use of reason, answered.
To avoid this, it is usually answered, that all men know and assent to
them, when they come to the use of reason; and this is enough to prove
them innate. I answer:
7. Doubtful expressions, that have scarce any signification, go for
clear reasons to those who, being prepossessed, take not the pains to examine
even what they themselves say. For, to apply this answer with any tolerable
sense to our present purpose, it must signify one of these two things:
either that as soon as men come to the use of reason these supposed native
inscriptions come to be known and observed by them; or else, that the use
and exercise of men's reason, assists them in the discovery of these principles,
and certainly makes them known to them.
8. If reason discovered them, that would not prove them innate. If they
mean, that by the use of reason men may discover these principles, and
that this is sufficient to prove them innate; their way of arguing will
stand thus, viz. that whatever truths reason can certainly discover to
us, and make us firmly assent to, those are all naturally imprinted on
the mind; since that universal assent, which is made the mark of them,
amounts to no more but this,- that by the use of reason we are capable
to come to a certain knowledge of and assent to them; and, by this means,
there will be no difference between the maxims of the mathematicians, and
theorems they deduce from them: all must be equally allowed innate; they
being all discoveries made by the use of reason, and truths that a rational
creature may certainty come to know, if he apply his thoughts rightly that
way.
9. It is false that reason discovers them. But how can these men think
the use of reason necessary to discover principles that are supposed innate,
when reason (if we may believe them) is nothing else but the faculty of
deducing unknown truths from principles or propositions that are already
known? That certainly can never be thought innate which we have need of
reason to discover; unless, as I have said, we will have all the certain
truths that reason ever teaches us, to be innate. We may as well think
the use of reason necessary to make our eyes discover visible objects,
as that there should be need of reason, or the exercise thereof, to make
the understanding see what is originally engraven on it, and cannot be
in the understanding before it be perceived by it. So that to make reason
discover those truths thus imprinted, is to say, that the use of reason
discovers to a man what he knew before: and if men have those innate impressed
truths originally, and before the use of reason, and yet are always ignorant
of them till they come to the use of reason, it is in effect to say, that
men know and know them not at the same time.
10. No use made of reasoning in the discovery of these two maxims. It
will here perhaps be said that mathematical demonstrations, and other truths
that are not innate, are not assented to as soon as proposed, wherein they
are distinguished from these maxims and other innate truths. I shall have
occasion to speak of assent upon the first proposing, more particularly
by and by. I shall here only, and that very readily, allow, that these
maxims and mathematical demonstrations are in this different: that the
one have need of reason, using of proofs, to make them out and to gain
our assent; but the other, as soon as understood, are, without any the
least reasoning, embraced and assented to. But I withal beg leave to observe,
that it lays open the weakness of this subterfuge, which requires the use
of reason for the discovery of these general truths: since it must be confessed
that in their discovery there is no use made of reasoning at all. And I
think those who give this answer will not be forward to affirm that the
knowledge of this maxim, "That it is impossible for the same thing to be
and not to be," is a deduction of our reason. For this would be to destroy
that bounty of nature they seem so fond of, whilst they make the knowledge
of those principles to depend on the labour of our thoughts. For all reasoning
is search, and casting about, and requires pains and application. And how
can it with any tolerable sense be supposed, that what was imprinted by
nature, as the foundation and guide of our reason, should need the use
of reason to discover it?
11. And if there were, this would prove them not innate. Those who will
take the pains to reflect with a little attention on the operations of
the understanding, will find that this ready assent of the mind to some
truths, depends not, either on native inscription, or the use of reason,
but on a faculty of the mind quite distinct from both of them, as we shall
see hereafter. Reason, therefore, having nothing to do in procuring our
assent to these maxims, if by saying, that "men know and assent to them,
when they come to the use of reason," be meant, that the use of reason
assists us in the knowledge of these maxims, it is utterly false; and were
it true, would prove them not to be innate.
12. The coming to the use of reason not the time we come to know these
maxims. If by knowing and assenting to them "when we come to the use of
reason," be meant, that this is the time when they come to be taken notice
of by the mind; and that as soon as children come to the use of reason,
they come also to know and assent to these maxims; this also is false and
frivolous. First, it is false; because it is evident these maxims are not
in the mind so early as the use of reason; and therefore the coming to
the use of reason is falsely assigned as the time of their discovery. How
many instances of the use of reason may we observe in children, a long
time before they have any knowledge of this maxim, "That it is impossible
for the same thing to be and not to be?" And a great part of illiterate
people and savages pass many years, even of their rational age, without
ever thinking on this and the like general propositions. I grant, men come
not to the knowledge of these general and more abstract truths, which are
thought innate, till they come to the use of reason; and I add, nor then
neither. Which is so, because, till after they come to the use of reason,
those general abstract ideas are not framed in the mind, about which those
general maxims are, which are mistaken for innate principles, but are indeed
discoveries made and verities introduced and brought into the mind by the
same way, and discovered by the same steps, as several other propositions,
which nobody was ever so extravagant as to suppose innate. This I hope
to make plain in the sequel of this Discourse. I allow therefore, a necessity
that men should come to the use of reason before they get the knowledge
of those general truths; but deny that men's coming to the use of reason
is the time of their discovery.
13. By this they are not distinguished from other knowable truths. In
the mean time it is observable, that this saying, that men know and assent
to these maxims "when they come to the use of reason," amounts in reality
of fact to no more but this,- that they are never known nor taken notice
of before the use of reason, but may possibly be assented to some time
after, during a man's life; but when is uncertain. And so may all other
knowable truths, as well as these; which therefore have no advantage nor
distinction from others by this note of being known when we come to the
use of reason; nor are thereby proved to be innate, but quite the contrary.
14. If coming to the use of reason were the time of their discovery
it would not prove them innate. But, secondly, were it true that the precise
time of their being known and assented to were, when men come to the use
of reason; neither would that prove them innate. This way of arguing is
as frivolous as the supposition itself is false. For, by what kind of logic
will it appear that any notion is originally by nature imprinted in the
mind in its first constitution, because it comes first to be observed and
assented to when a faculty of the mind, which has quite a distinct province,
begins to exert itself? And therefore the coming to the use of speech,
if it were supposed the time that these maxims are first assented to, (which
it may be with as much truth as the time when men come to the use of reason,)
would be as good a proof that they were innate, as to say they are innate
because men assent to them when they come to the use of reason. I agree
then with these men of innate principles, that there is no knowledge of
these general and self-evident maxims in the mind, till it comes to the
exercise of reason: but I deny that the coming to the use of reason is
the precise time when they are first taken notice of, and if that were
the precise time, I deny that it would prove them innate. All that can
with any truth be meant by this proposition, that men "assent to them when
they come to the use of reason," is no more but this,- that the making
of general abstract ideas, and the understanding of general names, being
a concomitant of the rational faculty, and growing up with it, children
commonly get not those general ideas, nor learn the names that stand for
them, till, having for a good while exercised their reason about familiar
and more particular ideas, they are, by their ordinary discourse and actions
with others, acknowledged to be capable of rational conversation. If assenting
to these maxims, when men come to the use of reason, can be true in any
other sense, I desire it may be shown; or at least, how in this, or any
other sense, it proves them innate.
15. The steps by which the mind attains several truths. The senses at
first let in particular ideas, and furnish the yet empty cabinet, and the
mind by degrees growing familiar with some of them, they are lodged in
the memory, and names got to them. Afterwards, the mind proceeding further,
abstracts them, and by degrees learns the use of general names. In this
manner the mind comes to be furnished with ideas and language, the materials
about which to exercise its discursive faculty. And the use of reason becomes
daily more visible, as these materials that give it employment increase.
But though the having of general ideas and the use of general words and
reason usually grow together, yet I see not how this any way proves them
innate. The knowledge of some truths, I confess, is very early in the mind
but in a way that shows them not to be innate. For, if we will observe,
we shall find it still to be about ideas, not innate, but acquired; it
being about those first which are imprinted by external things, with which
infants have earliest to do, which make the most frequent impressions on
their senses. In ideas thus got, the mind discovers that some agree and
others differ, probably as soon as it has any use of memory; as soon as
it is able to retain and perceive distinct ideas. But whether it be then
or no, this is certain, it does so long before it has the use of words;
or comes to that which we commonly call "the use of reason." For a child
knows as certainly before it can speak the difference between the ideas
of sweet and bitter (i.e. that sweet is not bitter), as it knows afterwards
(when it comes to speak) that wormwood and sugarplums are not the same
thing.
16. Assent to supposed innate truths depends on having clear and distinct
ideas of what their terms mean, and not on their innateness. A child knows
not that three and four are equal to seven, till he comes to be able to
count seven, and has got the name and idea of equality; and then, upon
explaining those words, he presently assents to, or rather perceives the
truth of that proposition. But neither does he then readily assent because
it is an innate truth, nor was his assent wanting till then because he
wanted the use of reason; but the truth of it appears to him as soon as
he has settled in his mind the clear and distinct ideas that these names
stand for. And then he knows the truth of that proposition upon the same
grounds and by the same means, that he knew before that a rod and a cherry
are not the same thing; and upon the same grounds also that he may come
to know afterwards "That it is impossible for the same thing to be and
not to be," as shall be more fully shown hereafter. So that the later it
is before any one comes to have those general ideas about which those maxims
are; or to know the signification of those general terms that stand for
them; or to put together in his mind the ideas they stand for; the later
also will it be before he comes to assent to those maxims;- whose terms,
with the ideas they stand for, being no more innate than those of a cat
or a weasel, he must stay till time and observation have acquainted him
with them; and then he will be in a capacity to know the truth of these
maxims, upon the first occasion that shall make him put together those
ideas in his mind, and observe whether they agree or disagree, according
as is expressed in those propositions. And therefore it is that a man knows
that eighteen and nineteen are equal to thirty-seven, by the same self-evidence
that he knows one and two to be equal to three: yet a child knows this
not so soon as the other; not for want of the use of reason, but because
the ideas the words eighteen, nineteen, and thirty-seven stand for, are
not so soon got, as those which are signified by one, two, and three.
17. Assenting as soon as proposed and understood, proves them not innate.
This evasion therefore of general assent when men come to the use of reason,
failing as it does, and leaving no difference between those suppose innate
and other truths that are afterwards acquired and learnt, men have endeavoured
to secure an universal assent to those they call maxims, by saying, they
are generally assented to as soon as proposed, and the terms they are proposed
in understood: seeing all men, even children, as soon as they hear and
understand the terms, assent to these propositions, they think it is sufficient
to prove them innate. For since men never fail after they have once understood
the words, to acknowledge them for undoubted truths, they would infer,
that certainly these propositions were first lodged in the understanding,
which, without any teaching, the mind, at the very first proposal immediately
closes with and assents to, and after that never doubts again.
18. If such an assent be a mark of innate, then "that one and two are
equal to three, that sweetness is not bitterness," and a thousand the like,
must be innate. In answer to this, I demand whether ready assent given
to a proposition, upon first hearing and understanding the terms, be a
certain mark of an innate principle? If it be not, such a general assent
is in vain urged as a proof of them: if it be said that it is a mark of
innate, they must then allow all such propositions to be innate which are
generally assented to as soon as heard, whereby they will find themselves
plentifully stored with innate principles. For upon the same ground, viz.
of assent at first hearing and understanding the terms, that men would
have those maxims pass for innate, they must also admit several propositions
about numbers to be innate; and thus, that one and two are equal to three,
that two and two are equal to four, and a multitude of other the like propositions
in numbers, that everybody assents to at first hearing and understanding
the terms, must have a place amongst these innate axioms. Nor is this the
prerogative of numbers alone, and propositions made about several of them;
but even natural philosophy, and all the other sciences, afford propositions
which are sure to meet with assent as soon as they are understood. That
"two bodies cannot be in the same place" is a truth that nobody any more
sticks at than at these maxims, that "it is impossible for the same thing
to be and not to be," that "white is not black," that "a square is not
a circle," that "bitterness is not sweetness." These and a million of such
other propositions, as many at least as we have distinct ideas of, every
man in his wits, at first hearing, and knowing what the names stand for,
must necessarily assent to. If these men will be true to their own rule,
and have assent at first hearing and understanding the terms to be a mark
of innate, they must allow not only as many innate propositions as men
have distinct ideas, but as many as men can make propositions wherein different
ideas are denied one of another. Since every proposition wherein one different
idea is denied of another, will as certainly find assent at first hearing
and understanding the terms as this general one, "It is impossible for
the same thing to be and not to be," or that which is the foundation of
it, and is the easier understood of the two, "The same is not different";
by which account they will have legions of innate propositions of this
one sort, without mentioning any other. But, since no proposition can be
innate unless the ideas about which it is be innate, this will be to suppose
all our ideas of colours, sounds, tastes, figure, &c., innate, than
which there cannot be anything more opposite to reason and experience.
Universal and ready assent upon hearing and understanding the terms is,
I grant, a mark of self-evidence; but self-evidence, depending not on innate
impressions, but on something else, (as we shall show hereafter,) belongs
to several propositions which nobody was yet so extravagant as to pretend
to be innate.
19. Such less general propositions known before these universal maxims.
Nor let it be said, that those more particular self-evident propositions,
which are assented to at first hearing, as that "one and two are equal
to three," that "green is not red," &c., are received as the consequences
of those more universal propositions which are looked on as innate principles;
since any one, who will but take the pains to observe what passes in the
understanding, will certainly find that these, and the like less general
propositions, are certainly known, and firmly assented to by those who
are utterly ignorant of those more general maxims; and so, being earlier
in the mind than those (as they are called) first principles, cannot owe
to them the assent wherewith they are received at first hearing.
20. "One and one equal to Two, &c., not general nor useful," answered.
If it be said, that these propositions, viz. "two and two are equal to
four," "red is not blue," &c., are not general maxims, nor of any great
use, I answer, that makes nothing to the argument of universal assent upon
hearing and understanding. For, if that be the certain mark of innate,
whatever proposition can be found that receives general assent as soon
as heard and understood, that must be admitted for an innate proposition,
as well as this maxim, "That it is impossible for the same thing to be
and not to be," they being upon this ground equal. And as to the difference
of being more general, that makes this maxim more remote from being innate;
those general and abstract ideas being more strangers to our first apprehensions
than those of more particular self-evident propositions; and therefore
it is longer before they are admitted and assented to by the growing understanding.
And as to the usefulness of these magnified maxims, that perhaps will not
be found so great as is generally conceived, when it comes in its due place
to be more fully considered.
21. These maxims not being known sometimes till proposed, proves them
not innate. But we have not yet done with "assenting to propositions at
first hearing and understanding their terms." It is fit we first take notice
that this, instead of being a mark that they are innate, is a proof of
the contrary; since it supposes that several, who understand and know other
things, are ignorant of these principles till they are proposed to them;
and that one may be unacquainted with these truths till he hears them from
others. For, if they were innate, what need they be proposed in order to
gaining assent, when, by being in the understanding, by a natural and original
impression, (if there were any such,) they could not but be known before?
Or doth the proposing them print them clearer in the mind than nature did?
If so, then the consequence will be, that a man knows them better after
he has been thus taught them than he did before. Whence it will follow
that these principles may be made more evident to us by others' teaching
than nature has made them by impression: which will ill agree with the
opinion of innate principles, and give but little authority to them; but,
on the contrary, makes them unfit to be the foundations of all our other
knowledge; as they are pretended to be. This cannot be denied, that men
grow first acquainted with many of these self-evident truths upon their
being proposed: but it is clear that whosoever does so, finds in himself
that he then begins to know a proposition, which he knew not before, and
which from thenceforth he never questions; not because it was innate, but
because the consideration of the nature of the things contained in those
words would not suffer him to think otherwise, how, or whensoever he is
brought to reflect on them. And if whatever is assented to at first hearing
and understanding the terms must pass for an innate principle, every well-grounded
observation, drawn from particulars into a general rule, must be innate.
When yet it is certain that not all, but only sagacious heads, light at
first on these observations, and reduce them into general propositions:
not innate, but collected from a preceding acquaintance and reflection
on particular instances. These, when observing men have made them, unobserving
men, when they are proposed to them, cannot refuse their assent to.
22. Implicitly known before proposing, signifies that the mind is capable
of understanding them, or else signifies nothing. If it be said, the understanding
hath an implicit knowledge of these principles, but not an explicit, before
this first hearing (as they must who will say "that they are in the understanding
before they are known,") it will be hard to conceive what is meant by a
principle imprinted on the understanding implicitly, unless it be this,-
that the mind is capable of understanding and assenting firmly to such
propositions. And thus all mathematical demonstrations, as well as first
principles, must be received as native impressions on the mind; which I
fear they will scarce allow them to be, who find it harder to demonstrate
a proposition than assent to it when demonstrated. And few mathematicians
will be forward to believe, that all the diagrams they have drawn were
but copies of those innate characters which nature had engraven upon their
minds.
23. The argument of assenting on first hearing, is upon a false supposition
of no precedent teaching. There is, I fear, this further weakness in the
foregoing argument, which would persuade us that therefore those maxims
are to be thought innate, which men admit at first hearing; because they
assent to propositions which they are not taught, nor do receive from the
force of any argument or demonstration, but a bare explication or understanding
of the terms. Under which there seems to me to lie this fallacy, that men
are supposed not to be taught nor to learn anything de novo; when, in truth,
they are taught, and do learn something they were ignorant of before. For,
first, it is evident that they have learned the terms, and their signification;
neither of which was born with them. But this is not all the acquired knowledge
in the case: the ideas themselves, about which the proposition is, are
not born with them, no more than their names, but got afterwards. So that
in all propositions that are assented to at first hearing, the terms of
the proposition, their standing for such ideas, and the ideas themselves
that they stand for, being neither of them innate, I would fain know what
there is remaining in such propositions that is innate. For I would gladly
have any one name that proposition whose terms or ideas were either of
them innate. We by degrees get ideas and names, and learn their appropriated
connexion one with another; and then to propositions made in such terms,
whose signification we have learnt, and wherein the agreement or disagreement
we can perceive in our ideas when put together is expressed, we at first
hearing assent; though to other propositions, in themselves as certain
and evident, but which are concerning ideas not so soon or so easily got,
we are at the same time no way capable of assenting. For, though a child
quickly assents to this proposition, "That an apple is not fire," when
by familiar acquaintance he has got the ideas of those two different things
distinctly imprinted on his mind, and has learnt that the names apple and
fire stand for them; yet it will be some years after, perhaps, before the
same child will assent to this proposition, "That it is impossible for
the same thing to be and not to be"; because that, though perhaps the words
are as easy to be learnt, yet the signification of them being more large,
comprehensive, and abstract than of the names annexed to those sensible
things the child hath to do with, it is longer before he learns their precise
meaning, and it requires more time plainly to form in his mind those general
ideas they stand for. Till that be done, you will in vain endeavour to
make any child assent to a proposition made up of such general terms; but
as soon as ever he has got those ideas, and learned their names, he forwardly
closes with the one as well as the other of the forementioned propositions:
and with both for the same reason; viz. because he finds the ideas he has
in his mind to agree or disagree, according as the words standing for them
are affirmed or denied one of another in the proposition. But if propositions
be brought to him in words which stand for ideas he has not yet in his
mind, to such propositions, however evidently true or false in themselves,
he affords neither assent nor dissent, but is ignorant. For words being
but empty sounds, any further than they are signs of our ideas, we cannot
but assent to them as they correspond to those ideas we have, but no further
than that. But the showing by what steps and ways knowledge comes into
our minds; and the grounds of several degrees of assent, being the business
of the following Discourse, it may suffice to have only touched on it here,
as one reason that made me doubt of those innate principles.
24. Not innate, because not universally assented to. To conclude this
argument of universal consent, I agree with these defenders of innate principles,-
that if they are innate, they must needs have universal assent. For that
a truth should be innate and yet not assented to, is to me as unintelligible
as for a man to know a truth and be ignorant of it at the same time. But
then, by these men's own confession, they cannot be innate; since they
are not assented to by those who understand not the terms; nor by a great
part of those who do understand them, but have yet never heard nor thought
of those propositions; which, I think, is at least one half of mankind.
But were the number far less, it would be enough to destroy universal assent,
and thereby show these propositions not to be innate, if children alone
were ignorant of them.
25. These maxims not the first known. But that I may not be accused
to argue from the thoughts of infants, which are unknown to us, and to
conclude from what passes in their understandings before they express it;
I say next, that these two general propositions are not the truths that
first possess the minds of children, nor are antecedent to all acquired
and adventitious notions: which, if they were innate, they must needs be.
Whether we can determine it or no, it matters not, there is certainly a
time when children begin to think, and their words and actions do assure
us that they do so. When therefore they are capable of thought, of knowledge,
of assent, can it rationally be supposed they can be ignorant of those
notions that nature has imprinted, were there any such? Can it be imagined,
with any appearance of reason, that they perceive the impressions from
things without, and be at the same time ignorant of those characters which
nature itself has taken care to stamp within? Can they receive and assent
to adventitious notions, and be ignorant of those which are supposed woven
into the very principles of their being, and imprinted there in indelible
characters, to be the foundation and guide of all their acquired knowledge
and future reasonings? This would be to make nature take pains to no purpose;
or at least to write very ill; since its characters could not be read by
those eyes which saw other things very well: and those are very ill supposed
the clearest parts of truth, and the foundations of all our knowledge,
which are not first known, and without which the undoubted knowledge of
several other things may be had. The child certainly knows, that the nurse
that feeds it is neither the cat it plays with, nor the blackmoor it is
afraid of: that the wormseed or mustard it refuses, is not the apple or
sugar it cries for: this it is certainly and undoubtedly assured of: but
will any one say, it is by virtue of this principle, "That it is impossible
for the same thing to be and not to be," that it so firmly assents to these
and other parts of its knowledge? Or that the child has any notion or apprehension
of that proposition at an age, wherein yet, it is plain, it knows a great
many other truths? He that will say, children join in these general abstract
speculations with their sucking-bottles and their rattles, may perhaps,
with justice, be thought to have more passion and zeal for his opinion,
but less sincerity and truth, than one of that age.
26. And so not innate. Though therefore there be several general propositions
that meet with constant and ready assent, as soon as proposed to men grown
up, who have attained the use of more general and abstract ideas, and names
standing for them; yet they not being to be found in those of tender years,
who nevertheless know other things, they cannot pretend to universal assent
of intelligent persons, and so by no means can be supposed innate;- it
being impossible that any truth which is innate (if there were any such)
should be unknown, at least to any one who knows anything else. Since,
if they are innate truths, they must be innate thoughts: there being nothing
a truth in the mind that it has never thought on. Whereby it is evident,
if there by any innate truths, they must necessarily be the first of any
thought on; the first that appear.
27. Not innate, because they appear least where what is innate shows
itself clearest. That the general maxims we are discoursing of are not
known to children, idiots, and a great part of mankind, we have already
sufficiently proved: whereby it is evident they have not an universal assent,
nor are general impressions. But there is this further argument in it against
their being innate: that these characters, if they were native and original
impressions, should appear fairest and clearest in those persons in whom
yet we find no footsteps of them; and it is, in my opinion, a strong presumption
that they are not innate, since they are least known to those in whom,
if they were innate, they must needs exert themselves with most force and
vigour. For children, idiots, savages, and illiterate people, being of
all others the least corrupted by custom, or borrowed opinions; learning
and education having not cast their native thoughts into new moulds; nor
by super-inducing foreign and studied doctrines, confounded those fair
characters nature had written there; one might reasonably imagine that
in their minds these innate notions should lie open fairly to every one's
view, as it is certain the thoughts of children do. It might very well
be expected that these principles should be perfectly known to naturals;
which being stamped immediately on the soul, (as these men suppose,) can
have no dependence on the constitution or organs of the body, the only
confessed difference between them and others. One would think, according
to these men's principles, that all these native beams of light (were there
any such) should, in those who have no reserves, no arts of concealment,
shine out in their full lustre, and leave us in no more doubt of their
being there, than we are of their love of pleasure and abhorrence of pain.
But alas, amongst children, idiots, savages, and the grossly illiterate,
what general maxims are to be found? What universal principles of knowledge?
Their notions are few and narrow, borrowed only from those objects they
have had most to do with, and which have made upon their senses the frequentest
and strongest impressions. A child knows his nurse and his cradle, and
by degrees the playthings of a little more advanced age; and a young savage
has, perhaps, his head filled with love and hunting, according to the fashion
of his tribe. But he that from a child untaught, or a wild inhabitant of
the woods, will expect these abstract maxims and reputed principles of
science, will, I fear, find himself mistaken. Such kind of general propositions
are seldom mentioned in the huts of Indians: much less are they to be found
in the thoughts of children, or any impressions of them on the minds of
naturals. They are the language and business of the schools and academies
of learned nations, accustomed to that sort of conversation or learning,
where disputes are frequent; these maxims being suited to artificial argumentation
and useful for conviction, but not much conducing to the discovery of truth
or advancement of knowledge. But of their small use for the improvement
of knowledge I shall have occasion to speak more at large, 1. 4, c. 7.
28. Recapitulation. I know not how absurd this may seem to the masters
of demonstration. And probably it will hardly go down with anybody at first
hearing. I must therefore beg a little truce with prejudice, and the forbearance
of censure, till I have been heard out in the sequel of this Discourse,
being very willing to submit to better judgments. And since I impartially
search after truth, I shall not be sorry to be convinced, that I have been
too fond of my own notions; which I confess we are all apt to be, when
application and study have warmed our heads with them.
Upon the whole matter, I cannot see any ground to think these two speculative
Maxims innate: since they are not universally assented to; and the assent
they so generally find is no other than what several propositions, not
allowed to be innate, equally partake in with them: and since the assent
that is given them is produced another way, and comes not from natural
inscription, as I doubt not but to make appear in the following Discourse.
And if these "first principles" of knowledge and science are found not
to be innate, no other speculative maxims can (I suppose), with better
right pretend to be so.
Chapter II: No Innate Practical Principles
1. No moral principles so clear and so generally received as the forementioned
speculative maxims. If those speculative Maxims, whereof we discoursed
in the foregoing chapter, have not an actual universal assent from all
mankind, as we there proved, it is much more visible concerning practical
Principles, that they come short of an universal reception: and I think
it will be hard to instance any one moral rule which can pretend to so
general and ready an assent as, "What is, is"; or to be so manifest a truth
as this, that "It is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be."
Whereby it is evident that they are further removed from a title to be
innate; and the doubt of their being native impressions on the mind is
stronger against those moral principles than the other. Not that it brings
their truth at all in question. They are equally true, though not equally
evident. Those speculative maxims carry their own evidence with them: but
moral principles require reasoning and discourse, and some exercise of
the mind, to discover the certainty of their truth. They lie not open as
natural characters engraven on the mind; which, if any such were, they
must needs be visible by themselves, and by their own light be certain
and known to everybody. But this is no derogation to their truth and certainty;
no more than it is to the truth or certainty of the three angles of a triangle
being equal to two right ones: because it is not so evident as "the whole
is bigger than a part," nor so apt to be assented to at first hearing.
It may suffice that these moral rules are capable of demonstration: and
therefore it is our own faults if we come not to a certain knowledge of
them. But the ignorance wherein many men are of them, and the slowness
of assent wherewith others receive them, are manifest proofs that they
are not innate, and such as offer themselves to their view without searching.
2. Faith and justice not owned as principles by all men. Whether there
be any such moral principles, wherein all men do agree, I appeal to any
who have been but moderately conversant in the history of mankind, and
looked abroad beyond the smoke of their own chimneys. Where is that practical
truth that is universally received, without doubt or question, as it must
be if innate? Justice, and keeping of contracts, is that which most men
seem to agree in. This is a principle which is thought to extend itself
to the dens of thieves, and the confederacies of the greatest villains;
and they who have gone furthest towards the putting off of humanity itself,
keep faith and rules of justice one with another. I grant that outlaws
themselves do this one amongst another: but it is without receiving these
as the innate laws of nature. They practise them as rules of convenience
within their own communities: but it is impossible to conceive that he
embraces justice as a practical principle, who acts fairly with his fellow-highwayman,
and at the same time plunders or kills the next honest man he meets with.
Justice and truth are the common ties of society; and therefore even outlaws
and robbers, who break with all the world besides, must keep faith and
rules of equity amongst themselves; or else they cannot hold together.
But will any one say, that those that live by fraud or rapine have innate
principles of truth and justice which they allow and assent to?
3. Objection: "though men deny them in their practice, yet they admit
them in their thoughts," answered. Perhaps it will be urged, that the tacit
assent of their minds agrees to what their practice contradicts. I answer,
first, I have always thought the actions of men the best interpreters of
their thoughts. But, since it is certain that most men's practices, and
some men's open professions, have either questioned or denied these principles,
it is impossible to establish an universal consent, (though we should look
for it only amongst grown men,) without which it is impossible to conclude
them innate. Secondly, it is very strange and unreasonable to suppose innate
practical principles, that terminate only in contemplation. Practical principles,
derived from nature, are there for operation, and must produce conformity
of action, not barely speculative assent to their truth, or else they are
in vain distinguished from speculative maxims. Nature, I confess, has put
into man a desire of happiness and an aversion to misery: these indeed
are innate practical principles which (as practical principles ought) do
continue constantly to operate and influence all our actions without ceasing:
these may be observed in all persons and all ages, steady and universal;
but these are inclinations of the appetite to good, not impressions of
truth on the understanding. I deny not that there are natural tendencies
imprinted on the minds of men; and that from the very first instances of
sense and perception, there are some things that are grateful and others
unwelcome to them; some things that they incline to and others that they
fly: but this makes nothing for innate characters on the mind, which are
to be the principles of knowledge regulating our practice. Such natural
impressions on the understanding are so far from being confirmed hereby,
that this is an argument against them; since, if there were certain characters
imprinted by nature on the understanding, as the principles of knowledge,
we could not but perceive them constantly operate in us and influence our
knowledge, as we do those others on the will and appetite; which never
cease to be the constant springs and motives of all our actions, to which
we perpetually feel them strongly impelling us.
4. Moral rules need a proof, ergo not innate. Another reason that makes
me doubt of any innate practical principles is, that I think there cannot
any one moral rule be proposed whereof a man may not justly demand a reason:
which would be perfectly ridiculous and absurd if they were innate; or
so much as self-evident, which every innate principle must needs be, and
not need any proof to ascertain its truth, nor want any reason to gain
it approbation. He would be thought void of common sense who asked on the
one side, or on the other side went to give a reason why "it is impossible
for the same thing to be and not to be." It carries its own light and evidence
with it, and needs no other proof: he that understands the terms assents
to it for its own sake or else nothing will ever be able to prevail with
him to do it. But should that most unshaken rule of morality and foundation
of all social virtue, "That one should do as he would be done unto," be
proposed to one who never heard of it before, but yet is of capacity to
understand its meaning; might he not without any absurdity ask a reason
why? And were not he that proposed it bound to make out the truth and reasonableness
of it to him? Which plainly shows it not to be innate; for if it were it
could neither want nor receive any proof; but must needs (at least as soon
as heard and understood) be received and assented to as an unquestionable
truth, which a man can by no means doubt of. So that the truth of all these
moral rules plainly depends upon some other antecedent to them, and from
which they must be deduced; which could not be if either they were innate
or so much as self-evident.
5. Instance in keeping compacts. That men should keep their compacts
is certainly a great and undeniable rule in morality. But yet, if a Christian,
who has the view of happiness and misery in another life, be asked why
a man must keep his word, he will give this as a reason:- Because God,
who has the power of eternal life and death, requires it of us. But if
a Hobbist be asked why? he will answer:- Because the public requires it,
and the Leviathan will punish you if you do not. And if one of the old
philosophers had been asked, he would have answered:- Because it was dishonest,
below the dignity of a man, and opposite to virtue, the highest perfection
of human nature, to do otherwise.
6. Virtue generally approved, not because innate, but because profitable.
Hence naturally flows the great variety of opinions concerning moral rules
which are to be found among men, according to the different sorts of happiness
they have a prospect of, or propose to themselves; which could not be if
practical principles were innate, and imprinted in our minds immediately
by the hand of God. I grant the existence of God is so many ways manifest,
and the obedience we owe him so congruous to the light of reason, that
a great part of mankind give testimony to the law of nature: but yet I
think it must be allowed that several moral rules may receive from mankind
a very general approbation, without either knowing or admitting the true
ground of morality; which can only be the will and law of a God, who sees
men in the dark, has in his hand rewards and punishments and power enough
to call to account the proudest offender. For, God having, by an inseparable
connexion, joined virtue and public happiness together, and made the practice
thereof necessary to the preservation of society, and visibly beneficial
to all with whom the virtuous man has to do; it is no wonder that every
one should not only allow, but recommend and magnify those rules to others,
from whose observance of them he is sure to reap advantage to himself He
may, out of interest as well as conviction, cry up that for sacred, which,
if once trampled on and profaned, he himself cannot be safe nor secure.
This, though it takes nothing from the moral and eternal obligation which
these rules evidently have, yet it shows that the outward acknowledgment
men pay to them in their words proves not that they are innate principles:
nay, it proves not so much as that men assent to them inwardly in their
own minds, as the inviolable rules of their own practice; since we find
that self-interest, and the conveniences of this life, make many men own
an outward profession and approbation of them, whose actions sufficiently
prove that they very little consider the Lawgiver that prescribed these
rules; nor the hell that he has ordained for the punishment of those that
transgress them.
7. Men's actions convince us that the rule of virtue is not their internal
principle. For, if we will not in civility allow too much sincerity to
the professions of most men, but think their actions to be the interpreters
of their thoughts, we shall find that they have no such internal veneration
for these rules, nor so full a persuasion of their certainty and obligation.
The great principle of morality, "To do as one would be done to," is more
commended than practised. But the breach of this rule cannot be a greater
vice, than to teach others, that it is no moral rule, nor obligatory, would
be thought madness, and contrary to that interest men sacrifice to, when
they break it themselves. Perhaps conscience will be urged as checking
us for such breaches, and so the internal obligation and establishment
of the rule be preserved.
8. Conscience no proof of any innate moral rule. To which I answer,
that I doubt not but, without being written on their hearts, many men may,
by the same way that they come to the knowledge of other things, come to
assent to several moral rules, and be convinced of their obligation. Others
also may come to be of the same mind, from their education, company, and
customs of their country; which persuasion, however got, will serve to
set conscience on work; which is nothing else but our own opinion or judgment
of the moral rectitude or pravity of our own actions; and if conscience
be a proof of innate principles, contraries may be innate principles; since
some men with the same bent of conscience prosecute what others avoid.
9. Instances of enormities practised without remorse. But I cannot see
how any men should ever transgress those moral rules, with confidence and
serenity, were they innate, and stamped upon their minds. View but an army
at the sacking of a town, and see what observation or sense of moral principles,
or what touch of conscience for all the outrages they do. Robberies, murders,
rapes, are the sports of men set at liberty from punishment and censure.
Have there not been whole nations, and those of the most civilized people,
amongst whom the exposing their children, and leaving them in the fields
to perish by want or wild beasts has been the practice; as little condemned
or scrupled as the begetting them? Do they not still, in some countries,
put them into the same graves with their mothers, if they die in childbirth;
or despatch them, if a pretended astrologer declares them to have unhappy
stars? And are there not places where, at a certain age, they kill or expose
their parents, without any remorse at all? In a part of Asia, the sick,
when their case comes to be thought desperate, are carried out and laid
on the earth before they are dead; and left there, exposed to wind and
weather, to perish without assistance or pity. It is familiar among the
Mingrelians, a people professing Christianity, to bury their children alive
without scruple. There are places where they eat their own children. The
Caribbees were wont to geld their children, on purpose to fat and eat them.
And Garcilasso de la Vega tells us of a people in Peru which were wont
to fat and eat the children they got on their female captives, whom they
kept as concubines for that purpose, and when they were past breeding,
the mothers themselves were killed too and eaten. The virtues whereby the
Tououpinambos believed they merited paradise, were revenge, and eating
abundance of their enemies. They have not so much as a name for God, and
have no religion, no worship. The saints who are canonized amongst the
Turks, lead lives which one cannot with modesty relate. A remarkable passage
to this purpose, out of the voyage of Baumgarten, which is a book not every
day to be met with, I shall set down at large, in the language it is published
in. Ibi (sc. prope Belbes in AEgypto) vidimus sanctum unum Saracenicum
inter arenarum cumulos, ita ut ex utero matris prodiit nudum sedentem.
Mos est, ut didicimus, Mahometistis, ut eos, qui amentes et sine ratione
sunt, prosanctis colant et venerentur. Insuper et eos, qui cum diu vitam
egerint inquinatissimam, voluntariam demum poenitentiam et paupertatem,
sanctitate venerandos deputant. Ejusmodi vero genus hominum libertatem
quandam effrenem habent, domos quos volunt intrandi, edendi, bibendi, et
quod majus est, concumbendi; ex quo concubitu, si proles secuta fuerit,
sancta similiter habetur. His ergo hominibus dum vivunt, magnos exhibent
honores; mortuis vero vel templa vel monumenta extruunt amplissima, eosque
contingere ac sepelire maximae fortunae ducunt loco. Audivimus haec dicta
et dicenda per interpretem a Mucrelo nostro. Insuper sanctum illum, quem
eo loco vidimus, publicitus apprime commendari, eum esse hominem sanctum,
divinum ac integritate praecipuum; eo quod, nec foeminarum unquam esset,
nec puerorum, sed tantummodo asellarum concubitor atque mularum. (Peregr.
Baumgarten, 1. ii. c. I. p. 73.) More of the same kind concerning these
precious saints amongst the Turks may be seen in Pietro della Valle, in
his letter of the 25th of January, 1616.
Where then are those innate principles of justice, piety, gratitude,
equity, chastity? Or where is that universal consent that assures us there
are such inbred rules? Murders in duels, when fashion has made them honourable,
are committed without remorse of conscience: nay, in many places innocence
in this case is the greatest ignominy. And if we look abroad to take a
view of men as they are, we shall find that they have remorse, in one place,
for doing or omitting that which others, in another place, think they merit
by.
10. Men have contrary practical principles. He that will carefully peruse
the history of mankind, and look abroad into the several tribes of men,
and with indifferency survey their actions, will be able to satisfy himself,
that there is scarce that principle of morality to be named, or rule of
virtue to be thought on, (those only excepted that are absolutely necessary
to hold society together, which commonly too are neglected betwixt distinct
societies,) which is not, somewhere or other, slighted and condemned by
the general fashion of whole societies of men, governed by practical opinions
and rules of living quite opposite to others.
11. Whole nations reject several moral rules. Here perhaps it will be
objected, that it is no argument that the rule is not known, because it
is broken. I grant the objection good where men, though they transgress,
yet disown not the law; where fear of shame, censure, or punishment carries
the mark of some awe it has upon them. But it is impossible to conceive
that a whole nation of men should all publicly reject and renounce what
every one of them certainly and infallibly knew to be a law; for so they
must who have it naturally imprinted on their minds. It is possible men
may sometimes own rules of morality which in their private thoughts they
do not believe to be true, only to keep themselves in reputation and esteem
amongst those who are persuaded of their obligation. But it is not to be
imagined that a whole society of men should publicly and professedly disown
and cast off a rule which they could not in their own minds but be infallibly
certain was a law; nor be ignorant that all men they should have to do
with knew it to be such: and therefore must every one of them apprehend
from others all the contempt and abhorrence due to one who professes himself
void of humanity: and one who, confounding the known and natural measures
of right and wrong, cannot but be looked on as the professed enemy of their
peace and happiness. Whatever practical principle is innate, cannot but
be known to every one to be just and good. It is therefore little less
than a contradiction to suppose, that whole nations of men should, both
in their professions and practice, unanimously and universally give the
lie to what, by the most invincible evidence, every one of them knew to
be true, right, and good. This is enough to satisfy us that no practical
rule which is anywhere universally, and with public approbation or allowance,
transgressed, can be supposed innate.- But I have something further to
add in answer to this objection.
12. The generally allowed breach of a rule, proof that it is not innate.
The breaking of a rule, say you, is no argument that it is unknown. I grant
it: but the generally allowed breach of it anywhere, I say, is a proof
that it is not innate. For example: let us take any of these rules, which,
being the most obvious deductions of human reason, and comformable to the
natural inclination of the greatest part of men, fewest people have had
the impudence to deny or inconsideration to doubt of. If any can be thought
to be naturally imprinted, none, I think, can have a fairer pretence to
be innate than this: "Parents, preserve and cherish your children." When,
therefore, you say that this is an innate rule, what do you mean? Either
that it is an innate principle which upon all occasions excites and directs
the actions of all men; or else, that it is a truth which all men have
imprinted on their minds, and which therefore they know and assent to.
But in neither of these senses is it innate. First, that it is not a principle
which influences all men's actions, is what I have proved by the examples
before cited: nor need we seek so far as Mingrelia or Peru to find instances
of such as neglect, abuse, nay, and destroy their children; or look on
it only as the more than brutality of some savage and barbarous nations,
when we remember that it was a familiar and uncondemned practice amongst
the Greeks and Romans to expose, without pity or remorse, their innocent
infants. Secondly, that it is an innate truth, known to all men, is also
false. For, "Parents preserve your children," is so far from an innate
truth, that it is no truth at all: it being a command, and not a proposition,
and so not capable of truth or falsehood. To make it capable of being assented
to as true, it must be reduced to some such proposition as this: "It is
the duty of parents to preserve their children." But what duty is, cannot
be understood without a law; nor a law be known or supposed without a lawmaker,
or without reward and punishment; so that it is impossible that this, or
any other, practical principle should be innate, i.e. be imprinted on the
mind as a duty, without supposing the ideas of God, of law, of obligation,
of punishment, of a life after this, innate: for that punishment follows
not in this life the breach of this rule, and consequently that it has
not the force of a law in countries where the generally allowed practice
runs counter to it, is in itself evident. But these ideas (which must be
all of them innate, if anything as a duty be so) are so far from being
innate, that it is not every studious or thinking man, much less every
one that is born, in whom they are to be found clear and distinct; and
that one of them, which of all others seems most likely to be innate, is
not so, (I mean the idea of God,) I think, in the next chapter, will appear
very evident to any considering man.
13. If men can be ignorant of what is innate, certainty is not described
by innate principles. From what has been said, I think we may safely conclude,
that whatever practical rule is in any place generally and with allowance
broken, cannot be supposed innate; it being impossible that men should,
without shame or fear, confidently and serenely, break a rule which they
could not but evidently know that God had set up, and would certainly punish
the breach of, (which they must, if it were innate,) to a degree to make
it a very ill bargain to the transgressor. Without such a knowledge as
this, a man can never be certain that anything is his duty. Ignorance or
doubt of the law, hopes to escape the knowledge or power of the law-maker,
or the like, may make men give way to a present appetite; but let any one
see the fault, and the rod by it, and with the transgression, a fire ready
to punish it; a pleasure tempting, and the hand of the Almighty visibly
held up and prepared to take vengeance, (for this must be the case where
any duty is imprinted on the mind,) and then tell me whether it be possible
for people with such a prospect, such a certain knowledge as this, wantonly,
and without scruple, to offend against a law which they carry about them
in indelible characters, and that stares them in the face whilst they are
breaking it? Whether men, at the same time that they feel in themselves
the imprinted edicts of an Omnipotent Law-maker, can, with assurance and
gaiety, slight and trample underfoot his most sacred injunctions? And lastly,
whether it be possible that whilst a man thus openly bids defiance to this
innate law and supreme Lawgiver, all the bystanders, yea, even the governors
and rulers of the people, full of the same sense both of the law and Law-maker,
should silently connive, without testifying their dislike or laying the
least blame on it? Principles of actions indeed there are lodged in men's
appetites; but these are so far from being innate moral principles, that
if they were left to their full swing they would carry men to the overturning
of all morality. Moral laws are set as a curb and restraint to these exorbitant
desires, which they cannot be but by rewards and punishments that will
overbalance the satisfaction any one shall propose to himself in the breach
of the law. If, therefore, anything be imprinted on the minds of all men
as a law, all men must have a certain and unavoidable knowledge that certain
and unavoidable punishment will attend the breach of it. For if men can
be ignorant or doubtful of what is innate, innate principles are insisted
on, and urged to no purpose; truth and certainty (the things pretended)
are not at all secured by them; but men are in the same uncertain floating
estate with as without them. An evident indubitable knowledge of unavoidable
punishment, great enough to make the transgression very uneligible, must
accompany an innate law; unless with an innate law they can suppose an
innate Gospel too. I would not here be mistaken, as if, because I deny
an innate law, I thought there were none but positive laws. There is a
great deal of difference between an innate law, and a law of nature; between
something imprinted on our minds in their very original, and something
that we, being ignorant of, may attain to the knowledge of, by the use
and due application of our natural faculties. And I think they equally
forsake the truth who, running into contrary extremes, either affirm an
innate law, or deny that there is a law knowable by the light of nature,
i.e. without the help of positive revelation.
14. Those who maintain innate practical principles tell us not what
they are. The difference there is amongst men in their practical principles
is so evident that I think I need say no more to evince, that it will be
impossible to find any innate moral rules by this mark of general assent;
and it is enough to make one suspect that the supposition of such innate
principles is but an opinion taken up at pleasure; since those who talk
so confidently of them are so sparing to tell us which they are. This might
with justice be expected from those men who lay stress upon this opinion;
and it gives occasion to distrust either their knowledge or charity, who,
declaring that God has imprinted on the minds of men the foundations of
knowledge and the rules of living, are yet so little favourable to the
information of their neighbours, or the quiet of mankind, as not to point
out to them which they are, in the variety men are distracted with. But,
in truth, were there any such innate principles there would be no need
to teach them. Did men find such innate propositions stamped on their minds,
they would easily be able to distinguish them from other truths that they
afterwards learned and deduced from them; and there would be nothing more
easy than to know what, and how many, they were. There could be no more
doubt about their number than there is about the number of our fingers;
and it is like then every system would be ready to give them us by tale.
But since nobody, that I know, has ventured yet to give a catalogue of
them, they cannot blame those who doubt of these innate principles; since
even they who require men to believe that there are such innate propositions,
do not tell us what they are. It is easy to foresee, that if different
men of different sects should go about to give us a list of those innate
practical principles, they would set down only such as suited their distinct
hypotheses, and were fit to support the doctrines of their particular schools
or churches; a plain evidence that there are no such innate truths. Nay,
a great part of men are so far from finding any such innate moral principles
in themselves, that, by denying freedom to mankind, and thereby making
men no other than bare machines, they take away not only innate, but all
moral rules whatsoever, and leave not a possibility to believe any such,
to those who cannot conceive how anything can be capable of a law that
is not a free agent. And upon that ground they must necessarily reject
all principles of virtue, who cannot put morality and mechanism together,
which are not very easy to be reconciled or made consistent.
15. Lord Herbert's innate principles examined. When I had written this,
being informed that my Lord Herbert had, in his book De Veritate, assigned
these innate principles, I presently consulted him, hoping to find in a
man of so great parts, something that might satisfy me in this point, and
put an end to my inquiry. In his chapter De Instinctu Naturali, p. 72,
ed. 1656, I met with these six marks of his Notitiae, Communes:- 1. Prioritas.
2. Independentia. 3. Universalitas. 4. Certitudo. 5. Necessitas, i.e. as
he explains it, faciunt ad hominis conservationem. 6. Modus conformationis,
i.e. Assensus mulla interposita mora. And at the latter end of his little
treatise De Religione Laici, he says this of these innate principles: Adeo
ut non uniuscujusvis religionis confinio arctentur quae ubique vigent veritates.
Sunt enim in ipsa mente caelitus descriptae, nullisque traditionibus, sive
scriptis, sive non scriptis, obnoxiae, p. 3. And Veritates nostrae catholicae,
quae tanquam indubia Dei emata inforo interiori descriptae.
Thus, having given the marks of the innate principles or common notions,
and asserted their being imprinted on the minds of men by the hand of God,
he proceeds to set them down, and they are these: 1. Esse aliquod supremum
numen. 2. Numen illud coli debere. 3. Virtutem cum pietate conjunctam optimam
esse rationem cultus divini. 4. Resipiscendum esse a peccatis. 5. Dari
praemium vel paenam post hanc vitam transactam. Though I allow these to
be clear truths, and such as, if rightly explained, a rational creature
can hardly avoid giving his assent to, yet I think he is far from proving
them innate impressions in foro interiori descriptae. For I must take leave
to observe:-
16. These five either not all, or more than all, if there are any. First,
that these five propositions are either not all, or more than all, those
common notions written on our minds by the finger of God; if it were reasonable
to believe any at all to be so written. Since there are other propositions
which, even by his own rules, have as just a pretence to such an original,
and may be as well admitted for innate principles, as at least some of
these five he enumerates, viz. "Do as thou wouldst be done unto." And perhaps
some hundreds of others, when well considered.
17. The supposed marks wanting. Secondly, that all his marks are not
to be found in each of his five propositions, viz. his first, second, and
third marks agree perfectly to neither of them; and the first, second,
third, fourth, and sixth marks agree but ill to his third, fourth, and
fifth propositions. For, besides that we are assured from history of many
men, nay whole nations, who doubt or disbelieve some or all of them, I
cannot see how the third, viz. "That virtue joined with piety is the best
worship of God," can be an innate principle, when the name or sound virtue,
is so hard to be understood; liable to so much uncertainty in its signification;
and the thing it stands for so much contended about and difficult to be
known. And therefore this cannot be but a very uncertain rule of human
practice, and serve but very little to the conduct of our lives, and is
therefore very unfit to be assigned as an innate practical principle.
18. Of little use if they were innate. For let us consider this proposition
as to its meaning, (for it is the sense, and not sound, that is and must
be the principle or common notion,) viz. "Virtue is the best worship of
God," i.e. is most acceptable to him; which, if virtue be taken, as most
commonly it is, for those actions which, according to the different opinions
of several countries, are accounted laudable, will be a proposition so
far from being certain, that it will not be true. If virtue be taken for
actions conformable to God's will, or to the rule prescribed by God- which
is the true and only measure of virtue when virtue is used to signify what
is in its own nature right and good- then this proposition, "That virtue
is the best worship of God," will be most true and certain, but of very
little use in human life: since it will amount to no more but this, viz.
"That God is pleased with the doing of what he commands;"- which a man
may certainly know to be true, without knowing what it is that God doth
command; and so be as far from any rule or principle of his actions as
he was before. And I think very few will take a proposition which amounts
to no more than this, viz. "That God is pleased with the doing of what
he himself commands," for an innate moral principle written on the minds
of all men, (however true and certain it may be,) since it teaches so little.
Whosoever does so will have reason to think hundreds of propositions innate
principles; since there are many which have as good a title as this to
be received for such, which nobody yet ever put into that rank of innate
principles.
19. Scarce possible that God should engrave principles in words of uncertain
meaning. Nor is the fourth proposition (viz."Men must repent of their sins")
much more instructive, till what those actions are that are meant by sins
be set down. For the word peccata, or sins, being put, as it usually is,
to signify in general ill actions that will draw punishment upon the doers,
what great principle of morality can that be to tell us we should be sorry,
and cease to do that which will bring mischief upon us; without knowing
what those particular actions are that will do so? Indeed this is a very
true proposition, and fit to be incated on and received by those who are
supposed to have been taught what actions in all kinds are sins: but neither
this nor the former can be imagined to be innate principles; nor to be
of any use if they were innate, unless the particular measures and bounds
of all virtues and vices were engraven in men's minds, and were innate
principles also, which I think is very much to be doubted. And, therefore,
I imagine, it will scarcely seem possible that God should engrave principles
in men's minds, in words of uncertain signification, such as virtues and
sins, which amongst different men stand for different things: nay, it cannot
be supposed to be in words at all, which, being in most of these principles
very general, names, cannot be understood but by knowing the particulars
comprehended under them. And in the practical instances, the measures must
be taken from the knowledge of the actions themselves, and the rules of
them,- abstracted from words, and antecedent to the knowledge of names;
which rules a man must know, what language soever he chance to learn, whether
English or Japan, or if he should learn no language at all, or never should
understand the use of words, as happens in the case of dumb and deaf men.
When it shall be made out that men ignorant of words, or untaught by the
laws and customs of their country, know that it is part of the worship
of God, not to kill another man; not to know more women than one; not to
procure abortion; not to expose their children; not to take from another
what is his, though we want it ourselves, but on the contrary, relieve
and supply his wants; and whenever we have done the contrary we ought to
repent, be sorry, and resolve to do so no more;- when I say, all men shall
be proved actually to know and allow all these and a thousand other such
rules, all of which come under these two general words made use of above,
viz. virtutes et peccata, virtues and sins, there will be more reason for
admitting these and the like, for common notions and practical principles.
Yet, after all, universal consent (were there any in moral principles)
to truths, the knowledge whereof may be attained otherwise, would scarce
prove them to be innate; which is all I contend for.
20. Objection, "innate principles may be corrupted," answered. Nor will
it be of much moment here to offer that very ready but not very material
answer, viz. that the innate principles of morality may, by education,
and custom, and the general opinion of those amongst whom we converse,
be darkened, and at last quite worn out of the minds of men. Which assertion
of theirs, if true, quite takes away the argument of universal consent,
by which this opinion of innate principles is endeavoured to be proved;
unless those men will think it reasonable that their private persuasions,
or that of their party, should pass for universal consent;- a thing not
unfrequently done, when men, presuming themselves to be the only masters
of right reason, cast by the votes and opinions of the rest of mankind
as not worthy the reckoning. And then their argument stands thus:- "The
principles which all mankind allow for true, are innate; those that men
of right reason admit, are the principles allowed by all mankind; we, and
those of our mind, are men of reason; therefore, we agreeing, our principles
are innate;"- which is a very pretty way of arguing, and a short cut to
infallibility. For otherwise it will be very hard to understand how there
be some principles which all men do acknowledge and agree in; and yet there
are none of those principles which are not, by depraved custom and ill
education, blotted out of the minds of many men: which is to say, that
all men admit, but yet many men do deny and dissent from them. And indeed
the supposition of such first principles will serve us to very little purpose;
and we shall be as much at a loss with as without them, if they may, by
any human power- such as the will of our teachers, or opinions of our companions-
be altered or lost in us: and notwithstanding all this boast of first principles
and innate light, we shall be as much in the dark and uncertainty as if
there were no such thing at all: it being all one to have no rule, and
one that will warp any way; or amongst various and contrary rules, not
to know which is the right. But concerning innate principles, I desire
these men to say, whether they can or cannot, by education and custom,
be blurred and blotted out; if they cannot, we must find them in all mankind
alike, and they must be clear in everybody; and if they may suffer variation
from adventitious notions, we must then find them clearest and most perspicuous
nearest the fountain, in children and illiterate people, who have received
least impression from foreign opinions. Let them take which side they please,
they will certainly find it inconsistent with visible matter of fact and
daily observation.
21. Contrary principles in the world. I easily grant that there are
great numbers of opinions which, by men of different countries, educations,
and tempers, are received and embraced as first and unquestionable principles;
many whereof, both for their absurdity as well as oppositions to one another,
it is impossible should be true. But yet all those propositions, how remote
soever from reason, are so sacred somewhere or other, that men even of
good understanding in other matters, will sooner part with their lives,
and whatever is dearest to them, than suffer themselves to doubt, or others
to question, the truth of them.
22. How men commonly come by their principles. This, however strange
it may seem, is that which every day's experience confirms; and will not,
perhaps, appear so wonderful, if we consider the ways and steps by which
it is brought about; and how really it may come to pass, that doctrines
that have been derived from no better original than the superstition of
a nurse, or the authority of an old woman, may, by length of time and consent
of neighbours, grow up to the dignity of principles in religion or morality.
For such, who are careful (as they call it) to principle children well,
(and few there be who have not a set of those principles for them, which
they believe in,) instil into the unwary, and as yet unprejudiced, understanding,
(for white paper receives any characters,) those doctrines they would have
them retain and profess. These being taught them as soon as they have any
apprehension; and still as they grow up confirmed to them, either by the
open profession or tacit consent of all they have to do with; or at least
by those of whose wisdom, knowledge, and piety they have an opinion, who
never suffer those propositions to be otherwise mentioned but as the basis
and foundation on which they build their religion and manners, come, by
these means, to have the reputation of unquestionable, self-evident, and
innate truths.
23. Principles supposed innate because we do not remember when we began
to hold them. To which we may add, that when men so instructed are grown
up, and reflect on their own minds, they cannot find anything more ancient
there than those opinions, which were taught them before their memory began
to keep a register of their actions, or date the time when any new thing
appeared to them; and therefore make no scruple to conclude, that those
propositions of whose knowledge they can find in themselves no original,
were certainly the impress of God and nature upon their minds, and not
taught them by any one else. These they entertain and submit to, as many
do to their parents with veneration; not because it is natural; nor do
children do it where they are not so taught; but because, having been always
so educated, and having no remembrance of the beginning of this respect,
they think it is natural.
24. How such principles come to be held. This will appear very likely,
and almost unavoidable to come to pass, if we consider the nature of mankind
and the constitution of human affairs; wherein most men cannot live without
employing their time in the daily labours of their callings; nor be at
quiet in their minds without some foundation or principle to rest their
thoughts on. There is scarcely any one so floating and superficial in his
understanding, who hath not some reverenced propositions, which are to
him the principles on which he bottoms his reasonings, and by which he
judgeth of truth and falsehood, right and wrong; which some, wanting skill
and leisure, and others the inclination, and some being taught that they
ought not to examine, there are few to be found who are not exposed by
their ignorance, laziness, education, or precipitancy, to take them upon
trust.
25. Further explained. This is evidently the case of all children and
young folk; and custom, a greater power than nature, seldom failing to
make them worship for divine what she hath inured them to bow their minds
and submit their understandings to, it is no wonder that grown men, either
perplexed in the necessary affairs of life, or hot in the pursuit of pleasures,
should not seriously sit down to examine their own tenets; especially when
one of their principles is, that principles ought not to be questioned.
And had men leisure, parts, and will, who is there almost that dare shake
the foundations of all his past thoughts and actions, and endure to bring
upon himself the shame of having been a long time wholly in mistake and
error? Who is there hardy enough to contend with the reproach which is
everywhere prepared for those who dare venture to dissent from the received
opinions of their country or party? And where is the man to be found that
can patiently prepare himself to bear the name of whimsical, sceptical,
or atheist; which he is sure to meet with, who does in the least scruple
any of the common opinions? And he will be much more afraid to question
those principles, when he shall think them, as most men do, the standards
set up by God in his mind, to be the rule and touchstone of all other opinions.
And what can hinder him from thinking them sacred, when he finds them the
earliest of all his own thoughts, and the most reverenced by others?
26. A worship of idols. It is easy to imagine how, by these means, it
comes to pass than men worship the idols that have been set up in their
minds; grow fond of the notions they have been long acquainted with there;
and stamp the characters of divinity upon absurdities and errors; become
zealous votaries to bulls and monkeys, and contend too, fight, and die
in defence of their opinions. Dum solos credit habendos esse deos, quos
ipse colit. For, since the reasoning faculties of the soul, which are almost
constantly, though not always warily nor wisely employed, would not know
how to move, for want of a foundation and footing, in most men, who through
laziness or avocation do not, or for want of time, or true helps, or for
other causes, cannot penetrate into the principles of knowledge, and trace
truth to its fountain and original, it is natural for them, and almost
unavoidable, to take up with some borrowed principles; which being reputed
and presumed to be the evident proofs of other things, are thought not
to need any other proof themselves. Whoever shall receive any of these
into his mind, and entertain them there with the reverence usually paid
to principles, never venturing to examine them, but accustoming himself
to believe them, because they are to be believed, may take up, from his
education and the fashions of his country, any absurdity for innate principles;
and by long poring on the same objects, so dim his sight as to take monsters
lodged in his own brain for the images of the Deity, and the workmanship
of his hands.
27. Principles must be examined. By this progress, how many there are
who arrive at principles which they believe innate may be easily observed,
in the variety of opposite principles held and contended for by all sorts
and degrees of men. And he that shall deny this to be the method wherein
most men proceed to the assurance they have of the truth and evidence of
their principles, will perhaps find it a hard matter any other way to account
for the contrary tenets, which are firmly believed, confidently asserted,
and which great numbers are ready at any time to seal with their blood.
And, indeed, if it be the privilege of innate principles to be received
upon their own authority, without examination, I know not what may not
be believed, or how any one's principles can be questioned. If they may
and ought to be examined and tried, I desire to know how first and innate
principles can be tried; or at least it is reasonable to demand the marks
and characters whereby the genuine innate principles may be distinguished
from others: that so, amidst the great variety of pretenders, I may be
kept from mistakes in so material a point as this. When this is done, I
shall be ready to embrace such welcome and useful propositions; and till
then I may with modesty doubt; since I fear universal consent, which is
the only one produced, will scarcely prove a sufficient mark to direct
my choice, and assure me of any innate principles.
From what has been said, I think it past doubt, that there are no practical
principles wherein all men agree; and therefore none innate.
Chapter III: Other considerations concerning Innate
Principles, both Speculative and Practical
1. Principles not innate, unless their ideas be innate. Had those who would
persuade us that there are innate principles not taken them together in
gross, but considered separately the parts out of which those propositions
are made, they would not, perhaps, have been so forward to believe they
were innate. Since, if the ideas which made up those truths were not, it
was impossible that the propositions made up of them should be innate,
or our knowledge of them be born with us. For, if the ideas be not innate,
there was a time when the mind was without those principles; and then they
will not be innate, but be derived from some other original. For, where
the ideas themselves are not, there can be no knowledge, no assent, no
mental or verbal propositions about them.
2. Ideas, especially those belonging to principles, not born with children.
If we will attentively consider new-born children, we shall have little
reason to think that they bring many ideas into the world with them. For,
bating perhaps some faint ideas of hunger, and thirst, and warmth, and
some pains, which they may have felt in the womb, there is not the least
appearance of any settled ideas at all in them; especially of ideas answering
the terms which make up those universal propositions that are esteemed
innate principles. One may perceive how, by degrees, afterwards, ideas
come into their minds; and that they get no more, nor other, than what
experience, and the observation of things that come in their way, furnish
them with; which might be enough to satisfy us that they are not original
characters stamped on the mind.
3. "Impossibility" and "identity" not innate ideas. "It is impossible
for the same thing to be, and not to be," is certainly (if there be any
such) an innate principle. But can any one think, or will any one say,
that "impossibility" and "identity" are two innate ideas? Are they such
as all mankind have, and bring into the world with them? And are they those
which are the first in children, and antecedent to all acquired ones? If
they are innate, they must needs be so. Hath a child an idea of impossibility
and identity, before it has of white or black, sweet or bitter? And is
it from the knowledge of this principle that it concludes, that wormwood
rubbed on the nipple hath not the same taste that it used to receive from
thence? Is it the actual knowledge of impossible est idem esse, et non
esse, that makes a child distinguish between its mother and a stranger;
or that makes it fond of the one and flee the other? Or does the mind regulate
itself and its assent by ideas that it never yet had? Or the understanding
draw conclusions from principles which it never yet knew or understood?
The names impossibility and identity stand for two ideas, so far from being
innate, or born with us, that I think it requires great care and attention
to form them right in our understandings. They are so far from being brought
into the world with us, so remote from the thoughts of infancy and childhood,
that I believe, upon examination it will be found that many grown men want
them.
4. "Identity," an idea not innate. If identity (to instance that alone)
be a native impression, and consequently so clear and obvious to us that
we must needs know it even from our cradles, I would gladly be resolved
by any one of seven, or seventy years old, whether a man, being a creature
consisting of soul and body, be the same man when his body is changed?
Whether Euphorbus and Pythagoras, having had the same soul, were the same
men, though they lived several ages asunder? Nay, whether the cock too,
which had the same soul, were not the same with both of them? Whereby,
perhaps, it will appear that our idea of sameness is not so settled and
clear as to deserve to be thought innate in us. For if those innate ideas
are not clear and distinct, so as to be universally known and naturally
agreed on, they cannot be subjects of universal and undoubted truths, but
will be the unavoidable occasion of perpetual uncertainty. For, I suppose
every one's idea of identity will not be the same that Pythagoras and thousands
of his followers have. And which then shall be true? Which innate? Or are
there two different ideas of identity, both innate?
5. What makes the same man? Nor let any one think that the questions
I have here proposed about the identity of man are bare empty speculations;
which, if they were, would be enough to show, that there was in the understandings
of men no innate idea of identity. He that shall with a little attention
reflect on the resurrection, and consider that divine justice will bring
to judgment, at the last day, the very same persons, to be happy or miserable
in the other, who did well or ill in this life, will find it perhaps not
easy to resolve with himself, what makes the same man, or wherein identity
consists; and will not be forward to think he, and every one, even children
themselves, have naturally a clear idea of it.
6. Whole and part, not innate ideas. Let us examine that principle of
mathematics, viz. that the whole is bigger than a part. This, I take it,
is reckoned amongst innate principles. I am sure it has as good a title
as any to be thought so; which yet nobody can think it to be, when he considers
[that] the ideas it comprehends in it, whole and part, are perfectly relative;
but the positive ideas to which they properly and immediately belong are
extension and number, of which alone whole and part are relations. So that
if whole and part are innate ideas, extension and number must be so too;
it being impossible to have an idea of a relation, without having any at
all of the thing to which it belongs, and in which it is founded. Now,
whether the minds of men have naturally imprinted on them the ideas of
extension and number, I leave to be considered by these who are the patrons
of innate principles.
7. Idea of worship not innate. That God is to be worshipped, is, without
doubt, as great a truth as any that can enter into the mind of man, and
deserves the first place amongst all practical principles. But yet it can
by no means be thought innate, unless the ideas of God and worship are
innate. That the idea the term worship stands for is not in the understanding
of children, and a character stamped on the mind in its first original,
I think will be easily granted, by any one that considers how few there
be amongst grown men who have a clear and distinct notion of it. And, I
suppose, there cannot be anything more ridiculous than to say, that children
have this practical principle innate, "That God is to be worshipped," and
yet that they know not what that worship of God is, which is their duty.
But to pass by this.
8. Idea of God not innate. If any idea can be imagined innate, the idea
of God may, of all others, for many reasons, be thought so; since it is
hard to conceive how there should be innate moral principles, without an
innate idea of a Deity. Without a notion of a law-maker, it is impossible
to have a notion of a law, and an obligation to observe it. Besides the
atheists taken notice of amongst the ancients, and left branded upon the
records of history, hath not navigation discovered, in these later ages,
whole nations, at the bay of Soldania, in Brazil, [in Boranday,] and in
the Caribbee islands, &c., amongst whom there was to be found no notion
of a God, no religion? Nicholaus del Techo, in Literis ex Paraquaria, de
Caiguarum Conversione, has these words: Reperi eam gentem nullum nomen
habere quod Deum, et hominis animam significet; nulla sacra habet, nulla
idola. These are instances of nations where uncultivated nature has been
left to itself, without the help of letters and discipline, and the improvements
of arts and sciences. But there are others to be found who have enjoyed
these in a very great measure, who yet, for want of a due application of
their thoughts this way, want the idea and knowledge of God. It will, I
doubt not, be a surprise to others, as it was to me, to find the Siamites
of this number. But for this, let them consult the King of France's late
envoy thither, who gives no better account of the Chinese themselves. And
if we will not believe La Loubere, the missionaries of China, even the
Jesuits themselves, the great encomiasts of the Chinese, do all to a man
agree, and will convince us, that the sect of the literari, or learned,
keeping to the old religion of China, and the ruling party there, are all
of them atheists. Vid. Navarette, in the Collection of Voyages, vol. i.,
and Historia Cultus Sinensium. And perhaps, if we should with attention
mind the lives and discourses of people not so far off, we should have
too much reason to fear, that many, in more civilized countries, have no
very strong and clear impressions of a Deity upon their minds, and that
the complaints of atheism made from the pulpit are not without reason.
And though only some profligate wretches own it too barefacedly now; yet
perhaps we should hear more than we do of it from others, did not the fear
of the magistrate's sword, or their neighbour's censure, tie up people's
tongues; which, were the apprehensions of punishment or shame taken away,
would as openly proclaim their atheism as their lives do.
9. The name of God not universal or obscure in meaning. But had all
mankind everywhere a notion of a God, (whereof yet history tells us the
contrary,) it would not from thence follow, that the idea of him was innate.
For, though no nation were to be found without a name, and some few dark
notions of him, yet that would not prove them to be natural impressions
on the mind; no more than the names of fire, or the sun, heat, or number,
do prove the ideas they stand for to be innate; because the names of those
things, and the ideas of them, are so universally received and known amongst
mankind. Nor, on the contrary, is the want of such a name, or the absence
of such a notion out of men's minds, any argument against the being of
a God; any more than it would be a proof that there was no loadstone in
the world, because a great part of mankind had neither a notion of any
such thing nor a name for it; or be any show of argument to prove that
there are no distinct and various species of angels, or intelligent beings
above us, because we have no ideas of such distinct species, or names for
them. For, men being furnished with words, by the common language of their
own countries, can scarce avoid having some kind of ideas of those things
whose names those they converse with have occasion frequently to mention
to them. And if they carry with it the notion of excellency, greatness,
or something extraordinary; if apprehension and concernment accompany it;
if the fear of absolute and irresistible power set it on upon the mind,-
the idea is likely to sink the deeper, and spread the further; especially
if it be such an idea as is agreeable to the common light of reason, and
naturally deducible from every part of our knowledge, as that of a God
is. For the visible marks of extraordinary wisdom and power appear so plainly
in all the works of the creation, that a rational creature, who will but
seriously reflect on them, cannot miss the discovery of a Deity. And the
influence that the discovery of such a Being must necessarily have on the
minds of all that have but once heard of it is so great, and carries such
a weight of thought and communication with it, that it seems stranger to
me that a whole nation of men should be anywhere found so brutish as to
want the notion of a God, than that they should be without any notion of
numbers, or fire.
10. Ideas of God and idea of fire. The name of God being once mentioned
in any part of the world, to express a superior, powerful, wise, invisible
Being, the suitableness of such a notion to the principles of common reason,
and the interest men will always have to mention it often, must necessarily
spread it far and wide; and continue it down to all generations: though
yet the general reception of this name, and some imperfect and unsteady
notions conveyed thereby to the unthinking part of mankind, prove not the
idea to be innate; but only that they who made the discovery had made a
right use of their reason, thought maturely of the causes of things, and
traced them to their original; from whom other less considering people
having once received so important a notion, it could not easily be lost
again.
11. Idea of God not innate. This is all could be inferred from the notion
of a God, were it to be found universally in all the tribes of mankind,
and generally acknowledged, by men grown to maturity in all countries.
For the generality of the acknowledging of a God, as I imagine, is extended
no further than that; which, if it be sufficient to prove the idea of God
innate, will as well prove the idea of fire innate; since I think it may
be truly said, that there is not a person in the world who has a notion
of a God, who has not also the idea of fire. I doubt not but if a colony
of young children should be placed in an island where no fire was, they
would certainly neither have any notion of such a thing, nor name for it,
how generally soever it were received and known in all the world besides;
and perhaps too their apprehensions would be as far removed from any name,
or notion, of a God, till some one amongst them had employed his thoughts
to inquire into the constitution and causes of things, which would easily
lead him to the notion of a God; which having once taught to others, reason,
and the natural propensity of their own thoughts, would afterwards propagate,
and continue amongst them.
12. Suitable to God's goodness, that all men should have an idea of
Him, therefore naturally imprinted by Him, answered. Indeed it is urged,
that it is suitable to the goodness of God, to imprint upon the minds of
men characters and notions of himself, and not to leave them in the dark
and doubt in so grand a concernment; and also, by that means, to secure
to himself the homage and veneration due from so intelligent a creature
as man; and therefore he has done it.
This argument, if it be of any force, will prove much more than those
who use it in this case expect from it. For, if we may conclude that God
hath done for men all that men shall judge is best for them, because it
is suitable to his goodness so to do, it will prove, not only that God
has imprinted on the minds of men an idea of himself, but that he hath
plainly stamped there, in fair characters, all that men ought to know or
believe of him; all that they ought to do in obedience to his will; and
that he hath given them a will and affections conformable to it. This,
no doubt, every one will think better for men, than that they should, in
the dark, grope after knowledge, as St. Paul tells us all nations did after
God (Acts 17. 27); than that their wills should clash with their understandings,
and their appetites cross their duty. The Romanists say it is best for
men, and so suitable to the goodness of God, that there should be an infallible
judge of controversies on earth; and therefore there is one. And I, by
the same reason, say it is better for men that every man himself should
be infallible. I leave them to consider, whether, by the force of this
argument, they shall think that every man is so. I think it a very good
argument to say,- the infinitely wise God hath made it so; and therefore
it is best. But it seems to me a little too much confidence of our own
wisdom to say,- "I think it best; and therefore God hath made it so." And
in the matter in hand, it will be in vain to argue from such a topic, that
God hath done so, when certain experience shows us that he hath not. But
the goodness of God hath not been wanting to men, without such original
impressions of knowledge or ideas stamped on the mind; since he hath furnished
man with those faculties which will serve for the sufficient discovery
of all things requisite to the end of such a being; and I doubt not but
to show, that a man, by the right use of his natural abilities, may, without
any innate principles, attain a knowledge of a God, and other things that
concern him. God having endued man with those faculties of knowledge which
he hath, was no more obliged by his goodness to plant those innate notions
in his mind, than that, having given him reason, hands, and materials,
he should build him bridges or houses,- which some people in the world,
however of good parts, do either totally want, or are but ill provided
of, as well as others are wholly without ideas of God and principles of
morality, or at least have but very ill ones; the reason in both cases,
being, that they never employed their parts, faculties, and powers industriously
that way, but contented themselves with the opinions, fashions, and things
of their country, as they found them, without looking any further. Had
you or I been born at the Bay of Soldania, possibly our thoughts and notions
had not exceeded those brutish ones of the Hottentots that inhabit there.
And had the Virginia king Apochancana been educated in England, he had
been perhaps as knowing a divine, and as good a mathematician as any in
it; the difference between him and a more improved Englishman lying barely
in this, that the exercise of his faculties was bounded within the ways,
modes, and notions of his own country, and never directed to any other
or further inquiries. And if he had not any idea of a God, it was only
because he pursued not those thoughts that would have led him to it.
13. Ideas of God various in different men. I grant that if there were
any ideas to be found imprinted on the minds of men, we have reason to
expect it should be the notion of his Maker, as a mark God set on his own
workmanship, to mind man of his dependence and duty; and that herein should
appear the first instances of human knowledge. But how late is it before
any such notion is discoverable in children? And when we find it there,
how much more does it resemble the opinion and notion of the teacher, than
represent the true God? He that shall observe in children the progress
whereby their minds attain the knowledge they have, will think that the
objects they do first and most familiarly converse with are those that
make the first impressions on their understandings; nor will he find the
least footsteps of any other. It is easy to take notice how their thoughts
enlarge themselves, only as they come to be acquainted with a greater variety
of sensible objects; to retain the ideas of them in their memories; and
to get the skill to compound and enlarge them, and several ways put them
together. How, by these means, they come to frame in their minds an idea
men have of a Deity, I shall hereafter show.
14. Contrary and inconsistent ideas of God under the same name. Can
it be thought that the ideas men have of God are the characters and marks
of himself, engraven in their minds by his own finger, when we see that,
in the same country, under one and the same name, men have far different,
nay often contrary and inconsistent ideas and conceptions of him? Their
agreeing in a name, or sound, will scarce prove an innate notion of him.
15. Gross ideas of God. What true or tolerable notion of a Deity could
they have, who acknowledged and worshipped hundreds? Every deity that they
owned above one was an infallible evidence of their ignorance of Him, and
a proof that they had no true notion of God, where unity, infinity, and
eternity were excluded. To which, if we add their gross conceptions of
corporeity, expressed in their images and representations of their deities;
the amours, marriages, copulations, lusts, quarrels, and other mean qualities
attributed by them to their gods; we shall have little reason to think
that the heathen world, i.e. the greatest part of mankind, had such ideas
of God in their minds as he himself, out of care that they should not be
mistaken about him, was author of. And this universality of consent, so
much argued, if it prove any native impressions, it will be only this:-
that God imprinted on the minds of all men speaking the same language,
a name for himself, but not any idea; since those people who agreed in
the name, had, at the same time, far different apprehensions about the
thing signified. If they say that the variety of deities worshipped by
the heathen world were but figurative ways of expressing the several attributes
of that incomprehensible Being, or several parts of his providence, I answer:
what they might be in the original I will not here inquire; but that they
were so in the thoughts of the vulgar I think nobody will affirm. And he
that will consult the voyage of the Bishop of Beryte, c. 13, (not to mention
other testimonies,) will find that the theology of the Siamites professedly
owns a plurality of gods: or, as the Abbe de Choisy more judiciously remarks
in his Journal du Voyage de Siam, 107/177, it consists properly in acknowledging
no God at all.
16. Idea of God not innate although wise men of all nations come to
have it. If it be said, that wise men of all nations came to have true
conceptions of the unity and infinity of the Deity, I grant it. But then
this,
First, excludes universality of consent in anything but the name; for
those wise men being very few, perhaps one of a thousand, this universality
is very narrow.
Secondly, it seems to me plainly to prove, that the truest and best
notions men have of God were not imprinted, but acquired by thought and
meditation, and a right use of their faculties: since the wise and considerate
men of the world, by a right and careful employment of their thoughts and
reason, attained true notions in this as well as other things; whilst the
lazy and inconsiderate part of men, making far the greater number, took
up their notions by chance, from common tradition and vulgar conceptions,
without much beating their heads about them. And if it be a reason to think
the notion of God innate, because all wise men had it, virtue too must
be thought innate; for that also wise men have always had.
17. Odd, low, and pitiful ideas of God common among men. This was evidently
the case of all Gentilism. Nor hath even amongst Jews, Christians, and
Mahometans, who acknowledged but one God, this doctrine, and the care taken
in those nations to teach men to have true notions of a God, prevailed
so far as to make men to have the same and the true ideas of him. How many
even amongst us, will be found upon inquiry to fancy him in the shape of
a man sitting in heaven; and to have many other absurd and unfit conceptions
of him? Christians as well as Turks have had whole sects owning and contending
earnestly for it,- that the Deity was corporeal, and of human shape: and
though we find few now amongst us who profess themselves Anthropomorphites,
(though some I have met with that own it,) yet I believe he that will make
it his business may find amongst the ignorant and uninstructed Christians
many of that opinion. Talk but with country people, almost of any age,
or young people almost of any condition, and you shall find that, though
the name of God be frequently in their mouths, yet the notions they apply
this name to are so odd, low, and pitiful, that nobody can imagine they
were taught by a rational man; much less that they were characters written
by the finger of God himself. Nor do I see how it derogates more from the
goodness of God, that he has given us minds unfurnished with these ideas
of himself, than that he hath sent us into the world with bodies unclothed;
and that there is no art or skill born with us. For, being fitted with
faculties to attain these, it is want of industry and consideration in
us, and not of bounty in him, if we have them not. It is as certain that
there is a God, as that the opposite angles made by the intersection of
two straight lines are equal. There was never any rational creature that
set himself sincerely to examine the truth of these propositions that could
fail to assent to them; though yet it be past doubt that there are many
men, who, having not applied their thoughts that way, are ignorant both
of the one and the other. If any one think fit to call this (which is the
utmost of its extent) universal consent, such an one I easily allow; but
such an universal consent as this proves not the idea of God, any more
than it does the idea of such angles, innate.
18. If the idea of God be not innate, no other can be supposed innate.
Since then though the knowledge of a God be the most natural discovery
of human reason, yet the idea of him is not innate, as I think is evident
from what has been said; I imagine there will be scarce any other idea
found that can pretend to it. Since if God hath set any impression, any
character, on the understanding of men, it is most reasonable to expect
it should have been some clear and uniform idea of Himself; as far as our
weak capacities were capable to receive so incomprehensible and infinite
an object. But our minds being at first void of that idea which we are
most concerned to have, it is a strong presumption against all other innate
characters. I must own, as far as I can observe, I can find none, and would
be glad to be informed by any other.
19. Idea of substance not innate. I confess there is another idea which
would be of general use for mankind to have, as it is of general talk as
if they had it; and that is the idea of substance; which we neither have
nor can have by sensation or reflection. If nature took care to provide
us any ideas, we might well expect they should be such as by our own faculties
we cannot procure to ourselves; but we see, on the contrary, that since,
by those ways whereby other ideas are brought into our minds, this is not,
we have no such clear idea at all; and therefore signify nothing by the
word substance but only an uncertain supposition of we know not what, i.e.
of something whereof we have no [particular distinct positive] idea, which
we take to be the substratum, or support, of those ideas we do know.
20. No propositions can be innate, since no ideas are innate. Whatever
then we talk of innate, either speculative or practical, principles, it
may with as much probability be said, that a man hath L100 sterling in
his pocket, and yet denied that he hath there either penny, shilling, crown,
or other coin out of which the sum is to be made up; as to think that certain
propositions are innate when the ideas about which they are can by no means
be supposed to be so. The general reception and assent that is given doth
not at all prove, that the ideas expressed in them are innate; for in many
cases, however the ideas came there, the assent to words expressing the
agreement or disagreement of such ideas, will necessarily follow. Every
one that hath a true idea of God and worship, will assent to this proposition,
"That God is to be worshipped," when expressed in a language he understands;
and every rational man that hath not thought on it to-day, may be ready
to assent to this proposition to-morrow; and yet millions of men may be
well supposed to want one or both those ideas to-day. For, if we will allow
savages, and most country people, to have ideas of God and worship, (which
conversation with them will not make one forward to believe,) yet I think
few children can be supposed to have those ideas, which therefore they
must begin to have some time or other; and then they will also begin to
assent to that proposition, and make very little question of it ever after.
But such an assent upon hearing, no more proves the ideas to be innate,
than it does that one born blind (with cataracts which will be couched
to-morrow) had the innate ideas of the sun, or light, or saffron, or yellow;
because, when his sight is cleared, he will certainly assent to this proposition,
"That the sun is lucid, or that saffron is yellow." And therefore, if such
an assent upon hearing cannot prove the ideas innate, it can much less
the propositions made up of those ideas. If they have any innate ideas,
I would be glad to be told what, and how many, they are.
21. No innate ideas in the memory. To which let me add: if there be
any innate ideas, any ideas in the mind which the mind does not actually
think on, they must be lodged in the memory; and from thence must be brought
into view by remembrance; i.e. must be known, when they are remembered,
to have been perceptions in the mind before; unless remembrance can be
without remembrance. For, to remember is to perceive anything with memory,
or with a consciousness that it was perceived or known before. Without
this, whatever idea comes into the mind is new, and not remembered; this
consciousness of its having been in the mind before, being that which distinguishes
remembering from all other ways of thinking. Whatever idea was never perceived
by the mind was never in the mind. Whatever idea is in the mind, is, either
an actual perception, or else, having been an actual perception, is so
in the mind that, by the memory, it can be made an actual perception again.
Whenever there is the actual perception of any idea without memory, the
idea appears perfectly new and unknown before to the understanding. Whenever
the memory brings any idea into actual view, it is with a consciousness
that it had been there before, and was not wholly a stranger to the mind.
Whether this be not so, I appeal to every one's observation. And then I
desire an instance of an idea, pretended to be innate, which (before any
impression of it by ways hereafter to be mentioned) any one could revive
and remember, as an idea he had formerly known; without which consciousness
of a former perception there is no remembrance; and whatever idea comes
into the mind without that consciousness is not remembered, or comes not
out of the memory, nor can be said to be in the mind before that appearance.
For what is not either actually in view or in the memory, is in the mind
no way at all, and is all one as if it had never been there. Suppose a
child had the use of his eyes till he knows and distinguishes colours;
but then cataracts shut the windows, and he is forty or fifty years perfectly
in the dark; and in that time perfectly loses all memory of the ideas of
colours he once had. This was the case of a blind man I once talked with,
who lost his sight by the small-pox when he was a child, and had no more
notion of colours than one born blind. I ask whether any one can say this
man had then any ideas of colours in his mind, any more than one born blind?
And I think nobody will say that either of them had in his mind any ideas
of colours at all. His cataracts are couched, and then he has the ideas
(which he remembers not) of colours, de novo, by his restored sight, conveyed
to his mind, and that without any consciousness of a former acquaintance.
And these now he can revive and call to mind in the dark. In this case
all these ideas of colours, which, when out of view, can be revived with
a consciousness of a former acquaintance, being thus in the memory, are
said to be in the mind. The use I make of this is,- that whatever idea,
being not actually in view, is in the mind, is there only by being in the
memory; and if it be not in the memory, it is not in the mind; and if it
be in the memory, it cannot by the memory be brought into actual view without
a perception that it comes out of the memory; which is this, that it had
been known before, and is now remembered. If therefore there be any innate
ideas, they must be in the memory, or else nowhere in the mind; and if
they be in the memory, they can be revived without any impression from
without; and whenever they are brought into the mind they are remembered,
i.e. they bring with them a perception of their not being wholly new to
it. This being a constant and distinguishing difference between what is,
and what is not in the memory, or in the mind;- that what is not in the
memory, whenever it appears there, appears perfectly new and unknown before;
and what is in the memory, or in the mind, whenever it is suggested by
the memory, appears not to be new, but the mind finds it in itself, and
knows it was there before. By this it may be tried whether there be any
innate ideas in the mind before impression from sensation or reflection.
I would fain meet with the man who, when he came to the use of reason,
or at any other time, remembered any of them; and to whom, after he was
born, they were never new. If any one will say, there are ideas in the
mind that are not in the memory, I desire him to explain himself, and make
what he says intelligible.
22. Principles not innate, because of little use or little certainty.
Besides what I have already said, there is another reason why I doubt that
neither these nor any other principles are innate. I that am fully persuaded
that the infinitely wise God made all things in perfect wisdom, cannot
satisfy myself why he should be supposed to print upon the minds of men
some universal principles; whereof those that are pretended innate, and
concern speculation, are of no great use; and those that concern practice,
not self-evident; and neither of them distinguishable from some other truths
not allowed to be innate. For, to what purpose should characters be graven
on the mind by the finger of God, which are not clearer there than those
which are afterwards introduced, or cannot be distinguished from them?
If any one thinks there are such innate ideas and propositions, which by
their clearness and usefulness are distinguishable from all that is adventitious
in the mind and acquired, it will not be a hard matter for him to tell
us which they are; and then every one will be a fit judge whether they
be so or no. Since if there be such innate ideas and impressions, plainly
different from all other perceptions and knowledge, every one will find
it true in himself of the evidence of these supposed innate maxims, I have
spoken already: of their usefulness I shall have occasion to speak more
hereafter.
23. Difference of men's discoveries depends upon the different application
of their faculties. To conclude: some ideas forwardly offer themselves
to all men's understanding; and some sorts of truths result from any ideas,
as soon as the mind puts them into propositions: other truths require a
train of ideas placed in order, a due comparing of them, and deductions
made with attention, before they can be discovered and assented to. Some
of the first sort, because of their general and easy reception, have been
mistaken for innate: but the truth is, ideas and notions are no more born
with us than arts and sciences; though some of them indeed offer themselves
to our faculties more readily than others; and therefore are more generally
received: though that too be according as the organs of our bodies and
powers of our minds happen to be employed; God having fitted men with faculties
and means to discover, receive, and retain truths, according as they are
employed. The great difference that is to be found in the notions of mankind
is, from the different use they put their faculties to. Whilst some (and
those the most) taking things upon trust, misemploy their power of assent,
by lazily enslaving their minds to the dictates and dominion of others,
in doctrines which it is their duty carefully to examine, and not blindly,
with an implicit faith, to swallow; others, employing their thoughts only
about some few things, grow acquainted sufficiently with them, attain great
degrees of knowledge in them, and are ignorant of all other, having never
let their thoughts loose in the search of other inquiries. Thus, that the
three angles of a triangle are quite equal to two right ones is a truth
as certain as anything can be, and I think more evident than many of those
propositions that go for principles; and yet there are millions, however
expert in other things, who know not this at all, because they never set
their thoughts on work about such angles. And he that certainly knows this
proposition may yet be utterly ignorant of the truth of other propositions,
in mathematics itself, which are as clear and evident as this; because,
in his search of those mathematical truths, he stopped his thoughts short
and went not so far. The same may happen concerning the notions we have
of the being of a Deity. For, though there be no truth which a man may
more evidently make out to himself than the existence of a God, yet he
that shall content himself with things as he finds them in this world,
as they minister to his pleasures and passions, and not make inquiry a
little further into their causes, ends, and admirable contrivances, and
pursue the thoughts thereof with diligence and attention, may live long
without any notion of such a Being. And if any person hath by talk put
such a notion into his head, he may perhaps believe it; but if he hath
never examined it, his knowledge of it will be no perfecter than his, who
having been told, that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two
right ones, takes it upon trust, without examining the demonstration; and
may yield his assent as a probable opinion, but hath no knowledge of the
truth of it; which yet his faculties, if carefully employed, were able
to make clear and evident to him. But this only, by the by, to show how
much our knowledge depends upon the right use of those powers nature hath
bestowed upon us, and how little upon such innate principles as are in
vain supposed to be in all mankind for their direction; which all men could
not but know if they were there, or else they would be there to no purpose.
And which since all men do not know, nor can distinguish from other adventitious
truths, we may well conclude there are no such.
24. Men must think and know for themselves. What censure doubting thus
of innate principles may deserve from men, who will be apt to call it pulling
up the old foundations of knowledge and certainty, I cannot tell;- I persuade
myself at least that the way I have pursued, being conformable to truth,
lays those foundations surer. This I am certain, I have not made it my
business either to quit or follow any authority in the ensuing Discourse.
Truth has been my only aim; and wherever that has appeared to lead, my
thoughts have impartially followed, without minding whether the footsteps
of any other lay that way or not. Not that I want a due respect to other
men's opinions; but, after all, the greatest reverence is due to truth:
and I hope it will not be thought arrogance to say, that perhaps we should
make greater progress in the discovery of rational and contemplative knowledge,
if we sought it in the fountain, in the consideration of things themselves;
and made use rather of our own thoughts than other men's to find it. For
I think we may as rationally hope to see with other men's eyes, as to know
by other men's understandings. So much as we ourselves consider and comprehend
of truth and reason, so much we possess of real and true knowledge. The
floating of other men's opinions in our brains, makes us not one jot the
more knowing, though they happen to be true. What in them was science,
is in us but opiniatrety; whilst we give up our assent only to reverend
names, and do not, as they did, employ our own reason to understand those
truths which gave them reputation. Aristotle was certainly a knowing man,
but nobody ever thought him so because he blindly embraced, and confidently
vented the opinions of another. And if the taking up of another's principles,
without examining them, made not him a philosopher, I suppose it will hardly
make anybody else so. In the sciences, every one has so much as he really
knows and comprehends. What he believes only, and takes upon trust, are
but shreds; which, however well in the whole piece, make no considerable
addition to his stock who gathers them. Such borrowed wealth, like fairy
money, though it were gold in the hand from which he received it, will
be but leaves and dust when it comes to use.
25. Whence the opinion of innate principles. When men have found some
general propositions that could not be doubted of as soon as understood,
it was, I know, a short and easy way to conclude them innate. This being
once received, it eased the lazy from the pains of search, and stopped
the inquiry of the doubtful concerning all that was once styled innate.
And it was of no small advantage to those who affected to be masters and
teachers, to make this the principle of principles,- that principles must
not he questioned. For, having once established this tenet,- that there
are innate principles, it put their followers upon a necessity of receiving
some doctrines as such; which was to take them off from the use of their
own reason and judgment, and put them on believing and taking them upon
trust without further examination: in which posture of blind credulity,
they might be more easily governed by, and made useful to some sort of
men, who had the skill and office to principle and guide them. Nor is it
a small power it gives one man over another, to have the authority to be
the dictator of principles, and teacher of unquestionable truths; and to
make a man swallow that for an innate principle which may serve to his
purpose who teacheth them. Whereas had they examined the ways whereby men
came to the knowledge of many universal truths, they would have found them
to result in the minds of men from the being of things themselves, when
duly considered; and that they were discovered by the application of those
faculties that were fitted by nature to receive and judge of them, when
duly employed about them.
26. Conclusion. To show how the understanding proceeds herein is the
design of the following Discourse; which I shall proceed to when I have
first premised, that hitherto,- to clear my way to those foundations which
I conceive are the only true ones, whereon to establish those notions we
can have of our own knowledge,- it hath been necessary for me to give an
account of the reasons I had to doubt of innate principles. And since the
arguments which are against them do, some of them, rise from common received
opinions, I have been forced to take several things for granted; which
is hardly avoidable to any one, whose task is to show the falsehood or
improbability of any tenet;- it happening in controversial discourses as
it does in assaulting of towns; where, if the ground be but firm whereon
the batteries are erected, there is no further inquiry of whom it is borrowed,
nor whom it belongs to, so it affords but a fit rise for the present purpose.
But in the future part of this Discourse, designing to raise an edifice
uniform and consistent with itself, as far as my own experience and observation
will assist me, I hope to erect it on such a basis that I shall not need
to shore it up with props and buttresses, leaning on borrowed or begged
foundations: or at least, if mine prove a castle in the air, I will endeavour
it shall be all of a piece and hang together. Wherein I warn the reader
not to expect undeniable cogent demonstrations, unless I may be allowed
the privilege, not seldom assumed by others, to take my principles for
granted; and then, I doubt not, but I can demonstrate too. All that I shall
say for the principles I proceed on is, that I can only appeal to men's
own unprejudiced experience and observation whether they be true or not;
and this is enough for a man who professes no more than to lay down candidly
and freely his own conjectures, concerning a subject lying somewhat in
the dark, without any other design than an unbiased inquiry after truth.
BOOK II: Of Ideas
Chapter I: Of Ideas in general, and their Original
1. Idea is the object of thinking. Every man being conscious to himself
that he thinks; and that which his mind is applied about whilst thinking
being the ideas that are there, it is past doubt that men have in their
minds several ideas,- such as are those expressed by the words whiteness,
hardness, sweetness, thinking, motion, man, elephant, army, drunkenness,
and others: it is in the first place then to be inquired, How he comes
by them?
I know it is a received doctrine, that men have native ideas, and original
characters, stamped upon their minds in their very first being. This opinion
I have at large examined already; and, I suppose what I have said in the
foregoing Book will be much more easily admitted, when I have shown whence
the understanding may get all the ideas it has; and by what ways and degrees
they may come into the mind;- for which I shall appeal to every one's own
observation and experience.
2. All ideas come from sensation or reflection. Let us then suppose
the mind to be, as we say, white paper, void of all characters, without
any ideas:- How comes it to be furnished? Whence comes it by that vast
store which the busy and boundless fancy of man has painted on it with
an almost endless variety? Whence has it all the materials of reason and
knowledge? To this I answer, in one word, from EXPERIENCE. In that all
our knowledge is founded; and from that it ultimately derives itself. Our
observation employed either, about external sensible objects, or about
the internal operations of our minds perceived and reflected on by ourselves,
is that which supplies our understandings with all the materials of thinking.
These two are the fountains of knowledge, from whence all the ideas we
have, or can naturally have, do spring.
3. The objects of sensation one source of ideas. First, our Senses,
conversant about particular sensible objects, do convey into the mind several
distinct perceptions of things, according to those various ways wherein
those objects do affect them. And thus we come by those ideas we have of
yellow, white, heat, cold, soft, hard, bitter, sweet, and all those which
we call sensible qualities; which when I say the senses convey into the
mind, I mean, they from external objects convey into the mind what produces
there those perceptions. This great source of most of the ideas we have,
depending wholly upon our senses, and derived by them to the understanding,
I call SENSATION.
4. The operations of our minds, the other source of them. Secondly,
the other fountain from which experience furnisheth the understanding with
ideas is,- the perception of the operations of our own mind within us,
as it is employed about the ideas it has got;- which operations, when the
soul comes to reflect on and consider, do furnish the understanding with
another set of ideas, which could not be had from things without. And such
are perception, thinking, doubting, believing, reasoning, knowing, willing,
and all the different actings of our own minds;- which we being conscious
of, and observing in ourselves, do from these receive into our understandings
as distinct ideas as we do from bodies affecting our senses. This source
of ideas every man has wholly in himself; and though it be not sense, as
having nothing to do with external objects, yet it is very like it, and
might properly enough be called internal sense. But as I call the other
SENSATION, so I Call this REFLECTION, the ideas it affords being such only
as the mind gets by reflecting on its own operations within itself. By
reflection then, in the following part of this discourse, I would be understood
to mean, that notice which the mind takes of its own operations, and the
manner of them, by reason whereof there come to be ideas of these operations
in the understanding. These two, I say, viz. external material things,
as the objects of SENSATION, and the operations of our own minds within,
as the objects of REFLECTION, are to me the only originals from whence
all our ideas take their beginnings. The term operations here I use in
a large sense, as comprehending not barely the actions of the mind about
its ideas, but some sort of passions arising sometimes from them, such
as is the satisfaction or uneasiness arising from any thought.
5. All our ideas are of the one or the other of these. The understanding
seems to me not to have the least glimmering of any ideas which it doth
not receive from one of these two. External objects furnish the mind with
the ideas of sensible qualities, which are all those different perceptions
they produce in us; and the mind furnishes the understanding with ideas
of its own operations.
These, when we have taken a full survey of them, and their several modes,
combinations, and relations, we shall find to contain all our whole stock
of ideas; and that we have nothing in our minds which did not come in one
of these two ways. Let any one examine his own thoughts, and thoroughly
search into his understanding; and then let him tell me, whether all the
original ideas he has there, are any other than of the objects of his senses,
or of the operations of his mind, considered as objects of his reflection.
And how great a mass of knowledge soever he imagines to be lodged there,
he will, upon taking a strict view, see that he has not any idea in his
mind but what one of these two have imprinted;- though perhaps, with infinite
variety compounded and enlarged by the understanding, as we shall see hereafter.
6. Observable in children. He that attentively considers the state of
a child, at his first coming into the world, will have little reason to
think him stored with plenty of ideas, that are to be the matter of his
future knowledge. It is by degrees he comes to be furnished with them.
And though the ideas of obvious and familiar qualities imprint themselves
before the memory begins to keep a register of time or order, yet it is
often so late before some unusual qualities come in the way, that there
are few men that cannot recollect the beginning of their acquaintance with
them. And if it were worth while, no doubt a child might be so ordered
as to have but a very few, even of the ordinary ideas, till he were grown
up to a man. But all that are born into the world, being surrounded with
bodies that perpetually and diversely affect them, variety of ideas, whether
care be taken of it or not, are imprinted on the minds of children. Light
and colours are busy at hand everywhere, when the eye is but open; sounds
and some tangible qualities fail not to solicit their proper senses, and
force an entrance to the mind;- but yet, I think, it will be granted easily,
that if a child were kept in a place where he never saw any other but black
and white till he were a man, he would have no more ideas of scarlet or
green, than he that from his childhood never tasted an oyster, or a pine-apple,
has of those particular relishes.
7. Men are differently furnished with these, according to the different
objects they converse with. Men then come to be furnished with fewer or
more simple ideas from without, according as the objects they converse
with afford greater or less variety; and from the operations of their minds
within, according as they more or less reflect on them. For, though he
that contemplates the operations of his mind, cannot but have plain and
clear ideas of them; yet, unless he turn his thoughts that way, and considers
them attentively, he will no more have clear and distinct ideas of all
the operations of his mind, and all that may be observed therein, than
he will have all the particular ideas of any landscape, or of the parts
and motions of a clock, who will not turn his eyes to it, and with attention
heed all the parts of it. The picture, or clock may be so placed, that
they may come in his way every day; but yet he will have but a confused
idea of all the parts they are made up of, till he applies himself with
attention, to consider them each in particular.
8. Ideas of reflection later, because they need attention. And hence
we see the reason why it is pretty late before most children get ideas
of the operations of their own minds; and some have not any very clear
or perfect ideas of the greatest part of them all their lives. Because,
though they pass there continually, yet, like floating visions, they make
not deep impressions enough to leave in their mind clear, distinct, lasting
ideas, till the understanding turns inward upon itself, reflects on its
own operations, and makes them the objects of its own contemplation. Children
when they come first into it, are surrounded with a world of new things,
which, by a constant solicitation of their senses, draw the mind constantly
to them; forward to take notice of new, and apt to be delighted with the
variety of changing objects. Thus the first years are usually employed
and diverted in looking abroad. Men's business in them is to acquaint themselves
with what is to be found without; and so growing up in a constant attention
to outward sensations, seldom make any considerable reflection on what
passes within them, till they come to be of riper years; and some scarce
ever at all.
9. The soul begins to have ideas when it begins to perceive. To ask,
at what time a man has first any ideas, is to ask, when he begins to perceive;-
having ideas, and perception, being the same thing. I know it is an opinion,
that the soul always thinks, and that it has the actual perception of ideas
in itself constantly, as long as it exists; and that actual thinking is
as inseparable from the soul as actual extension is from the body; which
if true, to inquire after the beginning of a man's ideas is the same as
to inquire after the beginning of his soul. For, by this account, soul
and its ideas, as body and its extension, will begin to exist both at the
same time.
10. The soul thinks not always; for this wants proofs. But whether the
soul be supposed to exist antecedent to, or coeval with, or some time after
the first rudiments of organization, or the beginnings of life in the body,
I leave to be disputed by those who have better thought of that matter.
I confess myself to have one of those dull souls, that doth not perceive
itself always to contemplate ideas; nor can conceive it any more necessary
for the soul always to think, than for the body always to move: the perception
of ideas being (as I conceive) to the soul, what motion is to the body;
not its essence, but one of its operations. And therefore, though thinking
be supposed never so much the proper action of the soul, yet it is not
necessary to suppose that it should be always thinking, always in action.
That, perhaps, is the privilege of the infinite Author and Preserver of
all things, who "never slumbers nor sleeps;" but is not competent to any
finite being, at least not to the soul of man. We know certainly, by experience,
that we sometimes think; and thence draw this infallible consequence,-
that there is something in us that has a power to think. But whether that
substance perpetually thinks or no, we can be no further assured than experience
informs us. For, to say that actual thinking is essential to the soul,
and inseparable from it, is to beg what is in question, and not to prove
it by reason;- which is necessary to be done, if it be not a self-evident
proposition. But whether this, "That the soul always thinks," be a self-evident
proposition, that everybody assents to at first hearing, I appeal to mankind.
It is doubted whether I thought at all last night or no. The question being
about a matter of fact, it is begging it to bring, as a proof for it, an
hypothesis, which is the very thing in dispute: by which way one may prove
anything, and it is but supposing that all watches, whilst the balance
beats, think, and it is sufficiently proved, and past doubt, that my watch
thought all last night. But he that would not deceive himself, ought to
build his hypothesis on matter of fact, and make it out by sensible experience,
and not presume on matter of fact, because of his hypothesis, that is,
because he supposes it to be so; which way of proving amounts to this,
that I must necessarily think all last night, because another supposes
I always think, though I myself cannot perceive that I always do so.
But men in love with their opinions may not only suppose what is in
question, but allege wrong matter of fact. How else could any one make
it an inference of mine, that a thing is not, because we are not sensible
of it in our sleep? I do not say there is no soul in a man, because he
is not sensible of it in his sleep; but I do say, he cannot think at any
time, waking or sleeping: without being sensible of it. Our being sensible
of it is not necessary to anything but to our thoughts; and to them it
is; and to them it always will be necessary, till we can think without
being conscious of it.
11. It is not always conscious of it. I grant that the soul, in a waking
man, is never without thought, because it is the condition of being awake.
But whether sleeping without dreaming be not an affection of the whole
man, mind as well as body, may be worth a waking man's consideration; it
being hard to conceive that anything should think and not be conscious
of it. If the soul doth think in a sleeping man without being conscious
of it, I ask whether, during such thinking, it has any pleasure or pain,
or be capable of happiness or misery? I am sure the man is not; no more
than the bed or earth he lies on. For to be happy or miserable without
being conscious of it, seems to me utterly inconsistent and impossible.
Or if it be possible that the soul can, whilst the body is sleeping, have
its thinking, enjoyments, and concerns, its pleasures or pain, apart, which
the man is not conscious of nor partakes in,- it is certain that Socrates
asleep and Socrates awake is not the same person; but his soul when he
sleeps, and Socrates the man, consisting of body and soul, when he is waking,
are two persons: since waking Socrates has no knowledge of, or concernment
for that happiness or misery of his soul, which it enjoys alone by itself
whilst he sleeps, without perceiving anything of it; no more than he has
for the happiness or misery of a man in the Indies, whom he knows not.
For, if we take wholly away all consciousness of our actions and sensations,
especially of pleasure and pain, and the concernment that accompanies it,
it will be hard to know wherein to place personal identity.
12. If a sleeping man thinks without knowing it, the sleeping and waking
man are two persons. The soul, during sound sleep, thinks, say these men.
Whilst it thinks and perceives, it is capable certainly of those of delight
or trouble, as well as any other perceptions; and it must necessarily be
conscious of its own perceptions. But it has all this apart: the sleeping
man, it is plain, is conscious of nothing of all this. Let us suppose,
then, the soul of Castor, while he is sleeping, retired from his body;
which is no impossible supposition for the men I have here to do with,
who so liberally allow life, without a thinking soul, to all other animals.
These men cannot then judge it impossible, or a contradiction, that the
body should live without the soul; nor that the soul should subsist and
think, or have perception, even perception of happiness or misery, without
the body. Let us then, I say, suppose the soul of Castor separated during
his sleep from his body, to think apart. Let us suppose, too, that it chooses
for its scene of thinking the body of another man, v.g. Pollux, who is
sleeping without a soul. For, if Castor's soul can think, whilst Castor
is asleep, what Castor is never conscious of, it is no matter what place
it chooses to think in. We have here, then, the bodies of two men with
only one soul between them, which we will suppose to sleep and wake by
turns; and the soul still thinking in the waking man, whereof the sleeping
man is never conscious, has never the least perception. I ask, then, whether
Castor and Pollux, thus with only one soul between them, which thinks and
perceives in one what the other is never conscious of, nor is concerned
for, are not two as distinct persons as Castor and Hercules, or as Socrates
and Plato were? And whether one of them might not be very happy, and the
other very miserable? Just by the same reason, they make the soul and the
man two persons, who make the soul think apart what the man is not conscious
of. For, I suppose nobody will make identity of persons to consist in the
soul's being united to the very same numercial particles of matter. For
if that be necessary to identity, it will be impossible, in that constant
flux of the particles of our bodies, that any man should be the same person
two days, or two moments, together.
13. Impossible to convince those that sleep without dreaming, that they
think. Thus, methinks, every drowsy nod shakes their doctrine, who teach
that the soul is always thinking. Those, at least, who do at any time sleep
without dreaming, can never be convinced that their thoughts are sometimes
for four hours busy without their knowing of it; and if they are taken
in the very act, waked in the middle of that sleeping contemplation, can
give no manner of account of it.
14. That men dream without remembering it, in vain urged. It will perhaps
be said,- That the soul thinks even in the soundest sleep, but the memory
retains it not. That the soul in a sleeping man should be this moment busy
a thinking, and the next moment in a waking man not remember nor be able
to recollect one jot of all those thoughts, is very hard to be conceived,
and would need some better proof than bare assertion to make it be believed.
For who can without any more ado, but being barely told so, imagine that
the greatest part of men do, during all their lives, for several hours
every day, think of something, which if they were asked, even in the middle
of these thoughts, they could remember nothing at all of? Most men, I think,
pass a great part of their sleep without dreaming. I once knew a man that
was bred a scholar, and had no bad memory, who told me he had never dreamed
in his life, till he had that fever he was then newly recovered of, which
was about the five or six and twentieth year of his age. I suppose the
world affords more such instances: at least every one's acquaintance will
furnish him with examples enough of such as pass most of their nights without
dreaming.
15. Upon this hypothesis, the thoughts of a sleeping man ought to be
most rational. To think often, and never to retain it so much as one moment,
is a very useless sort of thinking; and the soul, in such a state of thinking,
does very little, if at all, excel that of a looking-glass, which constantly
receives variety of images, or ideas, but retains none; they disappear
and vanish, and there remain no footsteps of them; the looking-glass is
never the better for such ideas, nor the soul for such thoughts. Perhaps
it will be said, that in a waking man the materials of the body are employed,
and made use of, in thinking; and that the memory of thoughts is retained
by the impressions that are made on the brain, and the traces there left
after such thinking; but that in the thinking of the soul, which is not
perceived in a sleeping man, there the soul thinks apart, and making no
use of the organs of the body, leaves no impressions on it, and consequently
no memory of such thoughts. Not to mention again the absurdity of two distinct
persons, which follows from this supposition, I answer, further,- That
whatever ideas the mind can receive and contemplate without the help of
the body, it is reasonable to conclude it can retain without the help of
the body too; or else the soul, or any separate spirit, will have but little
advantage by thinking. If it has no memory of its own thoughts; if it cannot
lay them up for its own use, and be able to recall them upon occasion;
if it cannot reflect upon what is past, and make use of its former experiences,
reasonings, and contemplations, to what purpose does it think? They who
make the soul a thinking thing, at this rate, will not make it a much more
noble being than those do whom they condemn, for allowing it to be nothing
but the subtilist parts of matter. Characters drawn on dust, that the first
breath of wind effaces; or impressions made on a heap of atoms, or animal
spirits, are altogether as useful, and render the subject as noble, as
the thoughts of a soul that perish in thinking; that, once out of sight,
are gone forever, and leave no memory of themselves behind them. Nature
never makes excellent things for mean or no uses: and it is hardly to be
conceived that our infinitely wise Creator should make so admirable a faculty
which comes nearest the excellency of his own incomprehensible being, to
be so idly and uselessly employed, at least a fourth part of its time here,
as to think constantly, without remembering any of those thoughts, without
doing any good to itself or others, or being any way useful to any other
part of the creation, If we will examine it, we shall not find, I suppose,
the motion of dull and senseless matter, any where in the universe, made
so little use of and so wholly thrown away.
16. On this hypothesis, the soul must have ideas not derived from sensation
or reflection, of which there is no appearance. It is true, we have sometimes
instances of perception whilst we are asleep, and retain the memory of
those thoughts: but how extravagant and incoherent for the most part they
are; how little conformable to the perfection and order of a rational being,
those who are acquainted with dreams need not be told. This I would willingly
be satisfied in,- whether the soul, when it thinks thus apart, and as it
were separate from the body, acts less rationally than when conjointly
with it, or no. If its separate thoughts be less rational, then these men
must say, that the soul owes the perfection of rational thinking to the
body: if it does not, it is a wonder that our dreams should be, for the
most part, so frivolous and irrational; and that the soul should retain
none of its more rational soliloquies and meditations.
17. If I think when I know it not, nobody else can know it. Those who
so confidently tell us that the soul always actually thinks, I would they
would also tell us, what those ideas are that are in the soul of a child,
before or just at the union with the body, before it hath received any
by sensation. The dreams of sleeping men are, as I take it, all made up
of the waking man's ideas; though for the most part oddly put together.
It is strange, if the soul has ideas of its own that it derived not from
sensation or reflection, (as it must have, if it thought before it received
any impressions from the body,) that it should never, in its private thinking,
(so private, that the man himself perceives it not,) retain any of them
the very moment it wakes out of them, and then make the man glad with new
discoveries. Who can find it reason that the soul should, in its retirement
during sleep, have so many hours' thoughts, and yet never light on any
of those ideas it borrowed not from sensation or reflection; or at least
preserve the memory of none but such, which, being occasioned from the
body, must needs be less natural to a spirit? It is strange the soul should
never once in a man's whole life recall over any of its pure native thoughts,
and those ideas it had before it borrowed anything from the body; never
bring into the waking man's view any other ideas but what have a tang of
the cask, and manifestly derive their original from that union. If it always
thinks, and so had ideas before it was united, or before it received any
from the body, it is not to be supposed but that during sleep it recollects
its native ideas; and during that retirement from communicating with the
body, whilst it thinks by itself, the ideas it is busied about should be,
sometimes at least, those more natural and congenial ones which it had
in itself, underived from the body, or its own operations about them: which,
since the waking man never remembers, we must from this hypothesis conclude
either that the soul remembers something that the man does not; or else
that memory belongs only to such ideas as are derived from the body, or
the mind's operations about them.
18. How knows any one that the soul always thinks? For if it be not
a self-evident proposition, it needs proof. I would be glad also to learn
from these men who so confidently pronounce that the human soul, or, which
is all one, that a man always thinks, how they come to know it; nay, how
they come to know that they themselves think when they themselves do not
perceive it. This, I am afraid, is to be sure without proofs, and to know
without perceiving. It is, I suspect, a confused notion, taken up to serve
an hypothesis; and none of those clear truths, that either their own evidence
forces us to admit, or common experience makes it impudence to deny. For
the most that can be said of it is, that it is possible the soul may always
think, but not always retain it in memory. And I say, it is as possible
that the soul may not always think; and much more probable that it should
sometimes not think, than that it should often think, and that a long while
together, and not be conscious to itself, the next moment after, that it
had thought.
19. "That a man should be busy in thinking, and yet not retain it the
next moment," very improbable. To suppose the soul to think, and the man
not to perceive it, is, as has been said, to make two persons in one man.
And if one considers well these men's way of speaking, one should be led
into a suspicion that they do so. For they who tell us that the soul always
thinks, do never, that I remember, say that a man always thinks. Can the
soul think, and not the man? Or a man think, and not be conscious of it?
This, perhaps, would be suspected of jargon in others. If they say the
man thinks always, but is not always conscious of it, they may as well
say his body is extended without having parts. For it is altogether as
intelligible to say that a body is extended without parts, as that anything
thinks without being conscious of it, or perceiving that it does so. They
who talk thus may, with as much reason, if it be necessary to their hypothesis,
say that a man is always hungry, but that he does not always feel it; whereas
hunger consists in that very sensation, as thinking consists in being conscious
that one thinks. If they say that a man is always conscious to himself
of thinking, I ask, How they know it? Consciousness is the perception of
what passes in a man's own mind. Can another man perceive that I am conscious
of anything, when I perceive it not myself? No man's knowledge here can
go beyond his experience. Wake a man out of a sound sleep, and ask him
what he was that moment thinking of. If he himself be conscious of nothing
he then thought on, he must be a notable diviner of thoughts that can assure
him that he was thinking. May he not, with more reason, assure him he was
not asleep? This is something beyond philosophy; and it cannot be less
than revelation, that discovers to another thoughts in my mind, when I
can find none there myself, And they must needs have a penetrating sight
who can certainly see that I think, when I cannot perceive it myself, and
when I declare that I do not; and yet can see that dogs or elephants do
not think, when they give all the demonstration of it imaginable, except
only telling us that they do so. This some may suspect to be a step beyond
the Rosicrucians; it seeming easier to make one's self invisible to others,
than to make another's thoughts visible to me, which are not visible to
himself. But it is but defining the soul to be "a substance that always
thinks," and the business is done. If such definition be of any authority,
I know not what it can serve for but to make many men suspect that they
have no souls at all; since they find a good part of their lives pass away
without thinking. For no definitions that I know, no suppositions of any
sect, are of force enough to destroy constant experience; and perhaps it
is the affectation of knowing beyond what we perceive, that makes so much
useless dispute and noise in the world.
20. No ideas but from sensation and reflection, evident, if we observe
children. I see no reason, therefore, to believe that the soul thinks before
the senses have furnished it with ideas to think on; and as those are increased
and retained, so it comes, by exercise, to improve its faculty of thinking
in the several parts of it; as well as, afterwards, by compounding those
ideas, and reflecting on its own operations, it increases its stock, as
well as facility in remembering, imagining, reasoning, and other modes
of thinking.
21. State of a child in the mother's womb. He that will suffer himself
to be informed by observation and experience, and not make his own hypothesis
the rule of nature, will find few signs of a soul accustomed to much thinking
in a new-born child, and much fewer of any reasoning at all. And yet it
is hard to imagine that the rational soul should think so much, and not
reason at all. And he that will consider that infants newly come into the
world spend the greatest part of their time in sleep, and are seldom awake
but when either hunger calls for the teat, or some pain (the most importunate
of all sensations), or some other violent impression on the body, forces
the mind to perceive and attend to it;- he, I say, who considers this,
will perhaps find reason to imagine that a foetus in the mother's womb
differs not much from the state of a vegetable, but passes the greatest
part of its time without perception or thought; doing very little but sleep
in a place where it needs not seek for food, and is surrounded with liquor,
always equally soft, and near of the same temper; where the eyes have no
light, and the ears so shut up are not very susceptible of sounds; and
where there is little or no variety, or change of objects, to move the
senses.
22. The mind thinks in proportion to the matter it gets from experience
to think about. Follow a child from its birth, and observe the alterations
that time makes, and you shall find, as the mind by the senses comes more
and more to be furnished with ideas, it comes to be more and more awake;
thinks more, the more it has matter to think on. After some time it begins
to know the objects which, being most familiar with it, have made lasting
impressions. Thus it comes by degrees to know the persons it daily converses
with, and distinguishes them from strangers; which are instances and effects
of its coming to retain and distinguish the ideas the senses convey to
it. And so we may observe how the mind, by degrees, improves in these;
and advances to the exercise of those other faculties of enlarging, compounding,
and abstracting its ideas, and of reasoning about them, and reflecting
upon all these; of which I shall have occasion to speak more hereafter.
23. A man begins to have ideas when he first has sensation. What sensation
is. If it shall be demanded then, when a man begins to have any ideas,
I think the true answer is,- when he first has any sensation. For, since
there appear not to be any ideas in the mind before the senses have conveyed
any in, I conceive that ideas in the understanding are coeval with sensation;
which is such an impression or motion made in some part of the body, as
produces some perception in the understanding. It is about these impressions
made on our senses by outward objects that the mind seems first to employ
itself, in such operations as we call perception, remembering, consideration,
reasoning, &c.
24. The original of all our knowledge. In time the mind comes to reflect
on its own operations about the ideas got by sensation, and thereby stores
itself with a new set of ideas, which I call ideas of reflection. These
are the impressions that are made on our senses by outward objects that
are extrinsical to the mind; and its own operations, proceeding from powers
intrinsical and proper to itself, which, when reflected on by itself, become
also objects of its contemplation- are, as I have said, the original of
all knowledge. Thus the first capacity of human intellect is,- that the
mind is fitted to receive the impressions made on it; either through the
senses by outward objects, or by its own operations when it reflects on
them. This is the first step a man makes towards the discovery of anything,
and the groundwork whereon to build all those notions which ever he shall
have naturally in this world. All those sublime thoughts which tower above
the clouds, and reach as high as heaven itself, take their rise and footing
here: in all that great extent wherein the mind wanders, in those remote
speculations it may seem to be elevated with, it stirs not one jot beyond
those ideas which sense or reflection have offered for its contemplation.
25. In the reception of simple ideas, the understanding is for the most
part passive. In this part the understanding is merely passive; and whether
or no it will have these beginnings, and as it were materials of knowledge,
is not in its own power. For the objects of our senses do, many of them,
obtrude their particular ideas upon our minds whether we will or not; and
the operations of our minds will not let us be without, at least, some
obscure notions of them. No man can be wholly ignorant of what he does
when he thinks. These simple ideas, when offered to the mind, the understanding
can no more refuse to have, nor alter when they are imprinted, nor blot
them out and make new ones itself, than a mirror can refuse, alter, or
obliterate the images or ideas which the objects set before it do therein
produce. As the bodies that surround us do diversely affect our organs,
the mind is forced to receive the impressions; and cannot avoid the perception
of those ideas that are annexed to them.
Chapter II: Of Simple Ideas
1. Uncompounded appearances. The better to understand the nature, manner,
and extent of our knowledge, one thing is carefully to be observed concerning
the ideas we have; and that is, that some of them are simple and some complex.
Though the qualities that affect our senses are, in the things themselves,
so united and blended, that there is no separation, no distance between
them; yet it is plain, the ideas they produce in the mind enter by the
senses simple and unmixed. For, though the sight and touch often take in
from the same object, at the same time, different ideas;- as a man sees
at once motion and colour; the hand feels softness and warmth in the same
piece of wax: yet the simple ideas thus united in the same subject, are
as perfectly distinct as those that come in by different senses. The coldness
and hardness which a man feels in a piece of ice being as distinct ideas
in the mind as the smell and whiteness of a lily; or as the taste of sugar,
and smell of a rose. And there is nothing can be plainer to a man than
the clear and distinct perception he has of those simple ideas; which,
being each in itself uncompounded, contains in it nothing but one uniform
appearance, or conception in the mind, and is not distinguishable into
different ideas.
2. The mind can neither make nor destroy them. These simple ideas, the
materials of all our knowledge, are suggested and furnished to the mind
only by those two ways above mentioned, viz. sensation and reflection.
When the understanding is once stored with these simple ideas, it has the
power to repeat, compare, and unite them, even to an almost infinite variety,
and so can make at pleasure new complex ideas. But it is not in the power
of the most exalted wit, or enlarged understanding, by any quickness or
variety of thought, to invent or frame one new simple idea in the mind,
not taken in by the ways before mentioned: nor can any force of the understanding
destroy those that are there. The dominion of man, in this little world
of his own understanding being muchwhat the same as it is in the great
world of visible things; wherein his power, however managed by art and
skill, reaches no farther than to compound and divide the materials that
are made to his hand; but can do nothing towards the making the least particle
of new matter, or destroying one atom of what is already in being. The
same inability will every one find in himself, who shall go about to fashion
in his understanding one simple idea, not received in by his senses from
external objects, or by reflection from the operations of his own mind
about them. I would have any one try to fancy any taste which had never
affected his palate; or frame the idea of a scent he had never smelt: and
when he can do this, I will also conclude that a blind man hath ideas of
colours, and a deaf man true distinct notions of sounds.
3. Only the qualities that affect the senses are imaginable. This is
the reason why- though we cannot believe it impossible to God to make a
creature with other organs, and more ways to convey into the understanding
the notice of corporeal things than those five, as they are usually counted,
which he has given to man- yet I think it is not possible for any man to
imagine any other qualities in bodies, howsoever constituted, whereby they
can be taken notice of, besides sounds, tastes, smells, visible and tangible
qualities. And had mankind been made but with four senses, the qualities
then which are the objects of the fifth sense had been as far from our
notice, imagination, and conception, as now any belonging to a sixth, seventh,
or eighth sense can possibly be;- which, whether yet some other creatures,
in some other parts of this vast and stupendous universe, may not have,
will be a great presumption to deny. He that will not set himself proudly
at the top of all things, but will consider the immensity of this fabric,
and the great variety that is to be found in this little and inconsiderable
part of it which he has to do with, may be apt to think that, in other
mansions of it, there may be other and different intelligent beings, of
whose faculties he has as little knowledge or apprehension as a worm shut
up in one drawer of a cabinet hath of the senses or understanding of a
man; such variety and excellency being suitable to the wisdom and power
of the Maker. I have here followed the common opinion of man's having but
five senses; though, perhaps, there may be justly counted more;- but either
supposition serves equally to my present purpose.
Chapter III: Of Simple Ideas of Sense
1. Division of simple ideas. The better to conceive the ideas we receive
from sensation, it may not be amiss for us to consider them, in reference
to the different ways whereby they make their approaches to our minds,
and make themselves perceivable by us.
First, then, There are some which come into our minds by one sense only.
Secondly, There are others that convey themselves into the mind by more
senses than one.
Thirdly, Others that are had from reflection only.
Fourthly, There are some that make themselves way, and are suggested
to the mind by all the ways of sensation and reflection.
We shall consider them apart under these several heads.
Ideas of one sense. There are some ideas which have admittance only
through one sense, which is peculiarly adapted to receive them. Thus light
and colours, as white, red, yellow, blue; with their several degrees or
shades and mixtures, as green, scarlet, purple, sea-green, and the rest,
come in only by the eyes. All kinds of noises, sounds, and tones, only
by the ears. The several tastes and smells, by the nose and palate. And
if these organs, or the nerves which are the conduits to convey them from
without to their audience in the brain,- the mind's presence-room (as I
may so call it)- are any of them so disordered as not to perform their
functions, they have no postern to be admitted by; no other way to bring
themselves into view, and be perceived by the understanding.
The most considerable of those belonging to the touch, are heat and
cold, and solidity: all the rest, consisting almost wholly in the sensible
configuration, as smooth and rough; or else, more or less firm adhesion
of the parts, as hard and soft, tough and brittle, are obvious enough.
2. Few simple ideas have names. I think it will be needless to enumerate
all the particular simple ideas belonging to each sense. Nor indeed is
it possible if we would; there being a great many more of them belonging
to most of the senses than we have names for. The variety of smells, which
are as many almost, if not more, than species of bodies in the world, do
most of them want names. Sweet and stinking commonly serve our turn for
these ideas, which in effect is little more than to call them pleasing
or displeasing; though the smell of a rose and violet, both sweet, are
certainly very distinct ideas. Nor are the different tastes, that by our
palates we receive ideas of, much better provided with names. Sweet, bitter,
sour, harsh, and salt are almost all the epithets we have to denominate
that numberless variety of relishes, which are to be found distinct, not
only in almost every sort of creatures, but in the different parts of the
same plant, fruit, or animal. The same may be said of colours and sounds.
I shall, therefore, in the account of simple ideas I am here giving, content
myself to set down only such as are most material to our present purpose,
or are in themselves less apt to be taken notice of though they are very
frequently the ingredients of our complex ideas; amongst which, I think,
I may well account solidity, which therefore I shall treat of in the next
chapter.
Chapter IV: Idea of Solidity
1. We receive this idea from touch. The idea of solidity we receive by
our touch: and it arises from the resistance which we find in body to the
entrance of any other body into the place it possesses, till it has left
it. There is no idea which we receive more constantly from sensation than
solidity. Whether we move or rest, in what posture soever we are, we always
feel something under us that support us, and hinders our further sinking
downwards; and the bodies which we daily handle make us perceive that,
whilst they remain between them, they do, by an insurmountable force, hinder
the approach of the parts of our hands that press them. That which thus
hinders the approach of two bodies, when they are moved one towards another,
I call solidity. I will not dispute whether this acceptation of the word
solid be nearer to its original signification than that which mathematicians
use it in. It suffices that I think the common notion of solidity will
allow, if not justify, this use of it; but if any one think it better to
call it impenetrability, he has my consent. Only I have thought the term
solidity the more proper to express this idea, not only because of its
vulgar use in that sense, but also because it carries something more of
positive in it than impenetrability; which is negative, and is perhaps
more a consequence of solidity, than solidity itself. This, of all other,
seems the idea most intimately connected with, and essential to body; so
as nowhere else to be found or imagined, but only in matter. And though
our senses take no notice of it, but in masses of matter, of a bulk sufficient
to cause a sensation in us: yet the mind, having once got this idea from
such grosser sensible bodies, traces it further, and considers it, as well
as figure, in the minutest particle of matter that can exist; and finds
it inseparably inherent in body, wherever or however modified.
2. Solidity fills space. This is the idea which belongs to body, whereby
we conceive it to fill space. The idea of which filling of space is,- that
where we imagine any space taken up by a solid substance, we conceive it
so to possess it, that it excludes all other solid substances; and will
for ever hinder any other two bodies, that move towards one another in
a straight line, from coming to touch one another, unless it removes from
between them in a line not parallel to that which they move in. This idea
of it, the bodies which we ordinarily handle sufficiently furnish us with.
3. Distinct from space. This resistance, whereby it keeps other bodies
out of the space which it possesses, is so great, that no force, how great
soever, can surmount it. All the bodies in the world, pressing a drop of
water on all sides, will never be able to overcome the resistance which
it will make, soft as it is, to their approaching one another, till it
be removed out of their way: whereby our idea of solidity is distinguished
both from pure space, which is capable neither of resistance nor motion;
and from the ordinary idea of hardness. For a man may conceive two bodies
at a distance, so as they may approach one another, without touching or
displacing any solid thing, till their superficies come to meet; whereby,
I think, we have the clear idea of space without solidity. For (not to
go so far as annihilation of any particular body) I ask, whether a man
cannot have the idea of the motion of one single body alone, without any
other succeeding immediately into its place? I think it is evident he can:
the idea of motion in one body no more including the idea of motion in
another, than the idea of a square figure in one body includes the idea
of a square figure in another. I do not ask, whether bodies do so exist,
that the motion of one body cannot really be without the motion of another.
To determine this either way, is to beg the question for or against a vacuum.
But my question is,- whether one cannot have the idea of one body moved,
whilst others are at rest? And I think this no one will deny. If so, then
the place it deserted gives us the idea of pure space without solidity;
whereinto any other body may enter, without either resistance or protrusion
of anything. When the sucker in a pump is drawn, the space it filled in
the tube is certainly the same whether any other body follows the motion
of the sucker or not: nor does it imply a contradiction that, upon the
motion of one body, another that is only contiguous to it should not follow
it. The necessity of such a motion is built only on the supposition that
the world is full; but not on the distinct ideas of space and solidity,
which are as different as resistance and not resistance, protrusion and
not protrusion. And that men have ideas of space without a body, their
very disputes about a vacuum plainly demonstrate, as is shown in another
place.
4. From hardness. Solidity is hereby also differenced from hardness,
in that solidity consists in repletion, and so an utter exclusion of other
bodies out of the space it possesses: but hardness, in a firm cohesion
of the parts of matter, making up masses of a sensible bulk, so that the
whole does not easily change its figure. And indeed, hard and soft are
names that we give to things only in relation to the constitutions of our
own bodies; that being generally called hard by us, which will put us to
pain sooner than change figure by the pressure of any part of our bodies;
and that, on the contrary, soft, which changes the situation of its parts
upon an easy and unpainful touch.
But this difficulty of changing the situation of the sensible parts
amongst themselves, or of the figure of the whole, gives no more solidity
to the hardest body in the world than to the softest; nor is an adamant
one jot more solid than water. For, though the two flat sides of two pieces
of marble will more easily approach each other, between which there is
nothing but water or air, than if there be a diamond between them; yet
it is not that the parts of the diamond are more solid than those of water,
or resist more; but because the parts of water, being more easily separable
from each other, they will, by a side motion, be more easily removed, and
give way to the approach of the two pieces of marble. But if they could
be kept from making place by that side motion, they would eternally hinder
the approach of these two pieces of marble, as much as the diamond; and
it would be as impossible by any force to surmount their resistance, as
to surmount the resistance of the parts of a diamond. The softest body
in the world will as invincibly resist the coming together of any other
two bodies, if it be not put out of the way, but remain between them, as
the hardest that can be found or imagined. He that shall fill a yielding
soft body well with air or water, will quickly find its resistance. And
he that thinks that nothing but bodies that are hard can keep his hands
from approaching one another, may be pleased to make a trial, with the
air inclosed in a football. The experiment, I have been told, was made
at Florence, with a hollow globe of gold filled with water, and exactly
closed; which further shows the solidity of so soft a body as water. For
the golden globe thus filled, being put into a press, which was driven
by the extreme force of screws, the water made itself way through the pores
of that very close metal, and finding no room for a nearer approach of
its particles within, got to the outside, where it rose like a dew, and
so fell in drops, before the sides of the globe could be made to yield
to the violent compression of the engine that squeezed it.
5. On solidity depend impulse, resistance, and protrusion. By this idea
of solidity is the extension of body distinguished from the extension of
space:- the extension of body being nothing but the cohesion or continuity
of solid, separable, movable parts; and the extension of space, the continuity
of unsolid, inseparable, and immovable parts. Upon the solidity of bodies
also depend their mutual impulse, resistance, and protrusion. Of pure space
then, and solidity, there are several (amongst which I confess myself one)
who persuade themselves they have clear and distinct ideas; and that they
can think on space, without anything in it that resists or is protruded
by body. This is the idea of pure space, which they think they have as
clear as any idea they can have of the extension of body: the idea of the
distance between the opposite parts of a concave superficies being equally
as clear without as with the idea of any solid parts between: and on the
other side, they persuade themselves that they have, distinct from that
of pure space, the idea of something that fills space, that can be protruded
by the impulse of other bodies, or resist their motion. If there be others
that have not these two ideas distinct, but confound them, and make but
one of them, I know not how men, who have the same idea under different
names, or different ideas under the same name, can in that case talk with
one another; any more than a man who, not being blind or deaf, has distinct
ideas of the colour of scarlet and the sound of a trumpet, could discourse
concerning scarlet colour with the blind man I mentioned in another place,
who fancied that the idea of scarlet was like the sound of a trumpet.
6. What solidity is. If any one ask me, What this solidity is, I send
him to his senses to inform him. Let him put a flint or a football between
his hands, and then endeavour to join them, and he will know. If he thinks
this not a sufficient explication of solidity, what it is, and wherein
it consists; I promise to tell him what it is, and wherein it consists,
when he tells me what thinking is, or wherein it consists; or explains
to me what extension or motion is, which perhaps seems much easier. The
simple ideas we have, are such as experience teaches them us; but if, beyond
that, we endeavour by words to make them clearer in the mind, we shall
succeed no better than if we went about to clear up the darkness of a blind
man's mind by talking; and to discourse into him the ideas of light and
colours. The reason of this I shall show in another place.
Chapter V: Of Simple Ideas of Divers Senses
Ideas received both by seeing and touching. The ideas we get by more than
one sense are, of space or extension, figure, rest, and motion. For these
make perceivable impressions, both on the eyes and touch; and we can receive
and convey into our minds the ideas of the extension, figure, motion, and
rest of bodies, both by seeing and feeling. But having occasion to speak
more at large of these in another place, I here only enumerate them.
Chapter VI: Of Simple Ideas of Reflection
1. Simple ideas are the operations of mind about its other ideas. The mind
receiving the ideas mentioned in the foregoing chapters from without, when
it turns its view inward upon itself, and observes its own actions about
those ideas it has, takes from thence other ideas, which are as capable
to be the objects of its contemplation as any of those it received from
foreign things.
2. The idea of perception, and idea of willing, we have from reflection.
The two great and principal actions of the mind, which are most frequently
considered, and which are so frequent that every one that pleases may take
notice of them in himself, are these two:-
Perception, or Thinking; and
Volition, or Willing.
The power of thinking is called the Understanding, and the power of
volition is called the Will; and these two powers or abilities in the mind
are denominated faculties.
Of some of the modes of these simple ideas of reflection, such as are
remembrance, discerning, reasoning, judging, knowledge, faith, &c.,
I shall have occasion to speak hereafter.
Chapter VII: Of Simple Ideas of both Sensation and
Reflection
1. Ideas of pleasure and pain. There be other simple ideas which convey
themselves into the mind by all the ways of sensation and reflection, viz.
pleasure or delight, and its opposite, pain, or uneasiness; power; existence;
unity.
2. Mix with almost all our other ideas. Delight or uneasiness, one or
other of them, join themselves to almost all our ideas both of sensation
and reflection: and there is scarce any affection of our senses from without,
any retired thought of our mind within, which is not able to produce in
us pleasure or pain. By pleasure and pain, I would be understood to signify,
whatsoever delights or molests us; whether it arises from the thoughts
of our minds, or anything operating on our bodies. For, whether we call
it satisfaction, delight, pleasure, happiness, &c., on the one side,
or uneasiness, trouble, pain, torment, anguish, misery, &c., on the
other, they are still but different degrees of the same thing, and belong
to the ideas of pleasure and pain, delight or uneasiness; which are the
names I shall most commonly use for those two sorts of ideas.
3. As motives of our actions. The infinite wise Author of our being,
having given us the power over several parts of our bodies, to move or
keep them at rest as we think fit; and also. by the motion of them, to
move ourselves and other contiguous bodies, in which consist all the actions
of our body: having also given a power to our minds, in several instances,
to choose, amongst its ideas, which it will think on, and to pursue the
inquiry of this or that subject with consideration and attention, to excite
us to these actions of thinking and motion that we are capable of,- has
been pleased to join to several thoughts, and several sensations a perception
of delight. If this were wholly separated from all our outward sensations,
and inward thoughts, we should have no reason to prefer one thought or
action to another; negligence to attention, or motion to rest. And so we
should neither stir our bodies, nor employ our minds, but let our thoughts
(if I may so call it) run adrift, without any direction or design, and
suffer the ideas of our minds, like unregarded shadows, to make their appearances
there, as it happened, without attending to them. In which state man, however
furnished with the faculties of understanding and will, would be a very
idle, inactive creature, and pass his time only in a lazy, lethargic dream.
It has therefore pleased our wise Creator to annex to several objects,
and the ideas which we receive from them, as also to several of our thoughts,
a concomitant pleasure, and that in several objects, to several degrees,
that those faculties which he had endowed us with might not remain wholly
idle and unemployed by us.
4. An end and use of pain. Pain has the same efficacy and use to set
us on work that pleasure has, we being as ready to employ our faculties
to avoid that, as to pursue this: only this is worth our consideration,
that pain is often produced by the same objects and ideas that produce
pleasure in us. This their near conjunction, which makes us often feel
pain in the sensations where we expected pleasure, gives us new occasion
of admiring the wisdom and goodness of our Maker, who, designing the preservation
of our being, has annexed pain to the application of many things to our
bodies, to warn us of the harm that they will do, and as advices to withdraw
from them. But he, not designing our preservation barely, but the preservation
of every part and organ in its perfection, hath in many cases annexed pain
to those very ideas which delight us. Thus heat, that is very agreeable
to us in one degree, by a little greater increase of it proves no ordinary
torment: and the most pleasant of all sensible objects, light itself, if
there be too much of it, if increased beyond a due proportion to our eyes,
causes a very painful sensation. Which is wisely and favourably so ordered
by nature, that when any object does, by the vehemency of its operation,
disorder the instruments of sensation, whose structures cannot but be very
nice and delicate, we might, by the pain, be warned to withdraw, before
the organ be quite put out of order, and so be unfitted for its proper
function for the future. The consideration of those objects that produce
it may well persuade us, that this is the end or use of pain. For, though
great light be insufferable to our eyes, yet the highest degree of darkness
does not at all disease them: because that, causing no disorderly motion
in it, leaves that curious organ unharmed in its natural state. But yet
excess of cold as well as heat pains us: because it is equally destructive
to that temper which is necessary to the preservation of life, and the
exercise of the several functions of the body, and which consists in a
moderate degree of warmth; or, if you please, a motion of the insensible
parts of our bodies, confined within certain bounds.
5. Another end. Beyond all this, we may find another reason why God
hath scattered up and down several degrees of pleasure and pain, in all
the things that environ and affect us; and blended them together in almost
all that our thoughts and senses have to do with;- that we, finding imperfection,
dissatisfaction, and want of complete happiness, in all the enjoyments
which the creatures can afford us, might be led to seek it in the enjoyment
of Him with whom there is fullness of joy, and at whose right hand are
pleasures for evermore.
6. Goodness of God in annexing pleasure and pain to our other ideas.
Though what I have here said may not, perhaps, make the ideas of pleasure
and pain clearer to us than our own experience does, which is the only
way that we are capable of having them; yet the consideration of the reason
why they are annexed to so many other ideas, serving to give us due sentiments
of the wisdom and goodness of the Sovereign Disposer of all things, may
not be unsuitable to the main end of these inquiries: the knowledge and
veneration of him being the chief end of all our thoughts, and the proper
business of all understandings.
7. Ideas of existence and unity. Existence and Unity are two other ideas
that are suggested to the understanding by every object without, and every
idea within. When ideas are in our minds, we consider them as being actually
there, as well as we consider things to be actually without us;- which
is, that they exist, or have existence. And whatever we can consider as
one thing, whether a real being or idea, suggests to the understanding
the idea of unity.
8. Idea of power. Power also is another of those simple ideas which
we receive from sensation and reflection. For, observing in ourselves that
we do and can think, and that we can at pleasure move several parts of
our bodies which were at rest; the effects, also, that natural bodies are
able to produce in one another, occurring every moment to our senses,-
we both these ways get the idea of power.
9. Idea of succession. Besides these there is another idea, which, though
suggested by our senses, yet is more constantly offered to us by what passes
in our minds; and that is the idea of succession. For if we look immediately
into ourselves, and reflect on what is observable there, we shall find
our ideas always, whilst we are awake, or have any thought, passing in
train, one going and another coming, without intermission.
10. Simple ideas the materials of all our knowledge. These, if they
are not all, are at least (as I think) the most considerable of those simple
ideas which the mind has, and out of which is made all its other knowledge;
all which it receives only by the two forementioned ways of sensation and
reflection.
Nor let any one think these too narrow bounds for the capacious mind
of man to expatiate in, which takes its flight further than the stars,
and cannot be confined by the limits of the world; that extends its thoughts
often even beyond the utmost expansion of Matter, and makes excursions
into that incomprehensible Inane. I grant all this, but desire any one
to assign any simple idea which is not received from one of those inlets
before mentioned, or any complex idea not made out of those simple ones.
Nor will it be so strange to think these few simple ideas sufficient to
employ the quickest thought, or largest capacity; and to furnish the materials
of all that various knowledge, and more various fancies and opinions of
all mankind, if we consider how many words may be made out of the various
composition of twenty-four letters; or if, going one step further, we will
but reflect on the variety of combinations that may be made with barely
one of the above-mentioned ideas, viz. number, whose stock is inexhaustible
and truly infinite: and what a large and immense field doth extension alone
afford the mathematicians?
Chapter VIII: Some further considerations concerning
our Simple Ideas of Sensation
1. Positive ideas from privative causes. Concerning the simple ideas of
Sensation, it is to be considered,- that whatsoever is so constituted in
nature as to be able, by affecting our senses, to cause any perception
in the mind, doth thereby produce in the understanding a simple idea; which,
whatever be the external cause of it, when it comes to be taken notice
of by our discerning faculty, it is by the mind looked on and considered
there to be a real positive idea in the understanding, as much as any other
whatsoever; though, perhaps, the cause of it be but a privation of the
subject.
2. Ideas in the mind distinguished from that in things which gives rise
to them. Thus the ideas of heat and cold, light and darkness, white and
black, motion and rest, are equally clear and positive ideas in the mind;
though, perhaps, some of the causes which produce them are barely privations,
in those subjects from whence our senses derive those ideas. These the
understanding, in its view of them, considers all as distinct positive
ideas, without taking notice of the causes that produce them: which is
an inquiry not belonging to the idea, as it is in the understanding, but
to the nature of the things existing without us. These are two very different
things, and carefully to be distinguished; it being one thing to perceive
and know the idea of white or black, and quite another to examine what
kind of particles they must be, and how ranged in the superficies, to make
any object appear white or black.
3. We may have the ideas when we are ignorant of their physical causes.
A painter or dyer who never inquired into their causes hath the ideas of
white and black, and other colours, as clearly, perfectly, and distinctly
in his understanding, and perhaps more distinctly, than the philosopher
who hath busied himself in considering their natures, and thinks he knows
how far either of them is, in its cause, positive or privative; and the
idea of black is no less positive in his mind than that of white, however
the cause of that colour in the external object may be only a privation.
4. Why a privative cause in nature may occasion a positive idea. If
it were the design of my present undertaking to inquire into the natural
causes and manner of perception, I should offer this as a reason why a
privative cause might, in some cases at least, produce a positive idea;
viz. that all sensation being produced in us only by different degrees
and modes of motion in our animal spirits, variously agitated by external
objects, the abatement of any former motion must as necessarily produce
a new sensation as the variation or increase of it; and so introduce a
new idea, which depends only on a different motion of the animal spirits
in that organ.
5. Negative names need not be meaningless. But whether this be so or
not I will not here determine, but appeal to every one's own experience,
whether the shadow of a man, though it consists of nothing but the absence
of light (and the more the absence of light is, the more discernible is
the shadow) does not, when a man looks on it, cause as clear and positive
idea in his mind as a man himself, though covered over with clear sunshine?
And the picture of a shadow is a positive thing. Indeed, we have negative
names, which stand not directly for positive ideas, but for their absence,
such as insipid, silence, nihil, &c.; which words denote positive ideas,
v.g. taste, sound, being, with a signification of their absence.
6. Whether any ideas are due to causes really privative. And thus one
may truly be said to see darkness. For, supposing a hole perfectly dark,
from whence no light is reflected, it is certain one may see the figure
of it, or it may be painted; or whether the ink I write with makes any
other idea, is a question. The privative causes I have here assigned of
positive ideas are according to the common opinion; but, in truth, it will
be hard to determine whether there be really any ideas from a privative
cause, till it be determined, whether rest be any more a privation than
motion.
7. Ideas in the mind, qualities in bodies. To discover the nature of
our ideas the better, and to discourse of them intelligibly, it will be
convenient to distinguish them as they are ideas or perceptions in our
minds; and as they are modifications of matter in the bodies that cause
such perceptions in us: that so we may not think (as perhaps usually is
done) that they are exactly the images and resemblances of something inherent
in the subject; most of those of sensation being in the mind no more the
likeness of something existing without us, than the names that stand for
them are the likeness of our ideas, which yet upon hearing they are apt
to excite in us.
8. Our ideas and the qualities of bodies. Whatsoever the mind perceives
in itself, or is the immediate object of perception, thought, or understanding,
that I call idea; and the power to produce any idea in our mind, I call
quality of the subject wherein that power is. Thus a snowball having the
power to produce in us the ideas of white, cold, and round,- the power
to produce those ideas in us, as they are in the snowball, I call qualities;
and as they are sensations or perceptions in our understandings, I call
them ideas; which ideas, if I speak of sometimes as in the things themselves,
I would be understood to mean those qualities in the objects which produce
them in us.
9. Primary qualities of bodies. Qualities thus considered in bodies
are,
First, such as are utterly inseparable from the body, in what state
soever it be; and such as in all the alterations and changes it suffers,
all the force can be used upon it, it constantly keeps; and such as sense
constantly finds in every particle of matter which has bulk enough to be
perceived; and the mind finds inseparable from every particle of matter,
though less than to make itself singly be perceived by our senses: v.g.
Take a grain of wheat, divide it into two parts; each part has still solidity,
extension, figure, and mobility: divide it again, and it retains still
the same qualities; and so divide it on, till the parts become insensible;
they must retain still each of them all those qualities. For division (which
is all that a mill, or pestle, or any other body, does upon another, in
reducing it to insensible parts) can never take away either solidity, extension,
figure, or mobility from any body, but only makes two or more distinct
separate masses of matter, of that which was but one before; all which
distinct masses, reckoned as so many distinct bodies, after division, make
a certain number. These I call original or primary qualities of body, which
I think we may observe to produce simple ideas in us, viz. solidity, extension,
figure, motion or rest, and number.
10. Secondary qualities of bodies. Secondly, such qualities which in
truth are nothing in the objects themselves but power to produce various
sensations in us by their primary qualities, i.e. by the bulk, figure,
texture, and motion of their insensible parts, as colours, sounds, tastes,
&c. These I call secondary qualities. To these might be added a third
sort, which are allowed to be barely powers; though they are as much real
qualities in the subject as those which I, to comply with the common way
of speaking, call qualities, but for distinction, secondary qualities.
For the power in fire to produce a new colour, or consistency, in wax or
clay,- by its primary qualities, is as much a quality in fire, as the power
it has to produce in me a new idea or sensation of warmth or burning, which
I felt not before,- by the same primary qualities, viz. the bulk, texture,
and motion of its insensible parts.
11. How bodies produce ideas in us. The next thing to be considered
is, how bodies produce ideas in us; and that is manifestly by impulse,
the only way which we can conceive bodies to operate in.
12. By motions, external, and in our organism. If then external objects
be not united to our minds when they produce ideas therein; and yet we
perceive these original qualities in such of them as singly fall under
our senses, it is evident that some motion must be thence continued by
our nerves, or animal spirits, by some parts of our bodies, to the brains
or the seat of sensation, there to produce in our minds the particular
ideas we have of them. And since the extension, figure, number, and motion
of bodies of an observable bigness, may be perceived at a distance by the
sight, it is evident some singly imperceptible bodies must come from them
to the eyes, and thereby convey to the brain some motion; which produces
these ideas which we have of them in us.
13. How secondary qualities produce their ideas. After the same manner,
that the ideas of these original qualities are produced in us, we may conceive
that the ideas of secondary qualities are also produced, viz. by the operation
of insensible particles on our senses. For, it being manifest that there
are bodies and good store of bodies, each whereof are so small, that we
cannot by any of our senses discover either their bulk, figure, or motion,-
as is evident in the particles of the air and water, and others extremely
smaller than those; perhaps as much smaller than the particles of air and
water, as the particles of air and water are smaller than peas or hail-stones;-
let us suppose at present that the different motions and figures, bulk
and number, of such particles, affecting the several organs of our senses,
produce in us those different sensations which we have from the colours
and smells of bodies; v.g. that a violet, by the impulse of such insensible
particles of matter, of peculiar figures and bulks, and in different degrees
and modifications of their motions, causes the ideas of the blue colour,
and sweet scent of that flower to be produced in our minds. It being no
more impossible to conceive that God should annex such ideas to such motions,
with which they have no similitude, than that he should annex the idea
of pain to the motion of a piece of steel dividing our flesh, with which
that idea hath no resemblance.
14. They depend on the primary qualities. What I have said concerning
colours and smells may be understood also of tastes and sounds, and other
the like sensible qualities; which, whatever reality we by mistake attribute
to them, are in truth nothing in the objects themselves, but powers to
produce various sensations in us; and depend on those primary qualities,
viz. bulk, figure, texture, and motion of parts as I have said.
15. Ideas of primary qualities are resemblances; of secondary, not.
From whence I think it easy to draw this observation,- that the ideas of
primary qualities of bodies are resemblances of them, and their patterns
do really exist in the bodies themselves, but the ideas produced in us
by these secondary qualities have no resemblance of them at all. There
is nothing like our ideas, existing in the bodies themselves. They are,
in the bodies we denominate from them, only a power to produce those sensations
in us: and what is sweet, blue, or warm in idea, is but the certain bulk,
figure, and motion of the insensible parts, in the bodies themselves, which
we call so.
16. Examples. Flame is denominated hot and light; snow, white and cold;
and manna, white and sweet, from the ideas they produce in us. Which qualities
are commonly thought to be the same in those bodies that those ideas are
in us, the one the perfect resemblance of the other, as they are in a mirror,
and it would by most men be judged very extravagant if one should say otherwise.
And yet he that will consider that the same fire that, at one distance
produces in us the sensation of warmth, does, at a nearer approach, produce
in us the far different sensation of pain, ought to bethink himself what
reason he has to say- that this idea of warmth, which was produced in him
by the fire, is actually in the fire; and his idea of pain, which the same
fire produced in him the same way, is not in the fire. Why are whiteness
and coldness in snow, and pain not, when it produces the one and the other
idea in us; and can do neither, but by the bulk, figure, number, and motion
of its solid parts?
17. The ideas of the primary alone really exist. The particular bulk,
number, figure, and motion of the parts of fire or snow are really in them,-
whether any one's senses perceive them or no: and therefore they may be
called real qualities, because they really exist in those bodies. But light,
heat, whiteness, or coldness, are no more really in them than sickness
or pain is in manna. Take away the sensation of them; let not the eyes
see light or colours, nor the ears hear sounds; let the palate not taste,
nor the nose smell, and all colours, tastes, odours, and sounds, as they
are such particular ideas, vanish and cease, and are reduced to their causes,
i.e. bulk, figure, and motion of parts.
18. The secondary exist in things only as modes of the primary. A piece
of manna of a sensible bulk is able to produce in us the idea of a round
or square figure; and by being removed from one place to another, the idea
of motion. This idea of motion represents it as it really is in manna moving:
a circle or square are the same, whether in idea or existence, in the mind
or in the manna. And this, both motion and figure, are really in the manna,
whether we take notice of them or no: this everybody is ready to agree
to. Besides, manna, by tie bulk, figure, texture, and motion of its parts,
has a power to produce the sensations of sickness, and sometimes of acute
pains or gripings in us. That these ideas of sickness and pain are not
in the manna, but effects of its operations on us, and are nowhere when
we feel them not; this also every one readily agrees to. And yet men are
hardly to be brought to think that sweetness and whiteness are not really
in manna; which are but the effects of the operations of manna, by the
motion, size, and figure of its particles, on the eyes and palate: as the
pain and sickness caused by manna are confessedly nothing but the effects
of its operations on the stomach and guts, by the size, motion, and figure
of its insensible parts, (for by nothing else can a body operate, as has
been proved): as if it could not operate on the eyes and palate, and thereby
produce in the mind particular distinct ideas, which in itself it has not,
as well as we allow it can operate on the guts and stomach, and thereby
produce distinct ideas, which in itself it has not. These ideas, being
all effects of the operations of manna on several parts of our bodies,
by the size, figure number, and motion of its parts;- why those produced
by the eyes and palate should rather be thought to be really in the manna,
than those produced by the stomach and guts; or why the pain and sickness,
ideas that are the effect of manna, should be thought to be nowhere when
they are not felt; and yet the sweetness and whiteness, effects of the
same manna on other parts of the body, by ways equally as unknown, should
be thought to exist in the manna, when they are not seen or tasted, would
need some reason to explain.
19. Examples. Let us consider the red and white colours in porphyry.
Hinder light from striking on it, and its colours vanish; it no longer
produces any such ideas in us: upon the return of light it produces these
appearances on us again. Can any one think any real alterations are made
in the porphyry by the presence or absence of light; and that those ideas
of whiteness and redness are really in porphyry in. the light, when it
is plain it has no colour in the dark? It has, indeed, such a configuration
of particles, both night and day, as are apt, by the rays of light rebounding
from some parts of that hard stone, to produce in us the idea of redness,
and from others the idea of whiteness; but whiteness or redness are not
in it at any time, but such a texture that hath the power to produce such
a sensation in us.
20. Pound an almond, and the clear white colour will be altered into
a dirty one, and the sweet taste into an oily one. What real alteration
can the beating of the pestle make in any body, but an alteration of the
texture of it?
21. Explains how water felt as cold by one hand may be warm to the other.
Ideas being thus distinguished and understood, we may be able to give an
account how the same water, at the same time, may produce the idea of cold
by one hand and of heat by the other: whereas it is impossible that the
same water, if those ideas were really in it, should at the same time be
both hot and cold. For, if we imagine warmth, as it is in our hands, to
be nothing but a certain sort and degree of motion in the minute particles
of our nerves or animal spirits, we may understand how it is possible that
the same water may, at the same time, produce the sensations of heat in
one hand and cold in the other; which yet figure never does, that never
producing- the idea of a square by one hand which has produced the idea
of a globe by another. But if the sensation of heat and cold be nothing
but the increase or diminution of the motion of the minute parts of our
bodies, caused by the corpuscles of any other body, it is easy to be understood,
that if that motion be greater in one hand than in the other; if a body
be applied to the two hands, which has in its minute particles a greater
motion than in those of one of the hands, and a less than in those of the
other, it will increase the motion of the one hand and lessen it in the
other; and so cause the different sensations of heat and cold that depend
thereon.
22. An excursion into natural philosophy. I have in what just goes before
been engaged in physical inquiries a little further than perhaps I intended.
But, it being necessary to make the nature of sensation a little understood;
and to make the difference between the qualities in bodies, and the ideas
produced by them in the mind, to be distinctly conceived, without which
it were impossible to discourse intelligibly of them;- I hope I shall be
pardoned this little excursion into natural philosophy; it being necessary
in our present inquiry to distinguish the primary and real qualities of
bodies, which are always in them (viz. solidity, extension, figure, number,
and motion, or rest, and are sometimes perceived by us, viz. when the bodies
they are in are big enough singly to be discerned), from those secondary
and imputed qualities, which are but the powers of several combinations
of those primary ones, when they operate without being distinctly discerned;-
whereby we may also come to know what ideas are, and what are not, resemblances
of something really existing in the bodies we denominate from them.
23. Three sorts of qualities in bodies. The qualities, then, that are
in bodies, rightly considered, are of three sorts:-
First, The bulk, figure, number, situation, and motion or rest of their
solid parts. Those are in them, whether we perceive them or not; and when
they are of that size that we can discover them, we have by these an idea
of the thing as it is in itself; as is plain in artificial things. These
I call primary qualities.
Secondly, The power that is in any body, by reason of its insensible
primary qualities, to operate after a peculiar manner on any of our senses,
and thereby produce in us the different ideas of several colours, sounds,
smells, tastes, &c. These are usually called sensible qualities.
Thirdly, The power that is in any body, by reason of the particular
constitution of its primary qualities, to make such a change in the bulk,
figure, texture, and motion of another body, as to make it operate on our
senses differently from what it did before. Thus the sun has a power to
make wax white, and fire to make lead fluid. These are usually called powers.
The first of these, as has been said, I think may be properly called
real, original, or primary qualities; because they are in the things themselves,
whether they are perceived or not: and upon their different modifications
it is that the secondary qualities depend.
The other two are only powers to act differently upon other things:
which powers result from the different modifications of those primary qualities.
24. The first are resemblances; the second thought to be resemblances,
but are not; the third neither are nor are thought so. But, though the
two latter sorts of qualities are powers barely, and nothing but powers,
relating to several other bodies, and resulting from the different modifications
of the original qualities, yet they are generally otherwise thought of.
For the second sort, viz, the powers to produce several ideas in us, by
our senses, are looked upon as real qualities in the things thus affecting
us: but the third sort are called and esteemed barely powers. v.g. The
idea of heat or light, which we receive by our eyes, or touch, from the
sun, are commonly thought real qualities existing in the sun, and something
more than mere powers in it. But when we consider the sun in reference
to wax, which it melts or blanches, we look on the whiteness and softness
produced in the wax, not as qualities in the sun, but effects produced
by powers in it. Whereas, if rightly considered, these qualities of light
and warmth, which are perceptions in me when I am warmed or enlightened
by the sun, are no otherwise in the sun, than the changes made in the wax,
when it is blanched or melted, are in the sun. They are all of them equally
powers in the sun, depending on its primary qualities; whereby it is able,
in the one case, so to alter the bulk, figure, texture, or motion of some
of the insensible parts of my eyes or hands, as thereby to produce in me
the idea of light or heat; and in the other, it is able so to alter the
bulk, figure, texture, or motion of the insensible parts of the wax, as
to make them fit to produce in me the distinct ideas of white and fluid.
25. Why the secondary are ordinarily taken for real qualities, and not
for bare powers. The reason why the one are ordinarily taken for real qualities,
and the other only for bare powers, seems to be, because the ideas we have
of distinct colours, sounds, &c., containing nothing at all in them
of bulk, figure, or motion, we are not apt to think them the effects of
these primary qualities; which appear not, to our senses, to operate in
their production, and with which they have not any apparent congruity or
conceivable connexion. Hence it is that we are so forward to imagine, that
those ideas are the resemblances of something really existing in the objects
themselves: since sensation discovers nothing of bulk, figure, or motion
of parts in their production; nor can reason show how bodies, by their
bulk, figure, and motion, should produce in the mind the ideas of blue
or yellow, &c. But, in the other case, in the operations of bodies
changing the qualities one of another, we plainly discover that the quality
produced hath commonly no resemblance with anything in the thing producing
it; wherefore we look on it as a bare effect of power. For, through receiving
the idea of heat or light from the sun, we are apt to think it is a perception
and resemblance of such a quality in the sun; yet when we see wax, or a
fair face, receive change of colour from the sun, we cannot imagine that
to be the reception or resemblance of anything in the sun, because we find
not those different colours in the sun itself. For, our senses being able
to observe a likeness or unlikeness of sensible qualities in two different
external objects, we forwardly enough conclude the production of any sensible
quality in any subject to be an effect of bare power, and not the communication
of any quality which was really in the efficient, when we find no such
sensible quality in the thing that produced it. But our senses, not being
able to discover any unlikeness between the idea produced in us, and the
quality of the object producing it, we are apt to imagine that our ideas
are resemblances of something in the objects, and not the effects of certain
powers placed in the modification of their primary qualities, with which
primary qualities the ideas produced in us have no resemblance.
26. Secondary qualities twofold; first, immediately perceivable; secondly,
mediately perceivable. To conclude. Besides those before-mentioned primary
qualities in bodies, viz. bulk, figure, extension, number, and motion of
their solid parts; all the rest, whereby we take notice of bodies, and
distinguish them one from another, are nothing else but several powers
in them, depending on those primary qualities; whereby they are fitted,
either by immediately operating on our bodies to produce several different
ideas in us; or else, by operating on other bodies, so to change their
primary qualities as to render them capable of producing ideas in us different
from what before they did. The former of these, I think, may be called
secondary qualities immediately perceivable: the latter, secondary qualities,
mediately perceivable.
Chapter IX: Of Perception
1. Perception the first simple idea of reflection. PERCEPTION, as it is
the first faculty of the mind exercised about our ideas; so it is the first
and simplest idea we have from reflection, and is by some called thinking
in general. Though thinking, in the propriety of the English tongue, signifies
that sort of operation in the mind about its ideas, wherein the mind is
active; where it, with some degree of voluntary attention, considers anything.
For in bare naked perception, the mind is, for the most part, only passive;
and what it perceives, it cannot avoid perceiving.
2. Reflection alone can give us the idea of what perception is. What
perception is, every one will know better by reflecting on what he does
himself, when he sees, hears, feels, &c., or thinks, than by any discourse
of mine. Whoever reflects on what passes in his own mind cannot miss it.
And if he does not reflect, all the words in the world cannot make him
have any notion of it.
3. Arises in sensation only when the mind notices the organic impression.
This is certain, that whatever alterations are made in the body, if they
reach not the mind; whatever impressions are made on the outward parts,
if they are not taken notice of within, there is no perception. Fire may
burn our bodies with no other effect than it does a billet, unless the
motion be continued to the brain, and there the sense of heat, or idea
of pain, be produced in the mind; wherein consists actual perception.
4. Impulse on the organ insufficient. How often may a man observe in
himself, that whilst his mind is intently employed in the contemplation
of some objects, and curiously surveying some ideas that are there, it
takes no notice of impressions of sounding bodies made upon the organ of
hearing, with the same alteration that uses to be for the producing the
idea of sound? A sufficient impulse there may be on the organ; but it not
reaching the observation of the mind, there follows no perception: and
though the motion that uses to produce the idea of sound be made in the
ear, yet no sound is heard. Want of sensation, in this case, is not through
any defect in the organ, or that the man's ears are less affected than
at other times when he does hear: but that which uses to produce the idea,
though conveyed in by the usual organ, not being taken notice of in the
understanding, and so imprinting no idea in the mind, there follows no
sensation. So that wherever there is sense or perception, there some idea
is actually produced, and present in the understanding.
5. Children, though they may have ideas in the womb, have none innate.
Therefore I doubt not but children, by the exercise of their senses about
objects that affect them in the womb, receive some few ideas before they
are born, as the unavoidable effects, either of the bodies that environ
them, or else of those wants or diseases they suffer; amongst which (if
one may conjecture concerning things not very capable of examination) I
think the ideas of hunger and warmth are two: which probably are some of
the first that children have, and which they scarce ever part with again.
6. The effects of sensation in the womb. But though it be reasonable
to imagine that children receive some ideas before they come into the world,
yet these simple ideas are far from those innate principles which some
contend for, and we, above, have rejected. These here mentioned, being
the effects of sensation, are only from some affections of the body, which
happen to them there, and so depend on something exterior to the mind;
no otherwise differing in their manner of production from other ideas derived
from sense, but only in the precedency of time. Whereas those innate principles
are supposed to be quite of another nature; not coming into the mind by
any accidental alterations in, or operations on the body; but, as it were,
original characters impressed upon it, in the very first moment of its
being and constitution.
7. Which ideas appear first, is not evident, nor important. As there
are some ideas which we may reasonably suppose may be introduced into the
minds of children in the womb, subservient to the necessities of their
life and being there: so, after they are born, those ideas are the earliest
imprinted which happen to be the sensible qualities which first occur to
them; amongst which light is not the least considerable, nor of the weakest
efficacy. And how covetous the mind is to be furnished with all such ideas
as have no pain accompanying them, may be a little guessed by what is observable
in children new-born; who always turn their eyes to that part from whence
the light comes, lay them how you please. But the ideas that are most familiar
at first, being various according to the divers circumstances of children's
first entertainment in the world, the order wherein the several ideas come
at first into the mind is very various, and uncertain also; neither is
it much material to know it.
8. Sensations often changed by the judgment. We are further to consider
concerning perception, that the ideas we receive by sensation are often,
in grown people, altered by the judgment, without our taking notice of
it. When we set before our eyes a round globe of any uniform colour, v.g.
gold, alabaster, or jet, it is certain that the idea thereby imprinted
on our mind is of a flat circle, variously shadowed, with several degrees
of light and brightness coming to our eyes. But we having, by use, been
accustomed to perceive what kind of appearance convex bodies are wont to
make in us; what alterations are made in the reflections of light by the
difference of the sensible figures of bodies;- the judgment presently,
by an habitual custom, alters the appearances into their causes. So that
from that which is truly variety of shadow or colour, collecting the figure,
it makes it pass for a mark of figure, and frames to itself the perception
of a convex figure and an uniform colour; when the idea we receive from
thence is only a plane variously coloured, as is evident in painting. To
which purpose I shall here insert a problem of that very ingenious and
studious promoter of real knowledge, the learned and worthy Mr. Molyneux,
which he was pleased to send me in a letter some months since; and it is
this:- "Suppose a man born blind, and now adult, and taught by his touch
to distinguish between a cube and a sphere of the same metal, and nighly
of the same bigness, so as to tell, when he felt one and the other, which
is the cube, which the sphere. Suppose then the cube and sphere placed
on a table, and the blind man be made to see: quaere, whether by his sight,
before he touched them, he could now distinguish and tell which is the
globe, which the cube?" To which the acute and judicious proposer answers,
"Not. For, though he has obtained the experience of how a globe, how a
cube affects his touch, yet he has not yet obtained the experience, that
what affects his touch so or so, must affect his sight so or so; or that
a protuberant angle in the cube, that pressed his hand unequally, shall
appear to his eye as it does in the cube."- I agree with this thinking
gentleman, whom I am proud to call my friend, in his answer to this problem;
and am of opinion that the blind man, at first sight, would not be able
with certainty to say which was the globe, which the cube, whilst he only
saw them; though he could unerringly name them by his touch, and certainly
distinguish them by the difference of their figures felt. This I have set
down, and leave with my reader, as an occasion for him to consider how
much he may be beholden to experience, improvement, and acquired notions,
where he thinks he had not the least use of, or help from them. And the
rather, because this observing gentleman further adds, that "having, upon
the occasion of my book, proposed this to divers very ingenious men, he
hardly ever met with one that at first gave the answer to it which he thinks
true, till by hearing his reasons they were convinced."
9. This judgment apt to be mistaken for direct perception. But this
is not, I think, usual in any of our ideas, but those received by sight.
Because sight, the most comprehensive of all our senses, conveying to our
minds the ideas of light and colours, which are peculiar only to that sense;
and also the far different ideas of space, figure, and motion, the several
varieties whereof change the appearances of its proper object, viz. light
and colours; we bring ourselves by use to judge of the one by the other.
This, in many cases by a settled habit,- in things whereof we have frequent
experience, is performed so constantly and so quick, that we take that
for the perception of our sensation which is an idea formed by our judgment;
so that one, viz. that of sensation, serves only to excite the other, and
is scarce taken notice of itself;- as a man who reads or hears with attention
and understanding, takes little notice of the characters or sounds, but
of the ideas that are excited in him by them.
10. How, by habit, ideas of sensation are unconsciously changed into
ideas of judgment. Nor need we wonder that this is done with so little
notice, if we consider how quick the actions of the mind are performed.
For, as itself is thought to take up no space, to have no extension; so
its actions seem to require no time, but many of them seem to be crowded
into an instant. I speak this in comparison to the actions of the body.
Any one may easily observe this in his own thoughts, who will take the
pains to reflect on them. How, as it were in an instant, do our minds,
with one glance, see all the parts of a demonstration, which may very well
be called a long one, if we consider the time it will require to put it
into words, and step by step show it another? Secondly, we shall not be
so much surprised that this is done in us with so little notice, if we
consider how the facility which we get of doing things, by a custom of
doing, makes them often pass in us without our notice. Habits, especially
such as are begun very early, come at last to produce actions in us, which
often escape our observation. How frequently do we, in a day, cover our
eyes with our eyelids, without perceiving that we are at all in the dark!
Men that, by custom, have got the use of a by-word, do almost in every
sentence pronounce sounds which, though taken notice of by others, they
themselves neither hear nor observe. And therefore it is not so strange,
that our mind should often change the idea of its sensation into that of
its judgment, and make one serve only to excite the other, without our
taking notice of it.
11. Perception puts the difference between animals and vegetables. This
faculty of perception seems to me to be, that which puts the distinction
betwixt the animal kingdom and the inferior parts of nature. For, however
vegetables have, many of them, some degrees of motion, and upon the different
application of other bodies to them, do very briskly alter their figures
and motions, and so have obtained the name of sensitive plants, from a
motion which has some resemblance to that which in animals follows upon
sensation: yet I suppose it is all bare mechanism; and no otherwise produced
than the turning of a wild oat-beard, by the insinuation of the particles
of moisture, or the shortening of a rope, by the affusion of water. All
which is done without any sensation in the subject, or the having or receiving
any ideas.
12. Perception in all animals. Perception, I believe, is, in some degree,
in all sorts of animals; though in some possibly the avenues provided by
nature for the reception of sensations are so few, and the perception they
are received with so obscure and dull, that it comes extremely short of
the quickness and variety of sensation which is in other animals; but yet
it is sufficient for, and wisely adapted to, the state and condition of
that sort of animals who are thus made. So that the wisdom and goodness
of the Maker plainly appear in all the parts of this stupendous fabric,
and all the several degrees and ranks of creatures in it.
13. According to their condition. We may, I think, from the make of
an oyster or cockle, reasonably conclude that it has not so many, nor so
quick senses as a man, or several other animals; nor if it had, would it,
in that state and incapacity of transferring itself from one place to another,
be bettered by them. What good would sight and hearing do to a creature
that cannot move itself to or from the objects wherein at a distance it
perceives good or evil? And would not quickness of sensation be an inconvenience
to an animal that must lie still where chance has once placed it, and there
receive the afflux of colder or warmer, clean or foul water, as it happens
to come to it?
14. Decay of perception in old age. But yet I cannot but think there
is some small dull perception, whereby they are distinguished from perfect
insensibility. And that this may be so, we have plain instances, even in
mankind itself. Take one in whom decrepit old age has blotted out the memory
of his past knowledge, and clearly wiped out the ideas his mind was formerly
stored with, and has, by destroying his sight, hearing, and smell quite,
and his taste to a great degree, stopped up almost all the passages for
new ones to enter; or if there be some of the inlets yet half open, the
impressions made are scarcely perceived, or not at all retained. How far
such an one (notwithstanding all that is boasted of innate principles)
is in his knowledge and intellectual faculties above the condition of a
cockle or an oyster, I leave to be considered. And if a man had passed
sixty years in such a state, as it is possible he might, as well as three
days, I wonder what difference there would be, in any intellectual perfections,
between him and the lowest degree of animals.
15. Perception the inlet of all materials of knowledge. Perception then
being the first step and degree towards knowledge, and the inlet of all
the materials of it; the fewer senses any man, as well as any other creature,
hath; and the fewer and duller the impressions are that are made by them,
and the duller the faculties are that are employed about them,- the more
remote are they from that knowledge which is to be found in some men. But
this being in great variety of degrees (as may be perceived amongst men)
cannot certainly be discovered in the several species of animals, much
less in their particular individuals. It suffices me only to have remarked
here,- that perception is the first operation of all our intellectual faculties,
and the inlet of all knowledge in our minds. And I am apt too to imagine,
that it is perception, in the lowest degree of it, which puts the boundaries
between animals and the inferior ranks of creatures. But this I mention
only as my conjecture by the by; it being indifferent to the matter in
hand which way the learned shall determine of it.
Chapter X: Of Retention
1. Contemplation. The next faculty of the mind, whereby it makes a further
progress towards knowledge, is that which I call retention; or the keeping
of those simple ideas which from sensation or reflection it hath received.
This is done two ways.
First, by keeping the idea which is brought into it, for some time actually
in view, which is called contemplation.
2. Memory. The other way of retention is, the power to revive again
in our minds those ideas which, after imprinting, have disappeared, or
have been as it were laid aside out of sight. And thus we do, when we conceive
heat or light, yellow or sweet,- the object being removed. This is memory,
which is as it were the storehouse of our ideas. For, the narrow mind of
man not being capable of having many ideas under view and consideration
at once, it was necessary to have a repository, to lay up those ideas which,
at another time, it might have use of. But, our ideas being nothing but
actual perceptions in the mind, which cease to be anything when there is
no perception of them; this laying up of our ideas in the repository of
the memory signifies no more but this,- that the mind has a power in many
cases to revive perceptions which it has once had, with this additional
perception annexed to them, that it has had them before. And in this sense
it is that our ideas are said to be in our memories, when indeed they are
actually nowhere;- but only there is an ability in the mind when it will
to revive them again, and as it were paint them anew on itself, though
some with more, some with less difficulty; some more lively, and others
more obscurely. And thus it is, by the assistance of this faculty, that
we are said to have all those ideas in our understandings which, though
we do not actually contemplate, yet we can bring in sight, and make appear
again, and be the objects of our thoughts, without the help of those sensible
qualities which first imprinted them there.
3. Attention, repetition, pleasure and pain, fix ideas. Attention and
repetition help much to the fixing any ideas in the memory. But those which
naturally at first make the deepest and most lasting impressions, are those
which are accompanied with pleasure or pain. The great business of the
senses being, to make us take notice of what hurts or advantages the body,
it is wisely ordered by nature, as has been shown, that pain should accompany
the reception of several ideas; which, supplying the place of consideration
and reasoning in children, and acting quicker than consideration in grown
men, makes both the old and young avoid painful objects with that haste
which is necessary for their preservation; and in both settles in the memory
a caution for the future.
4. Ideas fade in the memory. Concerning the several degrees of lasting,
wherewith ideas are imprinted on the memory, we may observe,- that some
of them have been produced in the understanding by an object affecting
the senses once only, and no more than once; others, that have more than
once offered themselves to the senses, have yet been little taken notice
of: the mind, either heedless, as in children, or otherwise employed, as
in men intent only on one thing; not setting the stamp deep into itself.
And in some, where they are set on with care and repeated impressions,
either through the temper of the body, or some other fault, the memory
is very weak. In all these cases, ideas in the mind quickly fade, and often
vanish quite out of the understanding, leaving no more footsteps or remaining
characters of themselves than shadows do flying over fields of corn, and
the mind is as void of them as if they had never been there.
5. Causes of oblivion. Thus many of those ideas which were produced
in the minds of children, in the beginning of their sensation, (some of
which perhaps, as of some pleasures and pains, were before they were born,
and others in their infancy,) if the future course of their lives they
are not repeated again, are quite lost, without the least glimpse remaining
of them. This may be observed in those who by some mischance have lost
their sight when they were very young; in whom the ideas of colours having
been but slightly taken notice of, and ceasing to be repeated, do quite
wear out; so that some years after, there is no more notion nor memory
of colours left in their minds, than in those of people born blind. The
memory of some men, it is true, is very tenacious, even to a miracle. But
yet there seems to be a constant decay of all our ideas, even of those
which are struck deepest, and in minds the most retentive; so that if they
be not sometimes renewed, by repeated exercise of the senses, or reflection
on those kinds of objects which at first occasioned them, the print wears
out, and at last there remains nothing to be seen. Thus the ideas, as well
as children, of our youth, often die before us: and our minds represent
to us those tombs to which we are approaching; where, though the brass
and marble remain, yet the inscriptions are effaced by time, and the imagery
moulders away. The pictures drawn in our minds are laid in fading colours;
and if not sometimes refreshed, vanish and disappear. How much the constitution
of our bodies and the make of our animal spirits are concerned in this;
and whether the temper of the brain makes this difference, that in some
it retains the characters drawn on it like marble, in others like freestone,
and in others little better than sand, I shall not here inquire; though
it may seem probable that the constitution of the body does sometimes influence
the memory, since we oftentimes find a disease quite strip the mind of
all its ideas, and the flames of a fever in a few days calcine all those
images to dust and confusion, which seemed to be as lasting as if graved
in marble.
6. Constantly repeated ideas can scarce be lost. But concerning the
ideas themselves, it is easy to remark, that those that are oftenest refreshed
(amongst which are those that are conveyed into the mind by more ways than
one) by a frequent return of the objects or actions that produce them,
fix themselves best in the memory, and remain clearest and longest there;
and therefore those which are of the original qualities of bodies, vis.
solidity, extension, figure, motion, and rest; and those that almost constantly
affect our bodies, as heat and cold; and those which are the affections
of all kinds of beings, as existence, duration, and number, which almost
every object that affects our senses, every thought which employs our minds,
bring along with them;- these, I say, and the like ideas, are seldom quite
lost, whilst the mind retains any ideas at all.
7. In remembering, the mind is often active. In this secondary perception,
as I may so call it, or viewing again the ideas that are lodged in the
memory, the mind is oftentimes more than barely passive; the appearance
of those dormant pictures depending sometimes on the will. The mind very
often sets itself on work in search of some hidden idea, and turns as it
were the eye of the soul upon it; though sometimes too they start up in
our minds of their own accord, and offer themselves to the understanding;
and very often are roused and tumbled out of their dark cells into open
daylight, by turbulent and tempestuous passions; our affections bringing
ideas to our memory, which had otherwise lain quiet and unregarded. This
further is to be observed, concerning ideas lodged in the memory, and upon
occasion revived by the mind, that they are not only (as the word revive
imports) none of them new ones, but also that the mind takes notice of
them as of a former impression, and renews its acquaintance with them,
as with ideas it had known before. So that though ideas formerly imprinted
are not all constantly in view, yet in remembrance they are constantly
known to be such as have been formerly imprinted; i.e. in view, and taken
notice of before, by the understanding.
8. Two defects in the memory, oblivion and slowness. Memory, in an intellectual
creature, is necessary in the next degree to perception. It is of so great
moment, that, where it is wanting, all the rest of our faculties are in
a great measure useless. And we in our thoughts, reasonings, and knowledge,
could not proceed beyond present objects, were it not for the assistance
of our memories; wherein there may be two defects:-
First, That it loses the idea quite, and so far it produces perfect
ignorance. For, since we can know nothing further than we have the idea
of it, when that is gone, we are in perfect ignorance.
Secondly, That it moves slowly, and retrieves not the ideas that it
has, and are laid up in store, quick enough to serve the mind upon occasion.
This, if it be to a great degree, is stupidity; and he who, through this
default in his memory, has not the ideas that are really preserved there,
ready at hand when need and occasion calls for them, were almost as good
be without them quite, since they serve him to little purpose. The dull
man, who loses the opportunity, whilst he is seeking in his mind for those
ideas that should serve his turn, is not much more happy in his knowledge
than one that is perfectly ignorant. It is the business therefore of the
memory to furnish to the mind those dormant ideas which it has present
occasion for; in the having them ready at hand on all occasions, consists
that which we call invention, fancy, and quickness of parts.
9. A defect which belongs to the memory of man, as finite. These are
defects we may observe in the memory of one man compared with another.
There is another defect which we may conceive to be in the memory of man
in general;- compared with some superior created intellectual beings, which
in this faculty may so far excel man, that they may have constantly in
view the whole scene of all their former actions, wherein no one of the
thoughts they have ever had may slip out of their sight. The omniscience
of God, who knows all things, past, present, and to come, and to whom the
thoughts of men's hearts always lie open, may satisfy us of the possibility
of this. For who can doubt but God may communicate to those glorious spirits,
his immediate attendants, any of his perfections; in what proportions he
pleases, as far as created finite beings can be capable? It is reported
of that prodigy of parts, Monsieur Pascal, that till the decay of his health
had impaired his memory, he forgot nothing of what he had done, read, or
thought, in any part of his rational age. This is a privilege so little
known to most men, that it seems almost incredible to those who, after
the ordinary way, measure all others by themselves; but yet, when considered,
may help us to enlarge our thoughts towards greater perfections of it,
in superior ranks of spirits. For this of Monsieur Pascal was still with
the narrowness that human minds are confined to here,- of having great
variety of ideas only by succession, not all at once. Whereas the several
degrees of angels may probably have larger views; and some of them be endowed
with capacities able to retain together, and constantly set before them,
as in one picture, all their past knowledge at once. This, we may conceive,
would be no small advantage to the knowledge of a thinking man,- if all
his past thoughts and reasonings could be always present to him. And therefore
we may suppose it one of those ways, wherein the knowledge of separate
spirits may exceedingly surpass ours.
10. Brutes have memory. This faculty of laying up and retaining the
ideas that are brought into the mind, several other animals seem to have
to a great degree, as well as man. For, to pass by other instances, birds
learning of tunes, and the endeavours one may observe in them to hit the
notes right, put it past doubt with me, that they have perception, and
retain ideas in their memories, and use them for patterns. For it seems
to me impossible that they should endeavour to conform their voices to
notes (as it is plain they do) of which they had no ideas. For, though
I should grant sound may mechanically cause a certain motion of the animal
spirits in the brains of those birds, whilst the tune is actually playing;
and that motion may be continued on to the muscles of the wings, and so
the bird mechanically be driven away by certain noises, because this may
tend to the bird's preservation; yet that can never be supposed a reason
why it should cause mechanically- either whilst the tune is playing, much
less after it has ceased- such a motion of the organs in the bird's voice
as should conform it to the notes of a foreign sound, which imitation can
be of no use to the bird's preservation. But, which is more, it cannot
with any appearance of reason be supposed (much less proved) that birds,
without sense and memory, can approach their notes nearer and nearer by
degrees to a tune played yesterday; which if they have no idea of in their
memory, is now nowhere, nor can be a pattern for them to imitate, or which
any repeated essays can bring them nearer to. Since there is no reason
why the sound of a pipe should leave traces in their brains, which, not
at first, but by their after-endeavours, should produce the like sounds;
and why the sounds they make themselves, should not make traces which they
should follow, as well as those of the pipe, is impossible to conceive.
Chapter XI: Of Discerning, and other operations
of the Mind
1. No knowledge without discernment. Another faculty we may take notice
of in our minds is that of discerning and distinguishing between the several
ideas it has. It is not enough to have a confused perception of something
in general. Unless the mind had a distinct perception of different objects
and their qualities, it would be capable of very little knowledge, though
the bodies that affect us were as busy about us as they are now, and the
mind were continually employed in thinking. On this faculty of distinguishing
one thing from another depends the evidence and certainty of several, even
very general, propositions, which have passed for innate truths;- because
men, overlooking the true cause why those propositions find universal assent,
impute it wholly to native uniform impressions; whereas it in truth depends
upon this clear discerning faculty of the mind, whereby it perceives two
ideas to be the same, or different. But of this more hereafter.
2. The difference of wit and judgment. How much the imperfection of
accurately discriminating ideas one from another lies, either in the dulness
or faults of the organs of sense; or want of acuteness, exercise, or attention
in the understanding; or hastiness and precipitancy, natural to some tempers,
I will not here examine: it suffices to take notice, that this is one of
the operations that the mind may reflect on and observe in itself It is
of that consequence to its other knowledge, that so far as this faculty
is in itself dull, or not rightly made use of, for the distinguishing one
thing from another,- so far our notions are confused, and our reason and
judgment disturbed or misled. If in having our ideas in the memory ready
at hand consists quickness of parts; in this, of having them unconfused,
and being able nicely to distinguish one thing from another, where there
is but the least difference, consists, in a great measure, the exactness
of judgment, and clearness of reason, which is to be observed in one man
above another. And hence perhaps may be given some reason of that common
observation,- that men who have a great deal of wit, and prompt memories,
have not always the clearest judgment or deepest reason. For wit lying
most in the assemblage of ideas, and putting those together with quickness
and variety, wherein can be found any resemblance or congruity, thereby
to make up pleasant pictures and agreeable visions in the fancy; judgment,
on the contrary, lies quite on the other side, in separating carefully,
one from another, ideas wherein can be found the least difference, thereby
to avoid being misled by similitude, and by affinity to take one thing
for another. This is a way of proceeding quite contrary to metaphor and
allusion; wherein for the most part lies that entertainment and pleasantry
of wit, which strikes so lively on the fancy, and therefore is so acceptable
to all people, because its beauty appears at first sight, and there is
required no labor of thought to examine what truth or reason there is in
it. The mind, without looking any further, rests satisfied with the agreeableness
of the picture and the gaiety of the fancy. And it is a kind of affront
to go about to examine it, by the severe rules of truth and good reason;
whereby it appears that it consists in something that is not perfectly
conformable to them.
3. Clearness done hinders confusion. To the well distinguishing our
ideas, it chiefly contributes that they be clear and determinate. And when
they are so, it will not breed any confusion or mistake about them, though
the senses should (as sometimes they do) convey them from the same object
differently on different occasions, and so seem to err. For, though a man
in a fever should from sugar have a bitter taste, which at another time
would produce a sweet one, yet the idea of bitter in that man's mind would
be as clear and distinct from the idea of sweet as if he had tasted only
gall. Nor does it make any more confusion between the two ideas of sweet
and bitter, that the same sort of body produces at one time one, and at
another time another idea by the taste, than it makes a confusion in two
ideas of white and sweet, or white and round, that the same piece of sugar
produces them both in the mind at the same time. And the ideas of orange-colour
and azure, that are produced in the mind by the same parcel of the infusion
of lignum nephriticum, are no less distinct ideas than those of the same
colours taken from two very different bodies.
4. Comparing. The COMPARING them one with another, in respect of extent,
degrees, time, place, or any other circumstances, is another operation
of the mind about its ideas, and is that upon which depends all that large
tribe of ideas comprehended under relation; which, of how vast an extent
it is, I shall have occasion to consider hereafter.
5. Brutes compare but imperfectly. How far brutes partake in this faculty,
is not easy to determine. I imagine they have it not in any great degree:
for, though they probably have several ideas distinct enough, yet it seems
to me to be the prerogative of human understanding, when it has sufficiently
distinguished any ideas, so as to perceive them to be perfectly different,
and so consequently two, to cast about and consider in what circumstances
they are capable to be compared. And therefore, I think, beasts compare
not their ideas further than some sensible circumstances annexed to the
objects themselves. The other power of comparing, which may be observed
in men, belonging to general ideas, and useful only to abstract reasonings,
we may probably conjecture beasts have not.
6. Compounding. The next operation we may observe in the mind about
its ideas is COMPOSITION; whereby it puts together several of those simple
ones it has received from sensation and reflection, and combines them into
complex ones. Under this of composition may be reckoned also that of enlarging,
wherein, though the composition does not so much appear as in more complex
ones, yet it is nevertheless a putting several ideas together, though of
the same kind. Thus, by adding several units together, we make the idea
of a dozen; and putting together the repeated ideas of several perches,
we frame that of a furlong.
7. Brutes compound but little. In this also, I suppose, brutes come
far short of man. For, though they take in, and retain together, several
combinations of simple ideas, as possibly the shape, smell, and voice of
his master make up the complex idea a dog has of him, or rather are so
many distinct marks whereby he knows him; yet I do not think they do of
themselves ever compound them and make complex ideas. And perhaps even
where we think they have complex ideas, it is only one simple one that
directs them in the knowledge of several things, which possibly they distinguish
less by their sight than we imagine. For I have been credibly informed
that a bitch will nurse, play with, and be fond of young foxes, as much
as, and in place of her puppies, if you can but get them once to suck her
so long that her milk may go through them. And those animals which have
a numerous brood of young ones at once, appear not to have any knowledge
of their number; for though they are mightily concerned for any of their
young that are taken from them whilst they are in sight or hearing, yet
if one or two of them be stolen from them in their absence, or without
noise, they appear not to miss them, or to have any sense that their number
is lessened.
8. Naming. When children have, by repeated sensations, got ideas fixed
in their memories, they begin by degrees to learn the use of signs. And
when they have got the skill to apply the organs of speech to the framing
of articulate sounds, they begin to make use of words, to signify their
ideas to others. These verbal signs they sometimes borrow from others,
and sometimes make themselves, as one may observe among the new and unusual
names children often give to things in the first use of language.
9. Abstraction. The use of words then being to stand as outward marks
of our internal ideas, and those ideas being taken from particular things,
if every particular idea that we take in should have a distinct name, names
must be endless. To prevent this, the mind makes the particular ideas received
from particular objects to become general; which is done by considering
them as they are in the mind such appearances,- separate from all other
existences, and the circumstances of real existence, as time, place, or
any other concomitant ideas. This is called ABSTRACTION, whereby ideas
taken from particular beings become general representatives of all of the
same kind; and their names general names, applicable to whatever exists
conformable to such abstract ideas. Such precise, naked appearances in
the mind, without considering how, whence, or with what others they came
there, the understanding lays up (with names commonly annexed to them)
as the standards to rank real existences into sorts, as they agree with
these patterns, and to denominate them accordingly. Thus the same colour
being observed to-day in chalk or snow, which the mind yesterday received
from milk, it considers that appearance alone, makes it a representative
of all of that kind; and having given it the name whiteness, it by that
sound signifies the same quality wheresoever to be imagined or met with;
and thus universals, whether ideas or terms, are made.
10. Brutes abstract not. If it may be doubted whether beasts compound
and enlarge their ideas that way to any degree; this, I think, I may be
positive in,- that the power of abstracting is not at all in them; and
that the having of general ideas is that which puts a perfect distinction
betwixt man and brutes, and is an excellency which the faculties of brutes
do by no means attain to. 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.
11. Brutes abstract not, yet are not bare machines. Nor can it be imputed
to their want of fit organs to frame articulate sounds, that they have
no use or knowledge of general words; since many of them, we find, can
fashion such sounds, and pronounce words distinctly enough, but never with
any such application. And, on the other side, men who, through some defect
in the organs, want words, yet fail not to express their universal ideas
by signs, which serve them instead of general words, a faculty which we
see beasts come short in. And, therefore, I think, we may suppose, that
it is in this that the species of brutes are discriminated from man: and
it is that proper difference wherein they are wholly separated, and which
at last widens to so vast 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 that they have sense; but it is only in
particular ideas, just as they received 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.
12. Idiots and madmen. How far idiots are concerned in the want or weakness
of any, or all of the foregoing faculties, an exact observation of their
several ways of faultering would no doubt discover. For those who either
perceive but dully, or retain the ideas that come into their minds but
ill, who cannot readily excite or compound them, will have little matter
to think on. Those who cannot distinguish, compare, and abstract, would
hardly be able to understand and make use of language, or judge or reason
to any tolerable degree; but only a little and imperfectly about things
present, and very familiar to their senses. And indeed any of the forementioned
faculties, if wanting, or out of order, produce suitable defects in men's
understandings and knowledge.
13. Difference between idiots and madmen. In fine, the defect in naturals
seems to proceed from want of quickness, activity, and motion in the intellectual
faculties, whereby they are deprived of reason; whereas madmen, on the
other side, seem to suffer by the other extreme. For they do not appear
to me to have lost the faculty of reasoning, but having joined together
some ideas very wrongly, they mistake them for truths; and they err as
men do that argue right from wrong principles. For, by the violence of
their imaginations, having taken their fancies for realities, they make
right deductions from them. Thus you shall find a distracted man fancying
himself a king, with a right inference require suitable attendance, respect,
and obedience: others who have thought themselves made of glass, have used
the caution necessary to preserve such brittle bodies. Hence it comes to
pass that a man who is very sober, and of a right understanding in all
other things, may in one particular be as frantic as any in Bedlam; if
either by any sudden very strong impression, or long fixing his fancy upon
one sort of thoughts, incoherent ideas have been cemented together so powerfully,
as to remain united. But there are degrees of madness, as of folly; the
disorderly jumbling ideas together is in some more, and some less. In short,
herein seems to lie the difference between idiots and madmen: that madmen
put wrong ideas together, and so make wrong propositions, but argue and
reason right from them; but idiots make very few or no propositions, and
reason scarce at all.
14. Method followed in this explication of faculties. These, I think,
are the first faculties and operations of the mind, which it makes use
of in understanding; and though they are exercised about all its ideas
in general, yet the instances I have hitherto given have been chiefly in
simple ideas. And I have subjoined the explication of these faculties of
the mind to that of simple ideas, before I come to what I have to say concerning
complex ones, for these following reasons:-
First, Because several of these faculties being exercised at first principally
about simple ideas, we might, by following nature in its ordinary method,
trace and discover them, in their rise, progress, and gradual improvements.
Secondly, Because observing the faculties of the mind, how they operate
about simple ideas,- which are usually, in most men's minds, much more
clear, precise, and distinct than complex ones,- we may the better examine
and learn how the mind extracts, denominates, compares, and exercises,
in its other operations about those which are complex, wherein we are much
more liable to mistake.
Thirdly, Because these very operations of the mind about ideas received
from sensations, are themselves, when reflected on, another set of ideas,
derived from that other source of our knowledge, which I call reflection;
and therefore fit to be considered in this place after the simple ideas
of sensation. Of compounding, comparing, abstracting, &c., I have but
just spoken, having occasion to treat of them more at large in other places.
15. The true beginning of human knowledge. And thus I have given a short,
and, I think, true history of the first beginnings of human knowledge;-
whence the mind has its first objects; and by what steps it makes its progress
to the laying in and storing up those ideas, out of which is to be framed
all the knowledge it is capable of: wherein I must appeal to experience
and observation whether I am in the right: the best way to come to truth
being to examine things as really they are, and not to conclude they are,
as we fancy of ourselves, or have been taught by others to imagine.
16. Appeal to experience. To deal truly, this is the only way that I
can discover, whereby the ideas of things are brought into the understanding.
If other men have either innate ideas or infused principles, they have
reason to enjoy them; and if they are sure of it, it is impossible for
others to deny them the privilege that they have above their neighbours.
I can speak but of what I find in myself, and is agreeable to those notions,
which, if we will examine the whole course of men in their several ages,
countries, and educations, seem to depend on those foundations which I
have laid, and to correspond with this method in all the parts and degrees
thereof.
17. Dark room. I pretend not to teach, but to inquire; and therefore
cannot but confess here again,- that external and internal sensation are
the only passages I can find of knowledge to the understanding. These alone,
as far as I can discover, are the windows by which light is let into this
dark room. For, methinks, the understanding is not much unlike a closet
wholly shut from light, with only some little openings left, to let in
external visible resemblances, or ideas of things without: would the pictures
coming into such a dark room but stay there, and lie so orderly as to be
found upon occasion, it would very much resemble the understanding of a
man, in reference to all objects of sight, and the ideas of them.
These are my guesses concerning the means whereby the understanding
comes to have and retain simple ideas, and the modes of them, with some
other operations about them.
I proceed now to examine some of these simple ideas and their modes
a little more particularly.
Chapter XII: Of Complex Ideas
1. Made by the mind out of simple ones. We have hitherto considered those
ideas, in the reception whereof the mind is only passive, which are those
simple ones received from sensation and reflection before mentioned, whereof
the mind cannot make one to itself, nor have any idea which does not wholly
consist of them. But as the mind is wholly passive in the reception of
all its simple ideas, so it exerts several acts of its own, whereby out
of its simple ideas, as the materials and foundations of the rest, the
others are framed. The acts of the mind, wherein it exerts its power over
its simple ideas, are chiefly these three: (1) Combining several simple
ideas into one compound one; and thus all complex ideas are made. (2) The
second is bringing two ideas, whether simple or complex, together, and
setting them by one another, so as to take a view of them at once, without
uniting them into one; by which way it gets all its ideas of relations.
(3) The third is separating them from all other ideas that accompany them
in their real existence: this is called abstraction: and thus all its general
ideas are made. This shows man's power, and its ways of operation, to be
much the same in the material and intellectual world. For the materials
in both being such as he has no power over, either to make or destroy,
all that man can do is either to unite them together, or to set them by
one another, or wholly separate them. I shall here begin with the first
of these in the consideration of complex ideas, and come to the other two
in their due places. As simple ideas are observed to exist in several combinations
united together, so the mind has a power to consider several of them united
together as one idea; and that not only as they are united in external
objects, but as itself has joined them together. Ideas thus made up of
several simple ones put together, I call complex;- such as are beauty,
gratitude, a man, an army, the universe; which, though complicated of various
simple ideas, or complex ideas made up of simple ones, yet are, when the
mind pleases, considered each by itself, as one entire thing, and signified
by one name.
2. Made voluntarily. In this faculty of repeating and joining together
its ideas, the mind has great power in varying and multiplying the objects
of its thoughts, infinitely beyond what sensation or reflection furnished
it with: but all this still confined to those simple ideas which it received
from those two sources, and which are the ultimate materials of all its
compositions. For simple ideas are all from things themselves, and of these
the mind can have no more, nor other than what are suggested to it. It
can have no other ideas of sensible qualities than what come from without
by the senses; nor any ideas of other kind of operations of a thinking
substance, than what it finds in itself But when it has once got these
simple ideas, it is not confined barely to observation, and what offers
itself from without; it can, by its own power, put together those ideas
it has, and make new complex ones, which it never received so united.
3. Complex ideas are either of modes, substances, or relations. COMPLEX
IDEAS, however compounded and decompounded, though their number be infinite,
and the variety endless, wherewith they fill and entertain the thoughts
of men; yet I think they may be all reduced under these three heads:-
1. MODES.
2. SUBSTANCES.
3. RELATIONS.
4. Ideas of modes. First, Modes I call such complex ideas which, however
compounded, contain not in them the supposition of subsisting by themselves,
but are considered as dependences on, or affections of substances;- such
as are the ideas signified by the words triangle, gratitude, murder, &c.
And if in this I use the word mode in somewhat a different sense from its
ordinary signification, I beg pardon; it being unavoidable in discourses,
differing from the ordinary received notions, either to make new words,
or to use old words in somewhat a new signification; the later whereof,
in our present case, is perhaps the more tolerable of the two.
5. Simple and mixed modes of simple ideas. Of these modes, there are
two sorts which deserve distinct consideration:
First, there are some which are only variations, or different combinations
of the same simple idea, without the mixture of any other;- as a dozen,
or score; which are nothing but the ideas of so many distinct units added
together, and these I call simple modes as being contained within the bounds
of one simple idea.
Secondly, there are others compounded of simple ideas of several kinds,
put together to make one complex one;- v.g. beauty, consisting of a certain
composition of colour and figure, causing delight to the beholder; theft,
which being the concealed change of the possession of anything, without
the consent of the proprietor, contains, as is visible, a combination of
several ideas of several kinds: and these I call mixed modes.
6. Ideas of substances, single or collective. Secondly, the ideas of
Substances are such combinations of simple ideas as are taken to represent
distinct particular things subsisting by themselves; the supposed or confused
idea of substance, such as it is, is always the first and chief Thus if
to substance be joined the simple idea of a certain dull whitish colour,
with certain degrees of weight, hardness, ductility, and fusibility, we
have the idea of lead; and a combination of the ideas of a certain sort
of figure, with the powers of motion, thought and reasoning, joined to
substance, the ordinary idea of a man. Now of substances also, there are
two sorts of ideas:- one of single substances, as they exist separately,
as of a man or a sheep; the other of several of those put together, as
an army of men, or flock of sheep- which collective ideas of several substances
thus put together are as much each of them one single idea as that of a
man or an unit.
7. Ideas of relation. Thirdly, the last sort of complex ideas is that
we call Relation, which consists in the consideration and comparing one
idea with another.
Of these several kinds we shall treat in their order.
8. The abstrusest ideas we can have are all from two sources. If we
trace the progress of our minds, and with attention observe how it repeats,
adds together, and unites its simple ideas received from sensation or reflection,
it will lead us further than at first perhaps we should have imagined.
And, I believe, we shall find, if we warily observe the originals of our
notions, that even the most abstruse ideas, how remote soever they may
seem from sense, or from any operations of our own minds, are yet only
such as the understanding frames to itself, by repeating and joining together
ideas that it had either from objects of sense, or from its own operations
about them: so that those even large and abstract ideas are derived from
sensation or reflection, being no other than what the mind, by the ordinary
use of its own faculties, employed about ideas received from objects of
sense, or from the operations it observes in itself about them, may, and
does, attain unto.
This I shall endeavour to show in the ideas we have of space, time,
and infinity, and some few others that seem the most remote, from those
originals.
Chapter XIII: Complex Ideas of Simple Modes: and
First, of the Simple Modes of the Idea of Space
1. Simple modes of simple ideas. Though in the foregoing part I have often
mentioned simple ideas, which are truly the materials of all our knowledge;
yet having treated of them there, rather in the way that they come into
the mind, than as distinguished from others more compounded, it will not
be perhaps amiss to take a view of some of them again under this consideration,
and examine those different modifications of the same idea; which the mind
either finds in things existing, or is able to make within itself without
the help of any extrinsical object, or any foreign suggestion.
Those modifications of any one simple idea (which, as has been said,
I call simple modes) are as perfectly different and distinct ideas in the
mind as those of the greatest distance or contrariety. For the idea of
two is as distinct from that of one, as blueness from heat, or either of
them from any number: and yet it is made up only of that simple idea of
an unit repeated; and repetitions of this kind joined together make those
distinct simple modes, of a dozen, a gross, a million.
2. Idea of Space. I shall begin with the simple idea of space. I have
showed above, chap. V, that we get the idea of space, both by our sight
and touch; which, I think, is so evident, that it would be as needless
to go to prove that men perceive, by their sight, a distance between bodies
of different colours, or between the parts of the same body, as that they
see colours themselves: nor is it less obvious, that they can do so in
the dark by feeling and touch.
3. Space and extension. This space, considered barely in length between
any two beings, without considering anything else between them, is called
distance: if considered in length, breadth, and thickness, I think it may
be called capacity. (The term extension is usually applied to it in what
manner soever considered.)
4. Immensity. Each different distance is a different modification of
space; and each idea of any different distance, or space, is a simple mode
of this idea. Men, for the use and by the custom of measuring, settle in
their minds the ideas of certain stated lengths,- such as are an inch,
foot, yard, fathom, mile, diameter of the earth, &c., which are so
many distinct ideas made up only of space. When any such stated lengths
or measures of space are made familiar to men's thoughts, they can, in
their minds, repeat them as often as they will, without mixing or joining
to them the idea of body, or anything else; and frame to themselves the
ideas of long, square, or cubic feet, yards or fathoms, here amongst the
bodies of the universe, or else beyond the utmost bounds of all bodies;
and, by adding these still one to another, enlarge their ideas of space
as much as they please. The power of repeating or doubling any idea we
have of any distance and adding it to the former as often as we will, without
being ever able to come to any stop or stint, let us enlarge it as much
as we will, is that which gives us the idea of immensity.
5. Figure. There is another modification of this idea, which is nothing
but the relation which the parts of the termination of extension, or circumscribed
space, have amongst themselves. This the touch discovers in sensible bodies,
whose extremities come within our reach; and the eye takes both from bodies
and colours, whose boundaries are within its view: where, observing how
the extremities terminate,- either in straight lines which meet at discernible
angles, or in crooked lines wherein no angles can be perceived; by considering
these as they relate to one another, in all parts of the extremities of
any body or space, it has that idea we call figure, which affords to the
mind infinite variety. For, besides the vast number of different figures
that do really exist, in the coherent masses of matter, the stock that
the mind has in its power, by varying the idea of space, and thereby making
still new compositions, by repeating its own ideas, and joining them as
it pleases, is perfectly inexhaustible. And so it can multiply figures
in infinitum.
6. Endless variety of figures. For the mind having a power to repeat
the idea of any length directly stretched out, and join it to another in
the same direction, which is to double the length of that straight line;
or else join another with what inclination it thinks fit, and so make what
sort of angle it pleases: and being able also to shorten any line it imagines,
by taking from it one half, one fourth, or what part it pleases, without
being able to come to an end of any such divisions, it can make an angle
of any bigness. So also the lines that are its sides, of what length it
pleases, which joining again to other lines, of different lengths, and
at different angles, till it has wholly enclosed any space, it is evident
that it can multiply figures, both in their shape and capacity, in infinitum;
all which are but so many different simple modes of space.
The same that it can do with straight lines, it can also do with crooked,
or crooked and straight together; and the same it can do in lines, it can
also in superficies; by which we may be led into farther thoughts of the
endless variety of figures that the mind has a power to make, and thereby
to multiply the simple modes of space.
7. Place. Another idea coming under this head, and belonging to this
tribe, is that we call place. As in simple space, we consider the relation
of distance between any two bodies or points; so in our idea of place,
we consider the relation of distance betwixt anything, and any two or more
points, which are considered as keeping the same distance one with another,
and so considered as at rest. For when we find anything at the same distance
now which it was yesterday, from any two or more points, which have not
since changed their distance one with another, and with which we then compared
it, we say it hath kept the same place: but if it hath sensibly altered
its distance with either of those points, we say it hath changed its place:
though, vulgarly speaking, in the common notion of place, we do not always
exactly observe the distance from these precise points, but from larger
portions of sensible objects, to which we consider the thing placed to
bear relation, and its distance from which we have some reason to observe.
8. Place relative to particular bodies. Thus, a company of chess-men,
standing on the same squares of the chess-board where we left them, we
say they are all in the same place, or unmoved, though perhaps the chess-board
hath been in the mean time carried out of one room into another; because
we compared them only to the parts of the chess-board, which keep the same
distance one with another. The chess-board, we also say, is in the same
place it was, if it remain in the same part of the cabin, though perhaps
the ship which it is in sails all the while. And the ship is said to be
in the same place, supposing it kept the same distance with the parts of
the neighbouring land; though perhaps the earth hath turned round, and
so both chess-men, and board, and ship, have every one changed place, in
respect of remoter bodies, which have kept the same distance one with another.
But yet the distance from certain parts of the board being that which determines
the place of the chessmen; and the distance from the fixed parts of the
cabin (with which we made the comparison) being that which determined the
place of the chess-board; and the fixed parts of the earth that by which
we determined the place of the ship,- these things may be said to be in
the same place in those respects: though their distance from some other
things, which in this matter we did not consider, being varied, they have
undoubtedly changed place in that respect; and we ourselves shall think
so, when we have occasion to compare them with those other.
9. Place relative to a present purpose. But this modification of distance
we call place, being made by men for their common use, that by it they
might be able to design the particular position of things, where they had
occasion for such designation; men consider and determine of this place
by reference to those adjacent things which best served to their present
purpose, without considering other things which, to another purpose, would
better determine the place of the same thing. Thus in the chess-board,
the use of the designation of the place of each chess-man being determined
only within that chequered piece of wood, it would cross that purpose to
measure it by anything else; but when these very chess-men are put up in
a bag, if any one should ask where the black king is, it would be proper
to determine the place by the part of the room it was in, and not by the
chess-board; there being another use of designing the place it is now in,
than when in play it was on the chess-board, and so must be determined
by other bodies. So if any one should ask, in what place are the verses
which report the story of Nisus and Euryalus, it would be very improper
to determine this place, by saying, they were in such a part of the earth,
or in Bodley's library: but the right designation of the place would be
by the parts of Virgil's works; and the proper answer would be, that these
verses were about the middle of the ninth book of his AEneids, and that
they have been always constantly in the same place ever since Virgil was
printed: which is true, though the book itself hath moved a thousand times,
the use of the idea of place here being, to know in what part of the book
that story is, that so, upon occasion, we may know where to find it, and
have recourse to it for use.
10. Place of the universe. That our idea of place is nothing else but
such a relative position of anything as I have before mentioned, I think
is plain, and will be easily admitted, when we consider that we can have
no idea of the place of the universe, though we can of all the parts of
it; because beyond that we have not the idea of any fixed, distinct, particular
beings, in reference to which we can imagine it to have any relation of
distance; but all beyond it is one uniform space or expansion, wherein
the mind finds no variety, no marks. For to say that the world is somewhere,
means no more than that it does exist; this, though a phrase borrowed from
place, signifying only its existence, not location: and when one can find
out, and frame in his mind, clearly and distinctly, the place of the universe,
he will be able to tell us whether it moves or stands still in the undistinguishable
inane of infinite space: though it be true that the word place has sometimes
a more confused sense, and stands for that space which anybody takes up;
and so the universe is in a place.
The idea, therefore, of place we have by the same means that we get
the idea of space, (whereof this is but a particular limited consideration,)
viz, by our sight and touch; by either of which we receive into our minds
the ideas of extension or distance.
11. Extension and body not the same. There are some that would persuade
us, that body and extension are the same thing, who either change the signification
of words, which I would not suspect them of,- they having so severely condemned
the philosophy of others, because it hath been too much placed in the uncertain
meaning, or deceitful obscurity of doubtful or insignificant terms. If,
therefore, they mean by body and extension the same that other people do,
viz. by body something that is solid and extended, whose parts are separable
and movable different ways; and by extension, only the space that lies
between the extremities of those solid coherent parts, and which is possessed
by them,- they confound very different ideas one with another; for I appeal
to every man's own thoughts whether the idea of space be not as distinct
from that of solidity, as it is from the idea of scarlet colour? It is
true, solidity cannot exist without extension, neither can scarlet colour
exist without extension, but this hinders not, but that they are distinct
ideas. Many ideas require others, as necessary to their existence or conception,
which yet are very distinct ideas. Motion can neither be, nor be conceived,
without space; and yet motion is not space, nor space motion; space can
exist without it, and they are very distinct ideas; and so, I think, are
those of space and solidity. Solidity is so inseparable an idea from body,
that upon that depends its filling of space, its contact, impulse, and
communication of motion upon impulse. And if it be a reason to prove that
spirit is different from body, because thinking includes not the idea of
extension in it; the same reason will be as valid, I suppose, to prove
that space is not body, because it includes not the idea of solidity in
it; space and solidity being as distinct ideas as thinking and extension,
and as wholly separable in the mind one from another. Body then and extension,
it is evident, are two distinct ideas. For,
12. Extension not solidity. First, Extension includes no solidity, nor
resistance to the motion of body, as body does.
13. The parts of space inseparable, both really and mentally. Secondly,
The parts of pure space are inseparable one from the other; so that the
continuity cannot be separated, neither really nor mentally. For I demand
of any one to remove any part of it from another, with which it is continued,
even so much as in thought. To divide and separate actually is, as I think,
by removing the parts one from another, to make two superficies, where
before there was a continuity: and to divide mentally is, to make in the
mind two superficies, where before there was a continuity, and consider
them as removed one from the other; which can only be done in things considered
by the mind as capable of being separated; and by separation, of acquiring
new distinct superficies, which they then have not, but are capable of
But neither of these ways of separation, whether real or mental, is, as
I think, compatible to pure space.
It is true, a man may consider so much of such a space as is answerable
or commensurate to a foot, without considering the rest, which is, indeed,
a partial consideration, but not so much as mental separation or division;
since a man can no more mentally divide, without considering two superficies
separate one from the other, than he can actually divide, without making
two superficies disjoined one from the other: but a partial consideration
is not separating. A man may consider light in the sun without its heat,
or mobility in body without its extension, without thinking of their separation.
One is only a partial consideration, terminating in one alone; and the
other is a consideration of both, as existing separately.
14. The parts of space, immovable. Thirdly, The parts of pure space
are immovable, which follows from their inseparability; motion being nothing
but change of distance between any two things; but this cannot be between
parts that are inseparable, which, therefore, must needs be at perpetual
rest one amongst another.
Thus the determined idea of simple space distinguishes it plainly and
sufficiently from body; since its parts are inseparable, immovable, and
without resistance to the motion of body.
15. The definition of extension explains it not. If any one ask me what
this space I speak of is, I will tell him when he tells me what his extension
is. For to say, as is usually done, that extension is to have partes extra
partes, is to say only, that extension is extension. For what am I the
better informed in the nature of extension, when I am told that extension
is to have parts that are extended, exterior to parts that are extended,
i.e. extension consists of extended parts? As if one, asking what a fibre
was, I should answer him,- that it was a thing made up of several fibres.
Would he thereby be enabled to understand what a fibre was better than
he did before? Or rather, would he not have reason to think that my design
was to make sport with him, rather than seriously to instruct him?
16. Division of beings into bodies and spirits proves not space and
body the same. Those who contend that space and body are the same, bring
this dilemma:- either this space is something or nothing; if nothing be
between two bodies, they must necessarily touch; if it be allowed to be
something, they ask, Whether it be body or spirit? To which I answer by
another question, Who told them that there was, or could be, nothing but
solid beings, which could not think, and thinking beings that were not
extended?- which is all they mean by the terms body and spirit.
17. Substance which we know not, no proof against space without body.
If it be demanded (as usually it is) whether this space, void of body,
be substance or accident, I shall readily answer I know not; nor shall
be ashamed to own my ignorance, till they that ask show me a clear distinct
idea of substance.
18. Different meanings of substance. I endeavour as much as I can to
deliver myself from those fallacies which we are apt to put upon ourselves,
by taking words for things. It helps not our ignorance to feign a knowledge
where we have none, by making a noise with sounds, without clear and distinct
significations. Names made at pleasure, neither alter the nature of things,
nor make us understand them, but as they are signs of and stand for determined
ideas. And I desire those who lay so much stress on the sound of these
two syllables, substance, to consider whether applying it, as they do,
to the infinite, incomprehensible God, to finite spirits, and to body,
it be in the same sense; and whether it stands for the same idea, when
each of those three so different beings are called substances. If so, whether
it will thence follow- that God, spirits, and body, agreeing in the same
common nature of substance, differ not any otherwise than in a bare different
modification of that substance; as a tree and a pebble, being in the same
sense body, and agreeing in the common nature of body, differ only in a
bare modification of that common matter, which will be a very harsh doctrine.
If they say, that they apply it to God, finite spirit, and matter, in three
different significations and that it stands for one idea when God is said
to be a substance; for another when the soul is called substance; and for
a third when body is called so;- if the name substance stands for three
several distinct ideas, they would do well to make known those distinct
ideas, or at least to give three distinct names to them, to prevent in
so important a notion the confusion and errors that will naturally follow
from the promiscuous use of so doubtful a term; which is so far from being
suspected to have three distinct, that in ordinary use it has scarce one
clear distinct signification. And if they can thus make three distinct
ideas of substance, what hinders why another may not make a fourth?
19. Substance and accidents of little use in philosophy. They who first
ran into the notion of accidents, as a sort of real beings that needed
something to inhere in, were forced to find out the word substance to support
them. Had the poor Indian philosopher (who imagined that the earth also
wanted something to bear it up) but thought of this word substance, he
needed not to have been at the trouble to find an elephant to support it,
and a tortoise to support his elephant: the word substance would have done
it effectually. And he that inquired might have taken it for as good an
answer from an Indian philosopher,- that substance, without knowing what
it is, is that which supports the earth, as we take it for a sufficient
answer and good doctrine from our European philosophers,- that substance,
without knowing what it is, is that which supports accidents. So that of
substance, we have no idea of what it is, but only a confused, obscure
one of what it does.
20. Sticking on and under-propping. Whatever a learned man may do here,
an intelligent American, who inquired into the nature of things, would
scarce take it for a satisfactory account, if, desiring to learn our architecture,
he should be told that a pillar is a thing supported by a basis, and a
basis something that supported a pillar. Would he not think himself mocked,
instead of taught, with such an account as this? And a stranger to them
would be very liberally instructed in the nature of books, and the things
they contained, if he should be told that all learned books consisted of
paper and letters, and that letters were things inhering in paper, and
paper a thing that held forth letters: a notable way of having clear ideas
of letters and paper. But were the Latin words, inhaerentia and substantio,
put into the plain English ones that answer them, and were called sticking
on and under-propping, they would better discover to us the very great
clearness there is in the doctrine of substance and accidents, and show
of what use they are in deciding of questions in philosophy.
21. A vacuum beyond the utmost bounds of body. But to return to our
idea of space. If body be not supposed infinite, (which I think no one
will affirm), I would ask, whether, if God placed a man at the extremity
of corporeal beings, he could not stretch his hand beyond his body? If
he could, then he would put his arm where there was before space without
body; and if there he spread his fingers, there would still be space between
them without body. If he could not stretch out his hand, it must be because
of some external hindrance; (for we suppose him alive, with such a power
of moving the parts of his body that he hath now, which is not in itself
impossible, if God so pleased to have it; or at least it is not impossible
for God so to move him): and then I ask,- whether that which hinders his
hand from moving outwards be substance or accident, something or nothing?
And when they have resolved that, they will be able to resolve themselves,-
what that is, which is or may be between two bodies at a distance, that
is not body, and has no solidity. In the mean time, the argument is at
least as good, that, where nothing hinders, (as beyond the utmost bounds
of all bodies), a body put in motion may move on, as where there is nothing
between, there two bodies must necessarily touch. For pure space between
is sufficient to take away the necessity of mutual contact; but bare space
in the way is not sufficient to stop motion. The truth is, these men must
either own that they think body infinite, though they are loth to speak
it out, or else affirm that space is not body. For I would fain meet with
that thinking man that can in his thoughts set any bounds to space, more
than he can to duration; or by thinking hope to arrive at the end of either.
And therefore, if his idea of eternity be infinite, so is his idea of immensity;
they are both finite or infinite alike.
22. The power of annihilation proves a vacuum. Farther, those who assert
the impossibility of space existing without matter, must not only make
body infinite, but must also deny a power in God to annihilate any part
of matter. No one, I suppose, will deny that God can put an end to all
motion that is in matter, and fix all the bodies of the universe in a perfect
quiet and rest, and continue them so long as he pleases. Whoever then will
allow that God can, during such a general rest, annihilate either this
book or the body of him that reads it, must necessarily admit the possibility
of a vacuum. For, it is evident that the space that was filled by the parts
of the annihilated body will still remain, and be a space without body.
For the circumambient bodies being in perfect rest, are a wall of adamant,
and in that state make it a perfect impossibility for any other body to
get into that space. And indeed the necessary motion of one particle of
matter into the place from whence another particle of matter is removed,
is but a consequence from the supposition of plenitude; which will therefore
need some better proof than a supposed matter of fact, which experiment
can never make out;- our own clear and distinct ideas plainly satisfying
us, that there is no necessary connexion between space and solidity, since
we can conceive the one without the other. And those who dispute for or
against a vacuum, do thereby confess they have distinct ideas of vacuum
and plenum, i.e. that they have an idea of extension void of solidity,
though they deny its existence; or else they dispute about nothing at all.
For they who so much alter the signification of words, as to call extension
body, and consequently make the whole essence of body to be nothing but
pure extension without solidity, must talk absurdly whenever they speak
of vacuum; since it is impossible for extension to be without extension.
For vacuum, whether we affirm or deny its existence, signifies space without
body; whose very existence no one can deny to be possible, who will not
make matter infinite, and take from God a power to annihilate any particle
of it.
23. Motion proves a vacuum. But not to go so far as beyond the utmost
bounds of body in the universe, nor appeal to God's omnipotency to find
a vacuum, the motion of bodies that are in our view and neighbourhood seems
to me plainly to evince it. For I desire any one so to divide a solid body,
of any dimension he pleases, as to make it possible for the solid parts
to move up and down freely every way within the bounds of that superficies,
if there be not left in it a void space as big as the least part into which
he has divided the said solid body. And if, where the least particle of
the body divided is as big as a mustard-seed, a void space equal to the
bulk of a mustard-seed be requisite to make room for the free motion of
the parts of the divided body within the bounds of its superficies, where
the particles of matter are 100,000,000 less than a mustard-seed, there
must also be a space void of solid matter as big as 100,000,000 part of
a mustard-seed; for if it hold in the one it will hold in the other, and
so on in infinitum. And let this void space be as little as it will, it
destroys the hypothesis of plenitude. For if there can be a space void
of body equal to the smallest separate particle of matter now existing
in nature, it is still space without body; and makes as great a difference
between space and body as if it were mega chasma, a distance as wide as
any in nature. And therefore, if we suppose not the void space necessary
to motion equal to the least parcel of the divided solid matter, but to
1/10 or 1/1000 of it, the same consequence will always follow of space
without matter.
24. The ideas of space and body distinct. But the question being here,-
Whether the idea of space or extension be the same with the idea of body?
it is not necessary to prove the real existence of a vacuum, but the idea
of it; which it is plain men have when they inquire and dispute whether
there be a vacuum or no. For if they had not the idea of space without
body, they could not make a question about its existence: and if their
idea of body did not include in it something more than the bare idea of
space, they could have no doubt about the plenitude of the world; and it
would be as absurd to demand, whether there were space without body, as
whether there were space without space, or body without body, since these
were but different names of the same idea.
25. Extension being inseparable from body, proves it not the same. It
is true, the idea of extension joins itself so inseparably with all visible,
and most tangible qualities, that it suffers us to see no one, or feel
very few external objects, without taking in impressions of extension too.
This readiness of extension to make itself be taken notice of so constantly
with other ideas, has been the occasion, I guess, that some have made the
whole essence of body to consist in extension; which is not much to be
wondered at, since some have had their minds, by their eyes and touch,
(the busiest of all our senses,) so filled with the idea of extension,
and, as it were, wholly possessed with it, that they allowed no existence
to anything that had not extension. I shall not now argue with those men,
who take the measure and possibility of all being only from their narrow
and gross imaginations: but having here to do only with those who conclude
the essence of body to be extension, because they say they cannot imagine
any sensible quality of any body without extension,- I shall desire them
to consider, that, had they reflected on their ideas of tastes and smells
as much as on those of sight and touch; nay, had they examined their ideas
of hunger and thirst, and several other pains, they would have found that
they included in them no idea of extension at all, which is but an affection
of body, as well as the rest, discoverable by our senses, which are scarce
acute enough to look into the pure essences of things.
26. Essences of things. If those ideas which are constantly joined to
all others, must therefore be concluded to be the essence of those things
which have constantly those ideas joined to them, and are inseparable from
them; then unity is without doubt the essence of everything. For there
is not any object of sensation or reflection which does not carry with
it the idea of one: but the weakness of this kind of argument we have already
shown sufficiently.
27. Ideas of space and solidity distinct. To conclude: whatever men
shall think concerning the existence of a vacuum, this is plain to me-
that we have as clear an idea of space distinct from solidity, as we have
of solidity distinct from motion, or motion from space. We have not any
two more distinct ideas; and we can as easily conceive space without solidity,
as we can conceive body or space without motion, though it be never so
certain that neither body nor motion can exist without space. But whether
any one will take space to be only a relation resulting from the existence
of other beings at a distance; or whether they will think the words of
the most knowing King Solomon, "The heaven, and the heaven of heavens,
cannot contain thee"; or those more emphatical ones of the inspired philosopher
St. Paul, "In him we live, move, and have our being," are to be understood
in a literal sense, I leave every one to consider: only our idea of space
is, I think, such as I have mentioned, and distinct from that of body.
For, whether we consider, in matter itself, the distance of its coherent
solid parts, and call it, in respect of those solid parts, extension; or
whether, considering it as lying between the extremities of any body in
its several dimensions, we call it length, breadth, and thickness; or else,
considering it as lying between any two bodies or positive beings, without
any consideration whether there be any matter or not between, we call it
distance;- however named or considered, it is always the same uniform simple
idea of space, taken from objects about which our senses have been conversant;
whereof, having settled ideas in our minds, we can revive, repeat, and
add them one to another as often as we will, and consider the space or
distance so imagined, either as filled with solid parts, so that another
body cannot come there without displacing and thrusting out the body that
was there before; or else as void of solidity, so that a body of equal
dimensions to that empty or pure space may be placed in it, without the
removing or expulsion of anything that was there. But, to avoid confusion
in discourses concerning this matter, it were possibly to be wished that
the name extension were applied only to matter, or the distance of the
extremities of particular bodies; and the term expansion to space in general,
with or without solid matter possessing it,- so as to say space is expanded
and body extended. But in this every one has his liberty: I propose it
only for the more clear and distinct way of speaking.
28. Men differ little in clear, simple ideas. The knowing precisely
what our words stand for, would, I imagine, in this as well as a great
many other cases, quickly end the dispute. For I am apt to think that men,
when they come to examine them, find their simple ideas all generally to
agree, though in discourse with one another they perhaps confound one another
with different names. I imagine that men who abstract their thoughts, and
do well examine the ideas of their own minds, cannot much differ in thinking;
however they may perplex themselves with words, according to the way of
speaking to the several schools or sects they have been bred up in: though
amongst unthinking men, who examine not scrupulously and carefully their
own ideas, and strip them not from the marks men use for them, but confound
them with words, there must be endless dispute, wrangling, and jargon;
especially if they be learned, bookish men, devoted to some sect, and accustomed
to the language of it, and have learned to talk after others. But if it
should happen that any two thinking men should really have different ideas,
I do not see how they could discourse or argue with another. Here I must
not be mistaken, to think that every floating imagination in men's brains
is presently of that sort of ideas I speak of. It is not easy for the mind
to put off those confused notions and prejudices it has imbibed from custom,
inadvertency, and common conversation. It requires pains and assiduity
to examine its ideas, till it resolves them into those clear and distinct
simple ones, out of which they are compounded; and to see which, amongst
its simple ones, have or have not a necessary connexion and dependence
one upon another. Till a man doth this in the primary and original notions
of things, he builds upon floating and uncertain principles, and will often
find himself at a loss.
Chapter XIV: Idea of Duration and its Simple Modes
1. Duration is fleeting extension. There is another sort of distance, or
length, the idea whereof we get not from the permanent parts of space,
but from the fleeting and perpetually perishing parts of succession. This
we call duration; the simple modes whereof are any different lengths of
it whereof we have distinct ideas, as hours, days, years, &c., time
and eternity.
2. Its idea from reflection on the train of our ideas. The answer of
a great man, to one who asked what time was: Si non rogas intelligo, (which
amounts to this; The more I set myself to think of it, the less I understand
it,) might perhaps persuade one that time, which reveals all other things,
is itself not to be discovered. Duration, time, and eternity, are, not
without reason, thought to have something very abstruse in their nature.
But however remote these may seem from our comprehension, yet if we trace
them right to their originals, I doubt not but one of those sources of
all our knowledge, viz. sensation and reflection, will be able to furnish
us with these ideas, as clear and distinct as many others which are thought
much less obscure; and we shall find that the idea of eternity itself is
derived from the same common original with the rest of our ideas.
3. Nature and origin of the idea of duration. To understand time and
eternity aright, we ought with attention to consider what idea it is we
have of duration, and how we came by it. It is evident to any one who will
but observe what passes in his own mind, that there is a train of ideas
which constantly succeed one another in his understanding, as long as he
is awake. Reflection on these appearances of several ideas one after another
in our minds, is that which furnishes us with the idea of succession: and
the distance between any parts of that succession, or between the appearance
of any two ideas in our minds, is that we call duration. For whilst we
are thinking, or whilst we receive successively several ideas in our minds,
we know that we do exist; and so we call the existence, or the continuation
of the existence of ourselves, or anything else, commensurate to the succession
of any ideas in our minds, the duration of ourselves, or any such other
thing co-existent with our thinking.
4. Proof that its idea is got from reflection on the train of our ideas.
That we have our notion of succession and duration from this original,
viz. from reflection on the train of ideas, which we find to appear one
after another in our own minds, seems plain to me, in that we have no perception
of duration but by considering the train of ideas that take their turns
in our understandings. When that succession of ideas ceases, our perception
of duration ceases with it; which every one clearly experiments in himself,
whilst he sleeps soundly, whether an hour or a day, a month or a year;
of which duration of things, while he sleeps or thinks not, he has no perception
at all, but it is quite lost to him; and the moment wherein he leaves off
to think, till the moment he begins to think again, seems to him to have
no distance. And so I doubt not it would be to a waking man, if it were
possible for him to keep only one idea in his mind, without variation and
the succession of others. And we see, that one who fixes his thoughts very
intently on one thing, so as to take but little notice of the succession
of ideas that pass in his mind, whilst he is taken up with that earnest
contemplation, lets slip out of his account a good part of that duration,
and thinks that time shorter than it is. But if sleep commonly unites the
distant parts of duration, it is because during that time we have no succession
of ideas in our minds. For if a man, during his sleep, dreams, and variety
of ideas make themselves perceptible in his mind one after another, he
hath then, during such dreaming, a sense of duration, and of the length
of it. By which it is to me very clear, that men derive their ideas of
duration from their reflections on the train of the ideas they observe
to succeed one another in their own understandings; without which observation
they can have no notion of duration, whatever may happen in the world.
5. The idea of duration applicable to things whilst we sleep. Indeed
a man having, from reflecting on the succession and number of his own thoughts,
got the notion or idea of duration, he can apply that notion to things
which exist while he does not think; as he that has got the idea of extension
from bodies by his sight or touch, can apply it to distances, where no
body is seen or felt. And therefore, though a man has no perception of
the length of duration which passed whilst he slept or thought not; yet,
having observed the revolution of days and nights, and found the length
of their duration to be in appearance regular and constant, he can, upon
the supposition that that revolution has proceeded after the same manner
whilst he was asleep or thought not, as it used to do at other times, he
can, I say, imagine and make allowance for the length of duration whilst
he slept. But if Adam and Eve, (when they were alone in the world), instead
of their ordinary night's sleep, had passed the whole twenty-four hours
in one continued sleep, the duration of that twenty-four hours had been
irrecoverably lost to them, and been for ever left out of their account
of time.
6. The idea of succession not from motion. Thus by reflecting on the
appearing of various ideas one after another in our understandings, we
get the notion of succession; which, if any one should think we did rather
get from our observation of motion by our senses, he will perhaps be of
my mind when he considers, that even motion produces in his mind an idea
of succession no otherwise than as it produces there a continued train
of distinguishable ideas. For a man looking upon a body really moving,
perceives yet no motion at all unless that motion produces a constant train
of successive ideas: v.g. a man becalmed at sea, out of sight of land,
in a fair day, may look on the sun, or sea, or ship, a whole hour together,
and perceive no motion at all in either; though it be certain that two,
and perhaps all of them, have moved during that time a great way. But as
soon as he perceives either of them to have changed distance with some
other body, as soon as this motion produces any new idea in him, then he
perceives that there has been motion. But wherever a man is, with all things
at rest about him, without perceiving any motion at all,- if during this
hour of quiet he has been thinking, he will perceive the various ideas
of his own thoughts in his own mind, appearing one after another, and thereby
observe and find succession where he could observe no motion.
7. Very slow motions unperceived. And this, I think, is the reason why
motions very slow, though they are constant, are not perceived by us; because
in their remove from one sensible part towards another, their change of
distance is so slow, that it causes no new ideas in us, but a good while
one after another. And so not causing a constant train of new ideas to
follow one another immediately in our minds, we have no perception of motion;
which consisting in a constant succession, we cannot perceive that succession
without a constant succession of varying ideas arising from it.
8. Very swift motions unperceived. On the contrary, things that move
so swift as not to affect the senses distinctly with several distinguishable
distances of their motion, and so cause not any train of ideas in the mind,
are not also perceived. For anything that moves round about in a circle,
in less times than our ideas are wont to succeed one another in our minds,
is not perceived to move; but seems to be a perfect entire circle of that
matter or colour, and not a part of a circle in motion.
9. The train of ideas has a certain degree of quickness. Hence I leave
it to others to judge, whether it be not probable that our ideas do, whilst
we are awake, succeed one another in our minds at certain distances; not
much unlike the images in the inside of a lantern, turned round by the
heat of a candle. This appearance of theirs in train, though perhaps it
may be sometimes faster and sometimes slower, yet, I guess, varies not
very much in a waking man: there seem to be certain bounds to the quickness
and slowness of the succession of those ideas one to another in our minds,
beyond which they can neither delay nor hasten.
10. Real succession in swift motions without sense of succession. The
reason I have for this odd conjecture is, from observing that, in the impressions
made upon any of our senses, we can but to a certain degree perceive any
succession; which, if exceeding quick, the sense of succession is lost,
even in cases where it is evident that there is a real succession. Let
a cannon-bullet pass through a room, and in its way take with it any limb,
or fleshy parts of a man, it is as clear as any demonstration can be, that
it must strike successively the two sides of the room: it is also evident
that it must touch one part of the flesh first, and another after, and
so in succession: and yet, I believe, nobody who ever felt the pain of
such a shot, or heard the blow against the two distant walls, could perceive
any succession either in the pain or sound of so swift a stroke. Such a
part of duration as this, wherein we perceive no succession, is that which
we call an instant, and is that which takes up the time of only one idea
in our minds, without the succession of another; wherein, therefore, we
perceive no succession at all.
11. In slow motions. This also happens where the motion is so slow as
not to supply a constant train of fresh ideas to the senses, as fast as
the mind is capable of receiving new ones into it; and so other ideas of
our own thoughts, having room to come into our minds between those offered
to our senses by the moving body, there the sense of motion is lost; and
the body, though it really moves, yet, not changing perceivable distance
with some other bodies as fast as the ideas of our own minds do naturally
follow one another in train, the thing seems to stand still; as is evident
in the hands of clocks, and shadows of sun-dials, and other constant but
slow motions, where, though, after certain intervals, we perceive, by the
change of distance, that it hath moved, yet the motion itself we perceive
not.
12. This train, the measure of other successions. So that to me it seems,
that the constant and regular succession of ideas in a waking man, is,
as it were, the measure and standard of all other successions. Whereof,
if any one either exceeds the pace of our ideas, as where two sounds or
pains, &c., take up in their succession the duration of but one idea;
or else where any motion or succession is so slow, as that it keeps not
pace with the ideas in our minds, or the quickness in which they take their
turns, as when any one or more ideas in their ordinary course come into
our mind, between those which are offered to the sight by the different
perceptible distances of a body in motion, or between sounds or smells
following one another,- there also the sense of a constant continued succession
is lost, and we perceive it not, but with certain gaps of rest between.
13. The mind cannot fix long on one invariable idea. If it be so, that
the ideas of our minds, whilst we have any there, do constantly change
and shift in a continual succession, it would be impossible, may any one
say, for a man to think long of any one thing. By which, if it be meant
that a man may have one self-same single idea a long time alone in his
mind, without any variation at all, I think, in matter of fact, it is not
possible. For which (not knowing how the ideas of our minds are framed,
of what materials they are made, whence they have their light, and how
they come to make their appearances) I can give no other reason but experience:
and I would have any one try, whether he can keep one unvaried single idea
in his mind, without any other, for any considerable time together.
14. Proof. For trial, let him take any figure, any degree of light or
whiteness, or what other he pleases, and he will, I suppose, find it difficult
to keep all other ideas out of his mind; but that some, either of another
kind, or various considerations of that idea, (each of which considerations
is a new idea), will constantly succeed one another in his thoughts, let
him be as wary as he can.
15. The extent of our power over the succession of our ideas. All that
is in a man's power in this case, I think, is only to mind and observe
what the ideas are that take their turns in his understanding; or else
to direct the sort, and call in such as he hath a desire or use of: but
hinder the constant succession of fresh ones, I think he cannot, though
he may commonly choose whether he will heedfully observe and consider them.
16. Ideas, however made, include no sense of motion. Whether these several
ideas in a man's mind be made by certain motions, I will not here dispute;
but this I am sure, that they include no idea of motion in their appearance;
and if a man had not the idea of motion otherwise, I think he would have
none at all, which is enough to my present purpose; and sufficiently shows
that the notice we take of the ideas of our own minds, appearing there
one after another, is that which gives us the idea of succession and duration,
without which we should have no such ideas at all. It is not then motion,
but the constant train of ideas in our minds whilst we are waking, that
furnishes us with the idea of duration; whereof motion no otherwise gives
us any perception than as it causes in our minds a constant succession
of ideas, as I have before showed: and we have as clear an idea of succession
and duration, by the train of other ideas succeeding one another in our
minds, without the idea of any motion, as by the train of ideas caused
by the uninterrupted sensible change of distance between two bodies, which
we have from motion; and therefore we should as well have the idea of duration
were there no sense of motion at all.
17. Time is duration set out by measures. Having thus got the idea of
duration, the next thing natural for the mind to do, is to get some measure
of this common duration, whereby it might judge of its different lengths,
and consider the distinct order wherein several things exist; without which
a great part of our knowledge would be confused, and a great part of history
be rendered very useless. This consideration of duration, as set out by
certain periods, and marked by certain measures or epochs, is that, I think,
which most properly we call time.
18. A good measure of time must divide its whole duration into equal
periods. In the measuring of extension, there is nothing more required
but the application of the standard or measure we make use of to the thing
of whose extension we would be informed. But in the measuring of duration
this cannot be done, because no two different parts of succession can be
put together to measure one another. And nothing being a measure of duration
but duration, as nothing is of extension but extension, we cannot keep
by us any standing, unvarying measure of duration, which consists in a
constant fleeting succession, as we can of certain lengths of extension,
as inches, feet, yards, &c., marked out in permanent parcels of matter.
Nothing then could serve well for a convenient measure of time, but what
has divided the whole length of its duration into apparently equal portions,
by constantly repeated periods. What portions of duration are not distinguished,
or considered as distinguished and measured, by such periods, come not
so properly under the notion of time; as appears by such phrases as these,
viz. "Before all time," and "When time shall be no more."
19. The revolutions of the sun and moon, the properest measures of time
for mankind. The diurnal and annual revolutions of the sun, as having been,
from the beginning of nature, constant, regular, and universally observable
by all mankind, and supposed equal to one another, have been with reason
made use of for the measure of duration. But the distinction of days and
years having depended on the motion of the sun, it has brought this mistake
with it, that it has been thought that motion and duration were the measure
one of another. For men, in the measuring of the length of time, having
been accustomed to the ideas of minutes, hours, days, months, years, &c.,
which they found themselves upon any mention of time or duration presently
to think on, all which portions of time were measured out by the motion
of those heavenly bodies, they were apt to confound time and motion; or
at least to think that they had a necessary connexion one with another.
Whereas any constant periodical appearance, or alteration of ideas, in
seemingly equidistant spaces of duration, if constant and universally observable,
would have as well distinguished the intervals of time, as those that have
been made use of. For, supposing the sun, which some have taken to be a
fire, had been lighted up at the same distance of time that it now every
day comes about to the same meridian, and then gone out again about twelve
hours after, and that in the space of an annual revolution it had sensibly
increased in brightness and heat, and so decreased again,- would not such
regular appearances serve to measure out the distances of duration to all
that could observe it, as well without as with motion? For if the appearances
were constant, universally observable, in equidistant periods, they would
serve mankind for measure of time as well were the motion away.
20. But not by their motion, but periodical appearances. For the freezing
of water, or the blowing of a plant, returning at equidistant periods in
all parts of the earth, would as well serve men to reckon their years by
as the motions of the sun: and in effect we see, that some people in America
counted their years by the coming of certain birds amongst them at their
certain seasons, and leaving them at others. For a fit of an ague; the
sense of hunger or thirst; a smell or a taste; or any other idea returning
constantly at equidistant periods, and making itself universally be taken
notice of, would not fail to measure out the course of succession, and
distinguish the distances of time. Thus we see that men born blind count
time well enough by years, whose revolutions yet they cannot distinguish
by motions that they perceive not. And I ask whether a blind man, who distinguished
his years either by the heat of summer, or cold of winter; by the smell
of any flower of the spring, or taste of any fruit of the autumn, would
not have a better measure of time than the Romans had before the reformation
of their calendar by Julius Caesar, or many other people whose years, notwithstanding
the motion of the sun, which they pretended to make use of, are very irregular?
And it adds no small difficulty to chronology, that the exact lengths of
the years that several nations counted by, are hard to be known, they differing
very much one from another, and I think I may say all of them from the
precise motion of the sun. And if the sun moved from the creation to the
flood constantly in the equator, and so equally dispersed its light and
heat to all the habitable parts of the earth, in days all of the same length,
without its annual variations to the tropics, as a late ingenious author
supposes, I do not think it very easy to imagine, that (notwithstanding
the motion of the sun) men should in the antediluvian world, from the beginning,
count by years, or measure their time by periods that had no sensible marks
very obvious to distinguish them by.
21. No two parts of duration can be certainly known to be equal. But
perhaps it will be said,- without a regular motion, such as of the sun,
or some other, how could it ever be known that such periods were equal?
To which I answer,- the equality of any other returning appearances might
be known by the same way that that of days was known, or presumed to be
so at first; which was only by judging of them by the train of ideas which
had passed in men's minds in the intervals; by which train of ideas discovering
inequality in the natural days, but none in the artificial days, the artificial
days, or nuchtheerha, were guessed to be equal, which was sufficient to
make them serve for a measure; though exacter search has since discovered
inequality in the diurnal revolutions of the sun, and we know not whether
the annual also be not unequal. These yet, by their presumed and apparent
equality, serve as well to reckon time by (though not to measure the parts
of duration exactly) as if they could be proved to be exactly equal. We
must, therefore, carefully distinguish betwixt duration itself, and the
measures we make use of to judge of its length. Duration, in itself, is
to be considered as going on in one constant, equal, uniform course: but
none of the measures of it which we make use of can be known to do so,
nor can we be assured that their assigned parts or periods are equal in
duration one to another; for two successive lengths of duration, however
measured, can never be demonstrated to be equal. The motion of the sun,
which the world used so long and so confidently for an exact measure of
duration, has, as I said, been found in its several parts unequal. And
though men have, of late, made use of a pendulum, as a more steady and
regular motion than that of the sun, or, (to speak more truly), of the
earth;- yet if any one should be asked how he certainly knows that the
two successive swings of a pendulum are equal, it would be very hard to
satisfy him that they are infallibly so; since we cannot be sure that the
cause of that motion, which is unknown to us, shall always operate equally;
and we are sure that the medium in which the pendulum moves is not constantly
the same: either of which varying, may alter the equality of such periods,
and thereby destroy the certainty and exactness of the measure by motion,
as well as any other periods of other appearances; the notion of duration
still remaining clear, though our measures of it cannot (any of them) be
demonstrated to be exact. Since then no two portions of succession can
be brought together, it is impossible ever certainly to know their equality.
All that we can do for a measure of time is, to take such as have continual
successive appearances at seemingly equidistant periods; of which seeming
equality we have no other measure, but such as the train of our own ideas
have lodged in our memories, with the concurrence of other probable reasons,
to persuade us of their equality.
22. Time not the measure of motion. One thing seems strange to me,-
that whilst all men manifestly measured time by the motion of the great
and visible bodies of the world, time yet should be defined to be the "measure
of motion": whereas it is obvious to every one who reflects ever so little
on it, that to measure motion, space is as necessary to be considered as
time; and those who look a little farther will find also the bulk of the
thing moved necessary to be taken into the computation, by any one who
will estimate or measure motion so as to judge right of it. Nor indeed
does motion any otherwise conduce to the measuring of duration, than as
it constantly brings about the return of certain sensible ideas, in seeming
equidistant periods. For if the motion of the sun were as unequal as of
a ship driven by unsteady winds, sometimes very slow, and at others irregularly
very swift; or if, being constantly equally swift, it yet was not circular,
and produced not the same appearances,- it would not at all help us to
measure time, any more than the seeming unequal motion of a comet does.
23. Minutes, hours, days, and years not necessary measures of duration.
Minutes, hours, days, and years are, then, no more necessary to time or
duration, than inches, feet, yards, and miles, marked out in any matter,
are to extension. For, though we in this part of the universe, by the constant
use of them, as of periods set out by the revolutions of the sun, or as
known parts of such periods, have fixed the ideas of such lengths of duration
in our minds, which we apply to all parts of time whose lengths we would
consider; yet there may be other parts of the universe, where they no more
use there measures of ours, than in Japan they do our inches, feet, or
miles; but yet something analogous to them there must be. For without some
regular periodical returns, we could not measure ourselves, or signify
to others, the length of any duration; though at the same time the world
were as full of motion as it is now, but no part of it disposed into regular
and apparently equidistant revolutions. But the different measures that
may be made use of for the account of time, do not at all alter the notion
of duration, which is the thing to be measured; no more than the different
standards of a foot and a cubit alter the notion of extension to those
who make use of those different measures.
24. Our measure of time applicable to duration before time. The mind
having once got such a measure of time as the annual revolution of the
sun, can apply that measure to duration wherein that measure itself did
not exist, and with which, in the reality of its being, it had nothing
to do. For should one say, that Abraham was born in the two thousand seven
hundred and twelfth year of the Julian period, it is altogether as intelligible
as reckoning from the beginning of the world, though there were so far
back no motion of the sun, nor any motion at all. For, though the Julian
period be supposed to begin several hundred years before there were really
either days, nights, or years, marked out by any revolutions of the sun,-
yet we reckon as right, and thereby measure durations as well, as if really
at that time the sun had existed, and kept the same ordinary motion it
doth now. The idea of duration equal to an annual revolution of the sun,
is as easily applicable in our thoughts to duration, where no sun or motion
was, as the idea of a foot or yard, taken from bodies here, can be applied
in our thoughts to duration, where no sun or motion was, as the idea of
a foot or yard, taken from bodies here, can be applied in our thoughts
to distances beyond the confines of the world, where are no bodies at all.
25. As we can measure space in our thoughts where there is no body.
For supposing it were 5639 miles, or millions of miles, from this place
to the remotest body of the universe, (for being finite, it must be at
a certain distance), as we suppose it to be 5639 years from this time to
the first existence of any body in the beginning of the world;- we can,
in our thoughts, apply this measure of a year to duration before the creation,
or beyond the duration of bodies or motion, as we can this measure of a
mile to space beyond the utmost bodies; and by the one measure duration,
where there was no motion, as well as by the other measure space in our
thoughts, where there is no body.
26. The assumption that the world is neither boundless nor eternal.
If it be objected to me here, that, in this way of explaining of time,
I have begged what I should not, viz. that the world is neither eternal
nor infinite; I answer, That to my present purpose it is not needful, in
this place, to make use of arguments to evince the world to be finite both
in duration and extension. But it being at least as conceivable as the
contrary, I have certainly the liberty to suppose it, as well as any one
hath to suppose the contrary; and I doubt not, but that every one that
will go about it, may easily conceive in his mind the beginning of motion,
though not of all duration, and so may come to a step and non ultra in
his consideration of motion. So also, in his thoughts, he may set limits
to body, and the extension belonging to it; but not to space, where no
body is, the utmost bounds of space and duration being beyond the reach
of thought, as well as the utmost bounds of number are beyond the largest
comprehension of the mind; and all for the same reason, as we shall see
in another place.
27. Eternity. By the same means, therefore, and from the same original
that we come to have the idea of time, we have also that idea which we
call Eternity; viz. having got the idea of succession and duration, by
reflecting on the train of our own ideas, caused in us either by the natural
appearances of those ideas coming constantly of themselves into our waking
thoughts, or else caused by external objects successively affecting our
senses; and having from the revolutions of the sun got the ideas of certain
lengths of duration,- we can in our thoughts add such lengths of duration
to one another, as often as we please, and apply them, so added, to durations
past or to come. And this we can continue to do on, without bounds or limits,
and proceed in infinitum, and apply thus the length of the annual motion
of the sun to duration, supposed before the sun's or any other motion had
its being; which is no more difficult or absurd, than to apply the notion
I have of the moving of a shadow one hour to-day upon the sun-dial to the
duration of something last night, v.g. the burning of a candle, which is
now absolutely separate from all actual motion; and it is as impossible
for the duration of that flame for an hour last night to co-exist with
any motion that now is, or for ever shall be, as for any part of duration,
that was before the beginning of the world, to co-exist with the motion
of the sun now. But yet this hinders not but that, having the idea of the
length of the motion of the shadow on a dial between the marks of two hours,
I can as distinctly measure in my thoughts the duration of that candle-light
last night, as I can the duration of anything that does now exist: and
it is no more than to think, that, had the sun shone then on the dial,
and moved after the same rate it doth now, the shadow on the dial would
have passed from one hour-line to another whilst that flame of the candle
lasted.
28. Our measures of duration dependent on our ideas. The notion of an
hour, day, or year, being only the idea I have of the length of certain
periodical regular motions, neither of which motions do ever all at once
exist, but only in the ideas I have of them in my memory derived from my
senses or reflection; I can with the same ease, and for the same reason,
apply it in my thoughts to duration antecedent to all manner of motion,
as well as to anything that is but a minute or a day antecedent to the
motion that at this very moment the sun is in. All things past are equally
and perfectly at rest; and to this way of consideration of them are all
one, whether they were before the beginning of the world, or but yesterday:
the measuring of any duration by some motion depending not at all on the
real co-existence of that thing to that motion, or any other periods of
revolution, but the having a clear idea of the length of some periodical
known motion, or other interval of duration, in my mind, and applying that
to the duration of the thing I would measure.
29. The duration of anything need not be co-existent with the motion
we measure it by. Hence we see that some men imagine the duration of the
world, from its first existence to this present year 1689, to have been
5639 years, or equal to 5639 annual revolutions of the sun, and others
a great deal more; as the Egyptians of old, who in the time of Alexander
counted 23,000 years from the reign of the sun; and the Chinese now, who
account the world 3,269,000 years old, or more; which longer duration of
the world, according to their computation, though I should not believe
to be true, yet I can equally imagine it with them, and as truly understand,
and say one is longer than the other, as I understand, that Methusalem's
life was longer than Enoch's. And if the common reckoning Of 5639 should
be true, (as it may be as well as any other assigned,) it hinders not at
all my imagining what others mean, when they make the world one thousand
years older, since every one may with the same facility imagine (I do not
say believe) the world to be 50,000 years old, as 5639; and may as well
conceive the duration of 50,000 years as 5639. Whereby it appears that,
to the measuring the duration of anything by time, it is not requisite
that that thing should be co-existent to the motion we measure by, or any
other periodical revolution; but it suffices to this purpose, that we have
the idea of the length of any regular periodical appearances, which we
can in our minds apply to duration, with which the motion or appearance
never co-existed.
30. Infinity in duration. For, as in the history of the creation delivered
by Moses, I can imagine that light existed three days before the sun was,
or had any motion, barely by thinking that the duration of light before
the sun was created was so long as (if the sun had moved then as it doth
now) would have been equal to three of his diurnal revolutions; so by the
same way I can have an idea of the chaos, or angels, being created before
there was either light or any continued motion, a minute, an hour, a day,
a year, or one thousand years. For, if I can but consider duration equal
to one minute, before either the being or motion of any body, I can add
one minute more till I come to sixty; and by the same way of adding minutes,
hours, or years (i.e. such or such parts of the sun's revolutions, or any
other period whereof I have the idea) proceed in infinitum, and suppose
a duration exceeding as many such periods as I can reckon, let me add whilst
I will, which I think is the notion we have of eternity; of whose infinity
we have no other notion than we have of the infinity of number, to which
we can add for ever without end.
31. Origin of our ideas of duration, and of the measures of it. And
thus I think it is plain, that from those two fountains of all knowledge
before mentioned, viz. reflection and sensation, we got the ideas of duration,
and the measures of it.
For, First, by observing what passes in our minds, how our ideas there
in train constantly some vanish and others begin to appear, we come by
the idea of succession.
Secondly, by observing a distance in the parts of this succession, we
get the idea of duration.
Thirdly, by sensation observing certain appearances, at certain regular
and seeming equidistant periods, we get the ideas of certain lengths or
measures of duration, as minutes, hours, days, years, &c.
Fourthly, by being able to repeat those measures of time, or ideas of
stated length of duration, in our minds, as often as we will, we can come
to imagine duration, where nothing does really endure or exist; and thus
we imagine to-morrow, next year, or seven years hence.
Fifthly, by being able to repeat ideas of any length of time, as of
a minute, a year, or an age, as often as we will in our own thoughts, and
adding them one to another, without ever coming to the end of such addition,
any nearer than we can to the end of number, to which we can always add;
we come by the idea of eternity, as the future eternal duration of our
souls, as well as the eternity of that infinite Being which must necessarily
have always existed.
Sixthly, by considering any part of infinite duration, as set out by
periodical measures, we come by the idea of what we call time in general.
Chapter XV: Ideas of Duration and Expansion, considered
together
1. Both capable of greater and less. Though we have in the precedent chapters
dwelt pretty long on the considerations of space and duration, yet, they
being ideas of general concernment, that have something very abstruse and
peculiar in their nature, the comparing them one with another may perhaps
be of use for their illustration; and we may have the more clear and distinct
conception of them by taking a view of them together. Distance or space,
in its simple abstract conception, to avoid confusion, I call expansion,
to distinguish it from extension, which by some is used to express this
distance only as it is in the solid parts of matter, and so includes, or
at least intimates, the idea of body: whereas the idea of pure distance
includes no such thing. I prefer also the word expansion to space, because
space is often applied to distance of fleeting successive parts, which
never exist together, as well as to those which are permanent. In both
these (viz. expansion and duration) the mind has this common idea of continued
lengths, capable of greater or less quantities. For a man has as clear
an idea of the difference of the length of an hour and a day, as of an
inch and a foot.
2. Expansion not bounded by matter. The mind, having got the idea of
the length of any part of expansion, let it be a span, or a pace, or what
length you will, can, as has been said, repeat that idea, and so, adding
it to the former, enlarge its idea of length, and make it equal to two
spans, or two paces; and so, as often as it will, till it equals the distance
of any parts of the earth one from another, and increase thus till it amounts
to the distance of the sun or remotest star. By such a progression as this,
setting out from the place where it is, or any other place, it can proceed
and pass beyond all those lengths, and find nothing to stop its going on,
either in or without body. It is true, we can easily in our thoughts come
to the end of solid extension; the extremity and bounds of all body we
have no difficulty to arrive at: but when the mind is there, it finds nothing
to hinder its progress into this endless expansion; of that it can neither
find nor conceive any end. Nor let any one say, that beyond the bounds
of body, there is nothing at all; unless he will confine God within the
limits of matter. Solomon, whose understanding was filled and enlarged
with wisdom, seems to have other thoughts when he says, "Heaven, and the
heaven of heavens, cannot contain thee." And he, I think, very much magnifies
to himself the capacity of his own understanding, who persuades himself
that he can extend his thoughts further than God exists, or imagine any
expansion where He is not.
3. Nor duration by motion. Just so is it in duration. The mind having
got the idea of any length of duration, can double, multiply, and enlarge
it, not only beyond its own, but beyond the existence of all corporeal
beings, and all the measures of time, taken from the great bodies of all
the world and their motions. But yet every one easily admits, that, though
we make duration boundless, as certainly it is, we cannot yet extend it
beyond all being. God, every one easily allows, fills eternity; and it
is hard to find a reason why any one should doubt that He likewise fills
immensity. His infinite being is certainly as boundless one way as another;
and methinks it ascribes a little too much to matter to say, where there
is no body, there is nothing.
4. Why men more easily admit infinite duration than infinite expansion.
Hence I think we may learn the reason why every one familiarly and without
the least hesitation speaks of and supposes Eternity, and sticks not to
ascribe infinity to duration; but it is with more doubting and reserve
that many admit or suppose the infinity of space. The reason whereof seems
to me to be this,- That duration and extension being used as names of affections
belonging to other beings, we easily conceive in God infinite duration,
and we cannot avoid doing so: but, not attributing to Him extension, but
only to matter, which is finite, we are apter to doubt of the existence
of expansion without matter; of which alone we commonly suppose it an attribute.
And, therefore, when men pursue their thoughts of space, they are apt to
stop at the confines of body: as if space were there at an end too, and
reached no further. Or if their ideas, upon consideration, carry them further,
yet they term what is beyond the limits of the universe, imaginary space:
as if it were nothing, because there is no body existing in it. Whereas
duration, antecedent to all body, and to the motions which it is measured
by, they never term imaginary: because it is never supposed void of some
other real existence. And if the names of things may at all direct our
thoughts towards the original of men's ideas, (as I am apt to think they
may very much,) one may have occasion to think by the name duration, that
the continuation of existence, with a kind of resistance to any destructive
force, and the continuation of solidity (which is apt to be confounded
with, and if we will look into the minute anatomical parts of matter, is
little different from, hardness) were thought to have some analogy, and
gave occasion to words so near of kin as durare and durum esse. And that
durare is applied to the idea of hardness, as well as that of existence,
we see in Horace, Epod. xvi. ferro duravit secula. But, be that as it will,
this is certain, that whoever pursues his own thoughts, will find them
sometimes launch out beyond the extent of body, into the infinity of space
or expansion; the idea whereof is distinct and separate from body and all
other things: which may, (to those who please), be a subject of further
meditation.
5. Time to duration is as place to expansion. Time in general is to
duration as place to expansion. They are so much of those boundless oceans
of eternity and immensity as is set out and distinguished from the rest,
as it were by landmarks; and so are made use of to denote the position
of finite real beings, in respect one to another, in those uniform infinite
oceans of duration and space. These, rightly considered, are only ideas
of determinate distances from certain known points, fixed in distinguishable
sensible things, and supposed to keep the same distance one from another.
From such points fixed in sensible beings we reckon, and from them we measure
our portions of those infinite quantities; which, so considered, are that
which we call time and place. For duration and space being in themselves
uniform and boundless, the order and position of things, without such known
settled points, would be lost in them; and all things would lie jumbled
in an incurable confusion.
6. Time and place are taken for so much of either as are set out by
the existence and motion of bodies. Time and place, taken thus for determinate
distinguishable portions of those infinite abysses of space and duration,
set out or supposed to be distinguished from the rest, by marks and known
boundaries, have each of them a twofold acceptation.
First, Time in general is commonly taken for so much of infinite duration
as is measured by, and co-existent with, the existence and motions of the
great bodies of the universe, as far as we know anything of them: and in
this sense time begins and ends with the frame of this sensible world,
as in these phrases before mentioned, "Before all time," or, "When time
shall be no more." Place likewise is taken sometimes for that portion of
infinite space which is possessed by and comprehended within the material
world; and is thereby distinguished from the rest of expansion; though
this may be more properly called extension than place. Within these two
are confined, and by the observable parts of them are measured and determined,
the particular time or duration, and the particular extension and place,
of all corporeal beings.
7. Sometimes for so much of either as we design by measures taken from
the bulk or motion of bodies. Secondly, sometimes the word time is used
in a larger sense, and is applied to parts of that infinite duration, not
that were really distinguished and measured out by this real existence,
and periodical motions of bodies, that were appointed from the beginning
to be for signs and for seasons and for days and years, and are accordingly
our measures of time; but such other portions too of that infinite uniform
duration, which we upon any occasion do suppose equal to certain lengths
of measured time; and so consider them as bounded and determined. For,
if we should suppose the creation, or fall of the angels, was at the beginning
of the Julian period, we should speak properly enough, and should be understood
if we said, it is a longer time since the creation of angels than the creation
of the world, by 7640 years: whereby we would mark out so much of that
undistinguished duration as we suppose equal to, and would have admitted,
7640 annual revolutions of the sun, moving at the rate it now does. And
thus likewise we sometimes speak of place, distance, or bulk, in the great
inane, beyond the confines of the world, when we consider so much of that
space as is equal to, or capable to receive, a body of any assigned dimensions,
as a cubic foot; or do suppose a point in it, at such a certain distance
from any part of the universe.
8. They belong to all finite beings. Where and when are questions belonging
to all finite existences, and are by us always reckoned from some known
parts of this sensible world, and from some certain epochs marked out to
us by the motions observable in it. Without some such fixed parts or periods,
the order of things would be lost, to our finite understandings, in the
boundless invariable oceans of duration and expansion, which comprehend
in them all finite beings, and in their full extent belong only to the
Deity. And therefore we are not to wonder that we comprehend them not,
and do so often find our thoughts at a loss, when we would consider them,
either abstractly in themselves, or as any way attributed to the first
incomprehensible Being. But when applied to any particular finite beings,
the extension of any body is so much of that infinite space as the bulk
of the body takes up. And place is the position of any body, when considered
at a certain distance from some other. As the idea of the particular duration
of anything is, an idea of that portion of infinite duration which passes
during the existence of that thing; so the time when the thing existed
is, the idea of that space of duration which passed between some known
and fixed period of duration, and the being of that thing. One shows the
distance of the extremities of the bulk or existence of the same thing,
as that it is a foot square, or lasted two years; the other shows the distance
of it in place, or existence from other fixed points of space or duration,
as that it was in the middle of Lincoln's Inn Fields, or the first degree
of Taurus, and in the year of our Lord 1671, or the 1000th year of the
Julian period. All which distances we measure by preconceived ideas of
certain lengths of space and duration,- as inches, feet, miles, and degrees,
and in the other, minutes, days, and years, &c.
9. All the parts of extension are extension, and all the parts of duration
are duration. There is one thing more wherein space and duration have a
great conformity, and that is, though they are justly reckoned amongst
our simple ideas, yet none of the distinct ideas we have of either is without
all manner of composition: it is the very nature of both of them to consist
of parts: but their parts being all of the same kind, and without the mixture
of any other idea, hinder them not from having a place amongst simple ideas.
Could the mind, as in number, come to so small a part of extension or duration
as excluded divisibility, that would be, as it were, the indivisible unit
or idea; by repetition of which, it would make its more enlarged ideas
of extension and duration. But, since the mind is not able to frame an
idea of any space without parts, instead thereof it makes use of the common
measures, which, by familiar use in each country, have imprinted themselves
on the memory (as inches and feet; or cubits and parasangs; and so seconds,
minutes, hours, days, and years in duration);- the mind makes use, I say,
of such ideas as these, as simple ones: and these are the component parts
of larger ideas, which the mind upon occasion makes by the addition of
such known lengths which it is acquainted with. On the other side, the
ordinary smallest measure we have of either is looked on as an unit in
number, when the mind by division would reduce them into less fractions.
Though on both sides, both in addition and division, either of space or
duration, when the idea under consideration becomes very big or very small
its precise bulk becomes very obscure and confused; and it is the number
of its repeated additions or divisions that alone remains clear and distinct;
as will easily appear to any one who will let his thoughts loose in the
vast expansion of space, or divisibility of matter. Every part of duration
is duration too; and every part of extension is extension, both of them
capable of addition or division in infinitum. But the least portions of
either of them, whereof we have clear and distinct ideas, may perhaps be
fittest to be considered by us, as the simple ideas of that kind out of
which our complex modes of space, extension, and duration are made up,
and into which they can again be distinctly resolved. Such a small part
in duration may be called a moment, and is the time of one idea in our
minds, in the train of their ordinary succession there. The other, wanting
a proper name, I know not whether I may be allowed to call a sensible point,
meaning thereby the least particle of matter or space we can discern, which
is ordinarily about a minute, and to the sharpest eyes seldom less than
thirty seconds of a circle, whereof the eye is the centre.
10. Their parts inseparable. Expansion and duration have this further
agreement, that, though they are both considered by us as having parts,
yet their parts are not separable one from another, no not even in thought:
though the parts of bodies from whence we take our measure of the one;
and the parts of motion, or rather the succession of ideas in our minds,
from whence we take the measure of the other, may be interrupted and separated;
as the one is often by rest, and the other is by sleep, which we call rest
too.
11. Duration is as a line, expansion as a solid. But there is this manifest
difference between them,- That the ideas of length which we have of expansion
are turned every way, and so make figure, and breadth, and thickness; but
duration is but as it were the length of one straight line, extended in
infinitum, not capable of multiplicity, variation, or figure; but is one
common measure of all existence whatsoever, wherein all things, whilst
they exist, equally partake. For this present moment is common to all things
that are now in being, and equally comprehends that part of their existence,
as much as if they were all but one single being; and we may truly say,
they all exist in the same moment of time. Whether angels and spirits have
any analogy to this, in respect to expansion, is beyond my comprehension:
and perhaps for us, who have understandings and comprehensions suited to
our own preservation, and the ends of our own being, but not to the reality
and extent of all other beings, it is near as hard to conceive any existence,
or to have an idea of any real being, with a perfect negation of all manner
of expansion, as it is to have the idea of any real existence with a perfect
negation of all manner of duration. And therefore, what spirits have to
do with space, or how they communicate in it, we know not. All that we
know is, that bodies do each singly possess its proper portion of it, according
to the extent of solid parts; and thereby exclude all other bodies from
having any share in that particular portion of space, whilst it remains
there.
12. Duration has never two parts together, expansion altogether. Duration,
and time which is a part of it, is the idea we have of perishing distance,
of which no two parts exist together, but follow each other in succession;
an expansion is the idea of lasting distance, all whose parts exist together,
and are not capable of succession. And therefore, though we cannot conceive
any duration without succession, nor can put it together in our thoughts
that any being does now exist tomorrow, or possess at once more than the
present moment of duration; yet we can conceive the eternal duration of
the Almighty far different from that of man, or any other finite being.
Because man comprehends not in his knowledge or power all past and future
things: his thoughts are but of yesterday, and he knows not what tomorrow
will bring forth. What is once past he can never recall; and what is yet
to come he cannot make present. What I say of man, I say of all finite
beings; who, though they may far exceed man in knowledge and power, yet
are no more than the meanest creature, in comparison with God himself Finite
or any magnitude holds not any proportion to infinite. God's infinite duration,
being accompanied with infinite knowledge and infinite power, He sees all
things, past and to come; and they are no more distant from His knowledge,
no further removed from His sight, than the present: they all lie under
the same view: and there is nothing which He cannot make exist each moment
He pleases. For the existence of all things, depending upon His good pleasure,
all things exist every moment that He thinks fit to have them exist. To
conclude: expansion and duration do mutually embrace and comprehend each
other; every part of space being in every part of duration, and every part
of duration in every part of expansion. Such a combination of two distinct
ideas is, I suppose, scarce to be found in all that great variety we do
or can conceive, and may afford matter to further speculation.
Chapter XVI: Idea of Number
1. Number the simplest and most universal idea. Amongst all the ideas we
have, as there is none suggested to the mind by more ways, so there is
none more simple, than that of unity, or one: it has no shadow of variety
or composition in it: every object our senses are employed about; every
idea in our understandings; every thought of our minds, brings this idea
along with it. And therefore it is the most intimate to our thoughts, as
well as it is, in its agreement to all other things, the most universal
idea we have. For number applies itself to men, angels, actions, thoughts;
everything that either doth exist, or can be imagined.
2. Its modes made by addition. By repeating this idea in our minds,
and adding the repetitions together, we come by the complex ideas of the
modes of it. Thus, by adding one to one, we have the complex idea of a
couple; by putting twelve units together, we have the complex idea of a
dozen; and so of a score, or a million, or any other number.
3. Each mode distinct. The simple modes of number are of all other the
most distinct; every the least variation, which is an unit, making each
combination as clearly different from that which approacheth nearest to
it, as the most remote; two being as distinct from one, as two hundred;
and the idea of two as distinct from the idea of three, as the magnitude
of the whole earth is from that of a mite. This is not so in other simple
modes, in which it is not so easy, nor perhaps possible for us to distinguish
betwixt two approaching ideas, which yet are really different. For who
will undertake to find a difference between the white of this paper and
that of the next degree to it: or can form distinct ideas of every the
least excess in extension?
4. Therefore demonstrations in numbers the most precise. The clearness
and distinctness of each mode of number from all others, even those that
approach nearest, makes me apt to think that demonstrations in numbers,
if they are not more evident and exact than in extension, yet they are
more general in their use, and more determinate in their application. Because
the ideas of numbers are more precise and distinguishable than in extension;
where every equality and excess are not so easy to be observed or measured;
because our thoughts cannot in space arrive at any determined smallness
beyond which it cannot go, as an unit; and therefore the quantity or proportion
of any the least excess cannot be discovered; which is clear otherwise
in number, where, as has been said, 91 is as distinguishable from go as
from 9000, though 91 be the next immediate excess to 90. But it is not
so in extension, where, whatsoever is more than just a foot or an inch,
is not distinguishable from the standard of a foot or an inch; and in lines
which appear of an equal length, one may be longer than the other by innumerable
parts: nor can any one assign an angle, which shall be the next biggest
to a right one.
5. Names necessary to numbers. By the repeating, as has been said, the
idea of an unit, and joining it to another unit, we make thereof one collective
idea, marked by the name two. And whosoever can do this, and proceed on,
still adding one more to the last collective idea which he had of any number,
and gave a name to it, may count, or have ideas, for several collections
of units, distinguished one from another, as far as he hath a series of
names for following numbers, and a memory to retain that series, with their
several names: all numeration being but still the adding of one unit more,
and giving to the whole together, as comprehended in one idea, a new or
distinct name or sign, whereby to know it from those before and after,
and distinguish it from every smaller or greater multitude of units. So
that he that can add one to one, and so to two, and so go on with his tale,
taking still with him the distinct names belonging to every progression;
and so again, by subtracting an unit from each collection, retreat and
lessen them, is capable of all the ideas of numbers within the compass
of his language, or for which he hath names, though not perhaps of more.
For, the several simple modes of numbers being in our minds but so many
combinations of units, which have no variety, nor are capable of any other
difference but more or less, names or marks for each distinct combination
seem more necessary than in any other sort of ideas. For, without such
names or marks, we can hardly well make use of numbers in reckoning, especially
where the combination is made up of any great multitude of units; which
put together, without a name or mark to distinguish that precise collection,
will hardly be kept from being a heap in confusion.
6. Another reason for the necessity of names to numbers. This I think
to be the reason why some Americans I have spoken with, (who were otherwise
of quick and rational parts enough,) could not, as we do, by any means
count to 1000; nor had any distinct idea of that number, though they could
reckon very well to 20. Because their language being scanty, and accommodated
only to the few necessaries of a needy, simple life, unacquainted either
with trade or mathematics, had no words in it to stand for 1000; so that
when they were discoursed with of those greater numbers, they would show
the hairs of their head, to express a great multitude, which they could
not number; which inability, I suppose, proceeded from their want of names.
The Tououpinambos had no names for numbers above 5; any number beyond that
they made out by showing their fingers, and the fingers of others who were
present. And I doubt not but we ourselves might distinctly number in words
a great deal further than we usually do, would we find out but some fit
denominations to signify them by; whereas, in the way we take now to name
them, by millions of millions of millions, &c., it is hard to go beyond
eighteen, or at most, four and twenty, decimal progressions, without confusion.
But to show how much distinct names conduce to our well reckoning, or having
useful ideas of numbers, let us see all these following figures in one
continued line, as the marks of one number: v. g.
Nonillions Octillions Septillions Sextillions Quintrillions
857324 162486 345896 437918 423147
Quartrillions Trillions Billions Millions Units
248106 235421 261734 368149 623137
The ordinary way of naming this number in English, will be the often
repeating of millions, of millions, of millions, of millions, of millions,
of millions, of millions, of millions, (which is the denomination of the
second six figures). In which way, it will be very hard to have any distinguishing
notions of this number. But whether, by giving every six figures a new
and orderly denomination, these, and perhaps a great many more figures
in progression, might not easily be counted distinctly, and ideas of them
both got more easily to ourselves, and more plainly signified to others,
I leave it to be considered. This I mention only to show how necessary
distinct names are to numbering, without pretending to introduce new ones
of my invention.
7. Why children number not earlier. Thus children, either for want of
names to mark the several progressions of numbers, or not having yet the
faculty to collect scattered ideas into complex ones, and range them in
a regular order, and so retain them in their memories, as is necessary
to reckoning, do not begin to number very early, nor proceed in it very
far or steadily, till a good while after they are well furnished with good
store of other ideas: and one may often observe them discourse and reason
pretty well, and have very clear conceptions of several other things, before
they can tell twenty. And some, through the default of their memories,
who cannot retain the several combinations of numbers, with their names,
annexed in their distinct orders, and the dependence of so long a train
of numeral progressions, and their relation one to another, are not able
all their lifetime to reckon, or regularly go over any moderate series
of numbers. For he that will count twenty, or have any idea of that number,
must know that nineteen went before, with the distinct name or sign of
every one of them, as they stand marked in their order; for wherever this
fails, a gap is made, the chain breaks, and the progress in numbering can
go no further. So that to reckon right, it is required, (1) That the mind
distinguish carefully two ideas, which are different one from another only
by the addition or subtraction of one unit: (2) That it retain in memory
the names or marks of the several combinations, from an unit to that number;
and that not confusedly, and at random, but in that exact order that the
numbers follow one another. In either of which, if it trips, the whole
business of numbering will be disturbed, and there will remain only the
confused idea of multitude, but the ideas necessary to distinct numeration
will not be attained to.
8. Number measures all measureables. This further is observable in number,
that it is that which the mind makes use of in measuring all things that
by us are measurable, which principally are expansion and duration; and
our idea of infinity, even when applied to those, seems to be nothing but
the infinity of number. For what else are our ideas of Eternity and Immensity,
but the repeated additions of certain ideas of imagined parts of duration
and expansion, with the infinity of number; in which we can come to no
end of addition? For such an inexhaustible stock, number (of all other
our ideas) most clearly furnishes us with, as is obvious to every one.
For let a man collect into one sum as great a number as he pleases, this
multitude, how great soever, lessens not one jot the power of adding to
it, or brings him any nearer the end of the inexhaustible stock of number;
where still there remains as much to be added, as if none were taken out.
And this endless addition or addibility (if any one like the word better)
of numbers, so apparent to the mind, is that, I think, which gives us the
clearest and most distinct idea of infinity: of which more in the following
chapter.
Chapter XVII: Of Infinity
1. Infinity, in its original intention, attributed to space, duration,
and number. He that would know what kind of idea it is to which we give
the name of infinity, cannot do it better than by considering to what infinity
is by the mind more immediately attributed; and then how the mind comes
to frame it.
Finite and infinite seem to me to be looked upon by the mind as the
modes of quantity, and to be attributed primarily in their first designation
only to those things which have parts, and are capable of increase or diminution
by the addition or subtraction of any the least part: and such are the
ideas of space, duration, and number, which we have considered in the foregoing
chapters. It is true, that we cannot but be assured, that the great God,
of whom and from whom are all things, is incomprehensibly infinite: but
yet, when we apply to that first and supreme Being our idea of infinite,
in our weak and narrow thoughts, we do it primarily in respect to his duration
and ubiquity; and, I think, more figuratively to his power, wisdom, and
goodness, and other attributes, which are properly inexhaustible and incomprehensible,
&c. For, when we call them infinite, we have no other idea of this
infinity but what carries with it some reflection on, and imitation of,
that number or extent of the acts or objects of God's power, wisdom, and
goodness, which can never be supposed so great, or so many, which these
attributes will not always surmount and exceed, let us multiply them in
our thoughts as far as we can, with all the infinity of endless number.
I do not pretend to say how these attributes are in God, who is infinitely
beyond the reach of our narrow capacities: they do, without doubt, contain
in them all possible perfection: but this, I say, is our way of conceiving
them, and these our ideas of their infinity.
2. The idea of finite easily got. Finite then, and infinite, being by
the mind looked on as modifications of expansion and duration, the next
thing to be considered, is,- How the mind comes by them. As for the idea
of finite, there is no great difficulty. The obvious portions of extension
that affect our senses, carry with them into the mind the idea of finite:
and the ordinary periods of succession, whereby we measure time and duration,
as hours, days, and years, are bounded lengths. The difficulty is, how
we come by those boundless ideas of eternity and immensity; since the objects
we converse with come so much short of any approach or proportion to that
largeness.
3. How we come by the idea of infinity. Every one that has any idea
of any stated lengths of space, as a foot, finds that he can repeat that
idea; and joining it to the former, make the idea of two feet; and by the
addition of a third, three feet; and so on, without ever coming to an end
of his additions, whether of the same idea of a foot, or, if he pleases,
of doubling it, or any other idea he has of any length, as a mile, or diameter
of the earth, or of the orbis magnus: for whichever of these he takes,
and how often soever he doubles, or any otherwise multiplies it, he finds,
that, after he has continued his doubling in his thoughts, and enlarged
his idea as much as he pleases, he has no more reason to stop, nor is one
jot nearer the end of such addition, than he was at first setting out:
the power of enlarging his idea of space by further additions remaining
still the same, he hence takes the idea of infinite space.
4. Our idea of space boundless. This, I think, is the way whereby the
mind gets the idea of infinite space. It is a quite different consideration,
to examine whether the mind has the idea of such a boundless space actually
existing; since our ideas are not always proofs of the existence of things:
but yet, since this comes here in our way, I suppose I may say, that we
are apt to think that space in itself is actually boundless, to which imagination
the idea of space or expansion of itself naturally leads us. For, it being
considered by us, either as the extension of body, or as existing by itself,
without any solid matter taking it up, (for of such a void space we have
not only the idea, but I have proved, as I think, from the motion of body,
its necessary existence), it is impossible the mind should be ever able
to find or suppose any end of it, or be stopped anywhere in its progress
in this space, how far soever it extends its thoughts. Any bounds made
with body, even adamantine walls, are so far from putting a stop to the
mind in its further progress in space and extension that it rather facilitates
and enlarges it. For so far as that body reaches, so far no one can doubt
of extension; and when we are come to the utmost extremity of body, what
is there that can there put a stop, and satisfy the mind that it is at
the end of space, when it perceives that it is not; nay, when it is satisfied
that body itself can move into it? For, if it be necessary for the motion
of body, that there should be an empty space, though ever so little, here
amongst bodies; and if it be possible for body to move in or through that
empty space;- nay, it is impossible for any particle of matter to move
but into an empty space; the same possibility of a body's moving into a
void space, beyond the utmost bounds of body, as well as into a void space
interspersed amongst bodies, will always remain clear and evident: the
idea of empty pure space, whether within or beyond the confines of all
bodies, being exactly the same, differing not in nature, though in bulk;
and there being nothing to hinder body from moving into it. So that wherever
the mind places itself by any thought, either amongst, or remote from all
bodies, it can, in this uniform idea of space, nowhere find any bounds,
any end; and so must necessarily conclude it, by the very nature and idea
of each part of it, to be actually infinite.
5. And so of duration. As, by the power we find in ourselves of repeating,
as often as we will, any idea of space, we get the idea of immensity; so,
by being able to repeat the idea of any length of duration we have in our
minds, with all the endless addition of number, we come by the idea of
eternity. For we find in ourselves, we can no more come to an end of such
repeated ideas than we can come to the end of number; which every one perceives
he cannot. But here again it is another question, quite different from
our having an idea of eternity, to know whether there were any real being,
whose duration has been eternal. And as to this, I say, he that considers
something now existing, must necessarily come to Something eternal. But
having spoke of this in another place, I shall say here no more of it,
but proceed on to some other considerations of our idea of infinity.
6. Why other ideas are not capable of infinity. If it be so, that our
idea of infinity be got from the power we observe in ourselves of repeating,
without end, our own ideas, it may be demanded,- Why we do not attribute
infinity to other ideas, as well as those of space and duration; since
they may be as easily, and as often, repeated in our minds as the other:
and yet nobody ever thinks of infinite sweetness, or infinite whiteness,
though he can repeat the idea of sweet or white, as frequently as those
of a yard or a day? To which I answer,- All the ideas that are considered
as having parts, and are capable of increase by the addition of any equal
or less parts, afford us, by their repetition, the idea of infinity; because,
with this endless repetition, there is continued an enlargement of which
there can be no end. But in other ideas it is not so. For to the largest
idea of extension or duration that I at present have, the addition of any
the least part makes an increase; but to the perfectest idea I have of
the whitest whiteness, if I add another of a less or equal whiteness, (and
of a whiter than I have, I cannot add the idea), it makes no increase,
and enlarges not my idea at all; and therefore the different ideas of whiteness,
&c. are called degrees. For those ideas that consist of parts are capable
of being augmented by every addition of the least part; but if you take
the idea of white, which one parcel of snow yielded yesterday to our sight,
and another idea of white from another parcel of snow you see to-day, and
put them together in your mind, they embody, as it were, and run into one,
and the idea of whiteness is not at all increased; and if we add a less
degree of whiteness to a greater, we are so far from increasing, that we
diminish it. Those ideas that consist not of parts cannot be augmented
to what proportion men please, or be stretched beyond what they have received
by their senses; but space, duration, and number, being capable of increase
by repetition, leave in the mind an idea of endless room for more; nor
can we conceive anywhere a stop to a further addition or progression: and
so those ideas alone lead our minds towards the thought of infinity.
7. Difference between infinity of space, and space infinite. Though
our idea of infinity arise from the contemplation of quantity, and the
endless increase the mind is able to make in quantity, by the repeated
additions of what portions thereof it pleases; yet I guess we cause great
confusion in our thoughts, when we join infinity to any supposed idea of
quantity the mind can be thought to have, and so discourse or reason about
an infinite quantity, as an infinite space, or an infinite duration. For,
as our idea of infinity being, as I think, an endless growing idea, but
the idea of any quantity the mind has, being at that time terminated in
that idea, (for be it as great as it will, it can be no greater than it
is,)- to join infinity to it, is to adjust a standing measure to a growing
bulk; and therefore I think it is not an insignificant subtilty, if I say,
that we are carefully to distinguish between the idea of the infinity of
space, and the idea of a space infinite. The first is nothing but a supposed
endless progression of the mind, over what repeated ideas of space it pleases;
but to have actually in the mind the idea of a space infinite, is to suppose
the mind already passed over, and actually to have a view of all those
repeated ideas of space which an endless repetition can never totally represent
to it; which carries in it a plain contradiction.
8. We have no idea of infinite space. This, perhaps, will be a little
plainer, if we consider it in numbers. The infinity of numbers, to the
end of whose addition every one perceives there is no approach, easily
appears to any one that reflects on it. But, how clear soever this idea
of the infinity of number be, there is nothing yet more evident than the
absurdity of the actual idea of an infinite number. Whatsoever positive
ideas we have in our minds of any space, duration, or number, let them
be ever so great, they are still finite; but when we suppose an inexhaustible
remainder, from which we remove all bounds, and wherein we allow the mind
an endless progression of thought, without ever completing the idea, there
we have our idea of infinity: which, though it seems to be pretty clear
when we consider nothing else in it but the negation of an end, yet, when
we would frame in our minds the idea of an infinite space or duration,
that idea is very obscure and confused, because it is made up of two parts,
very different, if not inconsistent. For, let a man frame in his mind an
idea of any space or number, as great as he will; it is plain the mind
rests and terminates in that idea, which is contrary to the idea of infinity,
which consists in a supposed endless progression. And therefore I think
it is that we are so easily confounded, when we come to argue and reason
about infinite space or duration, &c. Because the parts of such an
idea not being perceived to be, as they are, inconsistent, the one side
or other always perplexes, whatever consequences we draw from the other;
as an idea of motion not passing on would perplex any one who should argue
from such an idea, which is not better than an idea of motion at rest.
And such another seems to me to be the idea of a space, or (which is the
same thing) a number infinite, i.e. of a space or number which the mind
actually has, and so views and terminates in; and of a space or number,
which, in a constant and endless enlarging and progression, it can in thought
never attain to. For, how large soever an idea of space I have in my mind,
it is no larger than it is that instant that I have it, though I be capable
the next instant to double it, and so on in infinitum; for that alone is
infinite which has no bounds; and that the idea of infinity, in which our
thoughts can find none.
9. Number affords us the clearest idea of infinity. But of all other
ideas, it is number, as I have said, which I think furnishes us with the
clearest and most distinct idea of infinity we are capable of. For, even
in space and duration, when the mind pursues the idea of infinity, it there
makes use of the ideas and repetitions of numbers, as of millions and millions
of miles, or years, which are so many distinct ideas,- kept best by number
from running into a confused heap, wherein the mind loses itself; and when
it has added together as many millions, &c., as it pleases, of known
lengths of space or duration, the clearest idea it can get of infinity,
is the confused incomprehensible remainder of endless addible numbers,
which affords no prospect of stop or boundary.
10. Our different conceptions of the infinity of number contrasted with
those of duration and expansion. It will, perhaps, give us a little further
light into the idea we have of infinity, and discover to us, that it is
nothing but the infinity of number applied to determinate parts, of which
we have in our minds the distinct ideas, if we consider that number is
not generally thought by us infinite, whereas duration and extension are
apt to be so; which arises from hence,- that in number we are at one end,
as it were: for there being in number nothing less than an unit, we there
stop, and are at an end; but in addition, or increase of number, we can
set no bounds: and so it is like a line, whereof one end terminating with
us, the other is extended still forwards, beyond all that we can conceive.
But in space and duration it is otherwise. For in duration we consider
it as if this line of number were extended both ways- to an unconceivable,
undeterminate, and infinite length; which is evident to any one that will
but reflect on what consideration he hath of Eternity; which, I suppose,
will find to be nothing else but the turning this infinity of number both
ways, a parte ante, and a parte post, as they speak. For, when we would
consider eternity, a parte ante, what do we but, beginning from ourselves
and the present time we are in, repeat in our minds the ideas of years,
or ages, or any other assignable portion of duration past, with a prospect
of proceeding in such addition with all the infinity of number: and when
we would consider eternity, a parte post, we just after the same rate begin
from ourselves, and reckon by multiplied periods yet to come, still extending
that line of number as before. And these two being put together, are that
infinite duration we call Eternity: which, as we turn our view either way,
forwards or backwards, appears infinite, because we still turn that way
the infinite end of number, i.e. the power still of adding more.
11. How we conceive the infinity of space. The same happens also in
space, wherein, conceiving ourselves to be, as it were, in the centre,
we do on all sides pursue those indeterminable lines of number; and reckoning
any way from ourselves, a yard, mile, diameter of the earth, or orbis magnus,-
by the infinity of number, we add others to them, as often as we will.
And having no more reason to set bounds to those repeated ideas than we
have to set bounds to number, we have that indeterminable idea of immensity.
12. Infinite divisibility. And since in any bulk of matter our thoughts
can never arrive at the utmost divisibility, therefore there is an apparent
infinity to us also in that, which has the infinity also of number; but
with this difference,- that, in the former considerations of the infinity
of space and duration, we only use addition of numbers; whereas this is
like the division of an unit into its fractions, wherein the mind also
can proceed in infinitum, as well as in the former additions; it being
indeed but the addition still of new numbers: though in the addition of
the one, we can have no more the positive idea of a space infinitely great,
than, in the division of the other, we can have the [positive] idea of
a body infinitely little;- our idea of infinity being, as I may say, a
growing or fugitive idea, still in a boundless progression, that can stop
nowhere.
13. No positive idea of infinity. Though it be hard, I think, to find
anyone so absurd as to say he has the positive idea of an actual infinite
number;- the infinity whereof lies only in a power still of adding any
combination of units to any former number, and that as long and as much
as one will; the like also being in the infinity of space and duration,
which power leaves always to the mind room for endless additions;- yet
there be those who imagine they have positive ideas of infinite duration
and space. It would, I think, be enough to destroy any such positive idea
of infinite, to ask him that has it,- whether he could add to it or no;
which would easily show the mistake of such a positive idea. We can, I
think, have no positive idea of any space or duration which is not made
up of, and commensurate to, repeated numbers of feet or yards, or days
and years; which are the common measures, whereof we have the ideas in
our minds, and whereby we judge of the greatness of this sort of quantities.
And therefore, since an infinite idea of space or duration must needs be
made up of infinite parts, it can have no other infinity than that of number
capable still of further addition; but not an actual positive idea of a
number infinite. For, I think it is evident, that the addition of finite
things together (as are all lengths whereof we have the positive ideas)
can never otherwise produce the idea of infinite than as number does; which,
consisting of additions of finite units one to another, suggests the idea
of infinite, only by a power we find we have of still increasing the sum,
and adding more of the same kind; without coming one jot nearer the end
of such progression.
14. How we cannot have a positive idea of infinity in quantity. They
who would prove their idea of infinite to be positive, seem to me to do
it by a pleasant argument, taken from the negation of an end; which being
negative, the negation of it is positive. He that considers that the end
is, in body, but the extremity or superficies of that body, will not perhaps
be forward to grant that the end is a bare negative: and he that perceives
the end of his pen is black or white, will be apt to think that the end
is something more than a pure negation. Nor is it, when applied to duration,
the bare negation of existence, but more properly the last moment of it.
But if they will have the end to be nothing but the bare negation of existence,
I am sure they cannot deny but the beginning is the first instant of being,
and is not by any body conceived to be a bare negation; and therefore,
by their own argument, the idea of eternal, a parte ante, or of a duration
without a beginning, is but a negative idea.
15. What is positive, what negative, in our idea of infinite. The idea
of infinite has, I confess, something of positive in all those things we
apply to it. When we would think of infinite space or duration, we at first
step usually make some very large idea, as perhaps of millions of ages,
or miles, which possibly we double and multiply several times. All that
we thus amass together in our thoughts is positive, and the assemblage
of a great number of positive ideas of space or duration. But what still
remains beyond this we have no more a positive distinct notion of than
a mariner has of the depth of the sea; where, having let down a large portion
of his sounding-line, he reaches no bottom. Whereby he knows the depth
to be so many fathoms, and more; but how much the more is, he hath no distinct
notion at all: and could he always supply new line, and find the plummet
always sink, without ever stopping, he would be something in the posture
of the mind reaching after a complete and positive idea of infinity. In
which case, let this line be ten, or ten thousand fathoms long, it equally
discovers what is beyond it, and gives only this confused and comparative
idea, that this is not all, but one may yet go farther. So much as the
mind comprehends of any space, it has a positive idea of: but in endeavouring
to make it infinite,- it being always enlarging, always advancing,- the
idea is still imperfect and incomplete. So much space as the mind takes
a view of in its contemplation of greatness, is a clear picture, and positive
in the understanding: but infinite is still greater. 1. Then the idea of
so much is positive and clear. 2. The idea of greater is also clear; but
it is but a comparative idea, the idea of so much greater as cannot be
comprehended. 3. And this is plainly negative: not positive. For he has
no positive clear idea of the largeness of any extension, (which is that
sought for in the idea of infinite), that has not a comprehensive idea
of the dimensions of it: and such, nobody, I think, pretends to in what
is infinite. For to say a man has a positive clear idea of any quantity,
without knowing how great it is, is as reasonable as to say, he has the
positive clear idea of the number of the sands on the sea-shore, who knows
not how many there be, but only that they are more than twenty. For just
such a perfect and positive idea has he of an infinite space or duration,
who says it is larger than the extent or duration of ten, one hundred,
one thousand, or any other number of miles, or years, whereof he has or
can have a positive idea; which is all the idea, I think, we have of infinite.
So that what lies beyond our positive idea towards infinity, lies in obscurity,
and has the indeterminate confusion of a negative idea, wherein I know
I neither do nor can comprehend all I would, it being too large for a finite
and narrow capacity. And that cannot but be very far from a positive complete
idea, wherein the greatest part of what I would comprehend is left out,
under the undeterminate intimation of being still greater. For to say,
that, having in any quantity measured so much, or gone so far, you are
not yet at the end, is only to say that that quantity is greater. So that
the negation of an end in any quantity is, in other words, only to say
that it is bigger; and a total negation of an end is but carrying this
bigger still with you, in all the progressions of your thoughts shall make
in quantity; and adding this idea of still greater to all the ideas you
have, or can be supposed to have, of quantity. Now, whether such an idea
as that be positive, I leave any one to consider.
16. We have no positive idea of an infinite duration. I ask those who
say they have a positive idea of eternity, whether their idea of duration
includes in it succession, or not? If it does not, they ought to show the
difference of their notion of duration, when applied to an eternal Being,
and to a finite; since, perhaps, there may be others as well as I, who
will own to them their weakness of understanding in this point, and acknowledge
that the notion they have of duration forces them to conceive, that whatever
has duration, is of a longer continuance to-day than it was yesterday.
If, to avoid succession in external existence, they return to the punctum
stans of the schools, I suppose they will thereby very little mend the
matter, or help us to a more clear and positive idea of infinite duration;
there being nothing more inconceivable to me than duration without succession.
Besides, that punctum stans, if it signify anything, being not quantum,
finite or infinite cannot belong to it. But, if our weak apprehensions
cannot separate succession from any duration whatsoever, our idea of eternity
can be nothing but of infinite succession of moments of duration wherein
anything does exist; and whether any one has, or can have, a positive idea
of an actual infinite number, I leave him to consider, till his infinite
number be so great that he himself can add no more to it; and as long as
he can increase it, I doubt he himself will think the idea he hath of it
a little too scanty for positive infinity.
17. No complete idea of eternal being. I think it unavoidable for every
considering, rational creature, that will but examine his own or any other
existence, to have the notion of an eternal, wise Being, who had no beginning:
and such an idea of infinite duration I am sure I have. But this negation
of a beginning, being but the negation of a positive thing, scarce gives
me a positive idea of infinity; which, whenever I endeavour to extend my
thoughts to, I confess myself at a loss, and I find I cannot attain any
clear comprehension of it.
18. No positive idea of infinite space. He that thinks he has a positive
idea of infinite space, will, when he considers it, find that he can no
more have a positive idea of the greatest, than he has of the least space.
For in this latter, which seems the easier of the two, and more within
our comprehension, we are capable only of a comparative idea of smallness,
which will always be less than any one whereof we have the positive idea.
All our positive ideas of any quantity, whether great or little, have always
bounds, though our comparative idea, whereby we can always add to the one,
and take from the other, hath no bounds. For that which remains, either
great or little, not being comprehended in that positive idea which we
have, lies in obscurity; and we have no other idea of it, but of the power
of enlarging the one and diminishing the other, without ceasing. A pestle
and mortar will as soon bring any particle of matter to indivisibility,
as the acutest thought of a mathematician; and a surveyor may as soon with
his chain measure out infinite space, as a philosopher by the quickest
flight of mind reach it, or by thinking comprehend it; which is to have
a positive idea of it. He that thinks on a cube of an inch diameter, has
a clear and positive idea of it in his mind, and so can frame one of 1/2,
1/4, 1/8, and so on, till he has the idea in his thoughts of something
very little; but yet reaches not the idea of that incomprehensible littleness
which division can produce. What remains of smallness is as far from his
thoughts as when he first began; and therefore he never comes at all to
have a clear and positive idea of that smallness which is consequent to
infinite divisibility.
19. What is positive, what negative, in our idea of infinite. Every
one that looks towards infinity does, as I have said, at first glance make
some very large idea of that which he applies it to, let it be space or
duration; and possibly he wearies his thoughts, by multiplying in his mind
that first large idea: but yet by that he comes no nearer to the having
a positive clear idea of what remains to make up a positive infinite, than
the country fellow had of the water which was yet to come, and pass the
channel of the river where he stood:
Rusticus expectat dum defluat amnis, at ille
Labitur, et labetur in omne volubilis oevum.
20. Some think they have a positive idea of eternity, and not of infinite
space. There are some I have met that put so much difference between infinite
duration and infinite space, that they persuade themselves that they have
a positive idea of eternity, but that they have not, nor can have any idea
of infinite space. The reason of which mistake I suppose to be this- that
finding, by a due contemplation of causes and effects, that it is necessary
to admit some Eternal Being, and so to consider the real existence of that
Being as taken up and commensurate to their idea of eternity; but, on the
other side, not finding it necessary, but, on the contrary, apparently
absurd, that body should be infinite, they forwardly conclude that they
can have no idea of infinite space, because they can have no idea of infinite
matter. Which consequence, I conceive, is very ill collected, because the
existence of matter is no ways necessary to the existence of space, no
more than the existence of motion, or the sun, is necessary to duration,
though duration used to be measured by it. And I doubt not but that a man
may have the idea of ten thousand miles square, without any body so big,
as well as the idea of ten thousand years, without any body so old. It
seems as easy to me to have the idea of space empty of body, as to think
of the capacity of a bushel without corn, or the hollow of a nut-shell
without a kernel in it: it being no more necessary that there should be
existing a solid body, infinitely extended, because we have an idea of
the infinity of space, than it is necessary that the world should be eternal,
because we have an idea of infinite duration. And why should we think our
idea of infinite space requires the real existence of matter to support
it, when we find that we have as clear an idea of an infinite duration
to come, as we have of infinite duration past? Though I suppose nobody
thinks it conceivable that anything does or has existed in that future
duration. Nor is it possible to join our idea of future duration with present
or past existence, any more than it is possible to make the ideas of yesterday,
to-day, and to-morrow to be the same; or bring ages past and future together,
and make them contemporary. But if these men are of the mind, that they
have clearer ideas of infinite duration than of infinite space, because
it is past doubt that God has existed from all eternity, but there is no
real matter co-extended with infinite space; yet those philosophers who
are of opinion that infinite space is possessed by God's infinite omnipresence,
as well as infinite duration by his eternal existence, must be allowed
to have as clear an idea of infinite space as of infinite duration; though
neither of them, I think, has any positive idea of infinity in either case.
For whatsoever positive ideas a man has in his mind of any quantity, he
can repeat it, and add it to the former, as easy as he can add together
the ideas of two days, or two paces, which are positive ideas of lengths
he has in his mind, and so on as long as he pleases: whereby, if a man
had a positive idea of infinite, either duration or space, he could add
two infinities together; nay, make one infinite infinitely bigger than
another- absurdities too gross to be confuted.
21. Supposed positive ideas of infinity, cause of mistakes. But yet
if after all this, there be men who persuade themselves that they have
clear positive comprehensive ideas of infinity, it is fit they enjoy their
privilege: and I should be very glad (with some others that I know, who
acknowledge they have none such) to be better informed by their communication.
For I have been hitherto apt to think that the great and inextricable difficulties
which perpetually involve all discourses concerning infinity,- whether
of space, duration, or divisibility, have been the certain marks of a defect
in our ideas of infinity, and the disproportion the nature thereof has
to the comprehension of our narrow capacities. For, whilst men talk and
dispute of infinite space or duration, as if they had as complete and positive
ideas of them as they have of the names they use for them, or as they have
of a yard, or an hour, or any other determinate quantity; it is no wonder
if the incomprehensible nature of the thing they discourse of, or reason
about, leads them into perplexities and contradictions, and their minds
be overlaid by an object too large and mighty to be surveyed and managed
by them.
22. All these are modes of ideas got from sensation and reflection.
If I have dwelt pretty long on the consideration of duration, space, and
number, and what arises from the contemplation of them,- Infinity, it is
possibly no more than the matter requires; there being few simple ideas
whose modes give more exercise to the thoughts of men than those do. I
pretend not to treat of them in their full latitude. It suffices to my
design to show how the mind receives them, such as they are, from sensation
and reflection; and how even the idea we have of infinity, how remote soever
it may seem to be from any object of sense, or operation of our mind, has,
nevertheless, as all our other ideas, its original there. Some mathematicians
perhaps, of advanced speculations, may have other ways to introduce into
their minds ideas of infinity. But this hinders not but that they themselves,
as well as all other men, got the first ideas which they had of infinity
from sensation and reflection, in the method we have here set down.
Chapter XVIII: Other Simple Modes
1. Other simple modes of simple ideas of sensation. Though I have, in the
foregoing chapters, shown how, from simple ideas taken in by sensation,
the mind comes to extend itself even to infinity; which, however it may
of all others seem most remote from any sensible perception, yet at last
hath nothing in it but what is made out of simple ideas: received into
the mind by the senses, and afterwards there put together, by the faculty
the mind has to repeat its own ideas;- Though, I say, these might be instances
enough of simple modes of the simple ideas of sensation, and suffice to
show how the mind comes by them, yet I shall, for method's sake, though
briefly, give an account of some few more, and then proceed to more complex
ideas.
2. Simple modes of motion. To slide, roll, tumble, walk, creep, run,
dance, leap, skip, and abundance of others that might be named, are words
which are no sooner heard but every one who understands English has presently
in his mind distinct ideas, which are all but the different modifications
of motion. Modes of motion answer those of extension; swift and slow are
two different ideas of motion, the measures whereof are made of the distances
of time and space put together; so they are complex ideas, comprehending
time and space with motion.
3. Modes of sounds. The like variety have we in sounds. Every articulate
word is a different modification of sound; by which we see that, from the
sense of hearing, by such modifications, the mind may be furnished with
distinct ideas, to almost an infinite number. Sounds also, besides the
distinct cries of birds and beasts, are modified by diversity of notes
of different length put together, which make that complex idea called a
tune, which a musician may have in his mind when he hears or makes no sound
at all, by reflecting on the ideas of those sounds, so put together silently
in his own fancy.
4. Modes of colours. Those of colours are also very various: some we
take notice of as the different degrees, or as they were termed shades,
of the same colour. But since we very seldom make assemblages of colours,
either for use or delight, but figure is taken in also, and has its part
in it, as in painting, weaving, needleworks, &c.; those which are taken
notice of do most commonly belong to mixed modes, as being made up of ideas
of divers kinds, viz. figure and colour, such as beauty, rainbow, &c.
5. Modes of tastes. All compounded tastes and smells are also modes,
made up of the simple ideas of those senses. But they, being such as generally
we have no names for, are less taken notice of, and cannot be set down
in writing; and therefore must be left without enumeration to the thoughts
and experience of my reader.
6. Some simple modes have no names. In general it may be observed, that
those simple modes which are considered but as different degrees of the
same simple idea, though they are in themselves many of them very distinct
ideas, yet have ordinarily no distinct names, nor are much taken notice
of, as distinct ideas, where the difference is but very small between them.
Whether men have neglected these modes, and given no names to them, as
wanting measures nicely to distinguish them; or because, when they were
so distinguished, that knowledge would not be of general or necessary use,
I leave it to the thoughts of others. It is sufficient to my purpose to
show, that all our simple ideas come to our minds only by sensation and
reflection; and that when the mind has them, it can variously repeat and
compound them, and so make new complex ideas. But, though white, red, or
sweet, &c. have not been modified, or made into complex ideas, by several
combinations, so as to be named, and thereby ranked into species; yet some
others of the simple ideas, viz. those of unity, duration, and motion,
&c., above instanced in, as also power and thinking, have been thus
modified to a great variety of complex ideas, with names belonging to them.
7. Why some modes have, and others have not, names. The reason whereof,
I suppose, has been this,- That the great concernment of men being with
men one amongst another, the knowledge of men, and their actions, and the
signifying of them to one another, was most necessary; and therefore they
made ideas of actions very nicely modified, and gave those complex ideas
names, that they might the more easily record and discourse of those things
they were daily conversant in, without long ambages and circumlocutions;
and that the things they were continually to give and receive information
about might be the easier and quicker understood. That this is so, and
that men in framing different complex ideas, and giving them names, have
been much governed by the end of speech in general, (which is a very short
and expedite way of conveying their thoughts one to another), is evident
in the names which in several arts have been found out, and applied to
several complex ideas of modified actions, belonging to their several trades,
for dispatch sake, in their direction or discourses about them. Which ideas
are not generally framed in the minds of men not conversant about these
operations. And thence the words that stand for them, by the greatest part
of men of the same language, are not understood: v.g. coltshire, drilling,
filtration, cohobation, are words standing for certain complex ideas, which
being seldom in the minds of any but those few whose particular employments
do at every turn suggest them to their thoughts, those names of them are
not generally understood but by smiths and chymists; who, having framed
the complex ideas which these words stand for, and having given names to
them, or received them from others, upon hearing of these names in communication,
readily conceive those ideas in their minds;- as by cohobation all the
simple ideas of distilling, and the pouring the liquor distilled from anything
back upon the remaining matter, and distilling it again. Thus we see that
there are great varieties of simple ideas, as of tastes and smells, which
have no names; and of modes many more; which either not having been generally
enough observed, or else not being of any great use to be taken notice
of in the affairs and converse of men, they have not had names given to
them, and so pass not for species. This we shall have occasion hereafter
to consider more at large, when we come to speak of words.
Chapter XIX: Of the Modes of Thinking
1. Sensation, remembrance, contemplation, &c., modes of thinking. When
the mind turns its view inwards upon itself, and contemplates its own actions,
thinking is the first that occurs. In it the mind observes a great variety
of modifications, and from thence receives distinct ideas. Thus the perception
or thought which actually accompanies, and is annexed to, any impression
on the body, made by an external object, being distinct from all other
modifications of thinking, furnishes the mind with a distinct idea, which
we call sensation;- which is, as it were, the actual entrance of any idea
into the understanding by the senses. The same idea, when it again recurs
without the operation of the like object on the external sensory, is remembrance:
if it be sought after by the mind, and with pain and endeavour found, and
brought again in view, it is recollection: if it be held there long under
attentive consideration, it is contemplation: when ideas float in our mind,
without any reflection or regard of the understanding, it is that which
the French call reverie; our language has scarce a name for it: when the
ideas that offer themselves (for, as I have observed in another place,
whilst we are awake, there will always be a train of ideas succeeding one
another in our minds) are taken notice of, and, as it were, registered
in the memory, it is attention: when the mind with great earnestness, and
of choice, fixes its view on any idea, considers it on all sides, and will
not be called off by the ordinary solicitation of other ideas, it is that
we call intention or study: sleep, without dreaming, is rest from all these:
and dreaming itself is the having of ideas (whilst the outward senses are
stopped, so that they receive not outward objects with their usual quickness)
in the mind, not suggested by any external objects, or known occasion;
nor under any choice or conduct of the understanding at all: and whether
that which we call ecstasy be not dreaming with the eyes open, I leave
to be examined.
2. Other modes of thinking. These are some few instances of those various
modes of thinking, which the mind may observe in itself, and so have as
distinct ideas of as it hath of white and red, a square or a circle. I
do not pretend to enumerate them all, nor to treat at large of this set
of ideas, which are got from reflection: that would be to make a volume.
It suffices to my present purpose to have shown here, by some few examples,
of what sort these ideas are, and how the mind comes by them; especially
since I shall have occasion hereafter to treat more at large of reasoning,
judging, volition, and knowledge, which are some of the most considerable
operations of the mind, and modes of thinking.
3. The various degrees of attention in thinking. But perhaps it may
not be an unpardonable digression, nor wholly impertinent to our present
design, if we reflect here upon the different state of the mind in thinking,
which those instances of attention, reverie, and dreaming, &c., before
mentioned, naturally enough suggest. That there are ideas, some or other,
always present in the mind of a waking man, every one's experience convinces
him; though the mind employs itself about them with several degrees of
attention. Sometimes the mind fixes itself with so much earnestness on
the contemplation of some objects, that it turns their ideas on all sides;
marks their relations and circumstances; and views every part so nicely
and with such intention, that it shuts out all other thoughts, and takes
no notice of the ordinary impressions made then on the senses, which at
another season would produce very sensible perceptions: at other times
it barely observes the train of ideas that succeed in the understanding,
without directing and pursuing any of them: and at other times it lets
them pass almost quite unregarded, as faint shadows that make no impression.
4. Hence it is probable that thinking is the action, not the essence
of the soul. This difference of intention, and remission of the mind in
thinking, with a great variety of degrees between earnest study and very
near minding nothing at all, every one, I think, has experimented in himself.
Trace it a little further, and you find the mind in sleep retired as it
were from the senses, and out of the reach of those motions made on the
organs of sense, which at other times produce very vivid and sensible ideas.
I need not, for this, instance in those who sleep out whole stormy nights,
without hearing the thunder, or seeing the lightning, or feeling the shaking
of the house, which are sensible enough to those who are waking. But in
this retirement of the mind from the senses, it often retains a yet more
loose and incoherent manner of thinking, which we call dreaming. And, last
of all, sound sleep closes the scene quite, and puts an end to all appearances.
This, I think almost every one has experience of in himself, and his own
observation without difficulty leads him thus far. That which I would further
conclude from hence is, that since the mind can sensibly put on, at several
times, several degrees of thinking, and be sometimes, even in a waking
man, so remiss, as to have thoughts dim and obscure to that degree that
they are very little removed from none at all; and at last, in the dark
retirements of sound sleep, loses the sight perfectly of all ideas whatsoever:
since, I say, this is evidently so in matter of fact and constant experience,
I ask whether it be not probable, that thinking is the action and not the
essence of the soul? Since the operations of agents will easily admit of
intention and remission: but the essences of things are not conceived capable
of any such variation. But this by the by.
Chapter XX: Of Modes of Pleasure and Pain
1. Pleasure and pain, simple ideas. Amongst the simple ideas which we receive
both from sensation and reflection, pain and pleasure are two very considerable
ones. For as in the body there is sensation barely in itself, or accompanied
with pain or pleasure, so the thought or perception of the mind is simply
so, or else accompanied also with pleasure or pain, delight or trouble,
call it how you please. These, like other simple ideas, cannot be described,
nor their names defined; the way of knowing them is, as of the simple ideas
of the senses, only by experience. For, to define them by the presence
of good or evil, is no otherwise to make them known to us than by making
us reflect on what we feel in ourselves, upon the several and various operations
of good and evil upon our minds, as they are differently applied to or
considered by us.
2. Good and evil, what. Things then are good or evil, only in reference
to pleasure or pain. That we call good, which is apt to cause or increase
pleasure, or diminish pain in us; or else to procure or preserve us the
possession of any other good or absence of any evil. And, on the contrary,
we name that evil which is apt to produce or increase any pain, or diminish
any pleasure in us: or else to procure us any evil, or deprive us of any
good. By pleasure and pain, I must be understood to mean of body or mind,
as they are commonly distinguished; though in truth they be only different
constitutions of the mind, sometimes occasioned by disorder in the body,
sometimes by thoughts of the mind.
3. Our passions moved by good and evil. Pleasure and pain and that which
causes them,- good and evil, are the hinges on which our passions turn.
And if we reflect on ourselves, and observe how these, under various considerations,
operate in us; what modifications or tempers of mind, what internal sensations
(if I may so call them) they produce in us we may thence form to ourselves
the ideas of our passions.
4. Love. Thus any one reflecting upon the thought he has of the delight
which any present or absent thing is apt to produce in him, has the idea
we call love. For when a man declares in autumn when he is eating them,
or in spring when there are none, that he loves grapes, it is no more but
that the taste of grapes delights him: let an alteration of health or constitution
destroy the delight of their taste, and he then can be said to love grapes
no longer.
5. Hatred. On the contrary, the thought of the pain which anything present
or absent is apt to produce in us, is what we call hatred. Were it my business
here to inquire any further than into the bare ideas of our passions, as
they depend on different modifications of pleasure and pain, I should remark,
that our love and hatred of inanimate insensible beings is commonly founded
on that pleasure and pain which we receive from their use and application
any way to our senses, though with their destruction. But hatred or love,
to beings capable of happiness or misery, is often the uneasiness or delight
which we find in ourselves, arising from a consideration of their very
being or happiness. Thus the being and welfare of a man's children or friends,
producing constant delight in him, he is said constantly to love them.
But it suffices to note, that our ideas of love and hatred are but the
dispositions of the mind, in respect of pleasure and pain in general, however
caused in us.
6. Desire. The uneasiness a man finds in himself upon the absence of
anything whose present enjoyment carries the idea of delight with it, is
that we call desire; which is greater or less, as that uneasiness is more
or less vehement. Where, by the by, it may perhaps be of some use to remark,
that the chief, if not only spur to human industry and action is uneasiness.
For whatsoever good is proposed, if its absence carries no displeasure
or pain with it, if a man be easy and content without it, there is no desire
of it, nor endeavour after it; there is no more but a bare velleity, the
term used to signify the lowest degree of desire, and that which is next
to none at all, when there is so little uneasiness in the absence of anything,
that it carries a man no further than some faint wishes for it, without
any more effectual or vigorous use of the means to attain it. Desire also
is stopped or abated by the opinion of the impossibility or unattainableness
of the good proposed, as far as the uneasiness is cured or allayed by that
consideration. This might carry our thoughts further, were it seasonable
in this place.
7. Joy is a delight of the mind, from the consideration of the present
or assured approaching possession of a good; and we are then possessed
of any good, when we have it so in our power that we can use it when we
please. Thus a man almost starved has joy at the arrival of relief, even
before he has the pleasure of using it: and a father, in whom the very
well-being of his children causes delight, is always, as long as his children
are in such a state, in the possession of that good; for he needs but to
reflect on it, to have that pleasure.
8. Sorrow is uneasiness in the mind, upon the thought of a good lost,
which might have been enjoyed longer; or the sense of a present evil.
9. Hope is that pleasure in the mind, which every one finds in himself,
upon the thought of a probable future enjoyment of a thing which is apt
to delight him.
10. Fear is an uneasiness of the mind, upon the thought of future evil
likely to befal us.
11. Despair is the thought of the unattainableness of any good, which
works differently in men's minds, sometimes producing uneasiness or pain,
sometimes rest and indolency.
12. Anger is uneasiness or discomposure of the mind, upon the receipt
of any injury, with a present purpose of revenge.
13. Envy is an uneasiness of the mind, caused by the consideration of
a good we desire obtained by one we think should not have had it before
us.
14. What passions all men have. These two last, envy and anger, not
being caused by pain and pleasure simply in themselves, but having in them
some mixed considerations of ourselves and others, are not therefore to
be found in all men, because those other parts, of valuing their merits,
or intending revenge, is wanting in them. But all the rest, terminating
purely in pain and pleasure, are, I think, to be found in all men. For
we love, desire, rejoice, and hope, only in respect of pleasure; we hate,
fear, and grieve, only in respect of pain ultimately. In fine, all these
passions are moved by things, only as they appear to be the causes of pleasure
and pain, or to have pleasure or pain some way or other annexed to them.
Thus we extend our hatred usually to the subject (at least, if a sensible
or voluntary agent) which has produced pain in us; because the fear it
leaves is a constant pain: but we do not so constantly love what has done
us good; because pleasure operates not so strongly on us as pain, and because
we are not so ready to have hope it will do so again. But this by the by.
15. Pleasure and pain, what. By pleasure and pain, delight and uneasiness,
I must all along be understood (as I have above intimated) to mean not
only bodily pain and pleasure, but whatsoever delight or uneasiness is
felt by us, whether arising from any grateful or unacceptable sensation
or reflection.
16. Removal or lessening of either. It is further to be considered,
that, in reference to the passions, the removal or lessening of a pain
is considered, and operates, as a pleasure: and the loss or diminishing
of a pleasure, as a pain.
17. Shame. The passions too have most of them, in most persons, operations
on the body, and cause various changes in it; which not being always sensible,
do not make a necessary part of the idea of each passion. For shame, which
is an uneasiness of the mind upon the thought of having done something
which is indecent, or will lessen the valued esteem which others have for
us, has not always blushing accompanying it.
18. These instances to show how our ideas of the passions are got from
sensation and reflection. I would not be mistaken here, as if I meant this
as a Discourse of the Passions; they are many more than those I have here
named: and those I have taken notice of would each of them require a much
larger and more accurate discourse. I have only mentioned these here, as
so many instances of modes of pleasure and pain resulting in our minds
from various considerations of good and evil. I might perhaps have instanced
in other modes of pleasure and pain, more simple than these; as the pain
of hunger and thirst, and the pleasure of eating and drinking to remove
them: the pain of teeth set on edge; the pleasure of music; pain from captious
uninstructive wrangling, and the pleasure of rational conversation with
a friend, or of well-directed study in the search and discovery of truth.
But the passions being of much more concernment to us, I rather made choice
to instance in them, and show how the ideas we have of them are derived
from sensation or reflection.
Chapter XXI: Of Power
1. This idea how got. The mind being every day informed, by the senses,
of the alteration of those simple ideas it observes in things without;
and taking notice how one comes to an end, and ceases to be, and another
begins to exist which was not before; reflecting also on what passes within
itself, and observing a constant change of its ideas, sometimes by the
impression of outward objects on the senses, and sometimes by the determination
of its own choice; and concluding from what it has so constantly observed
to have been, that the like changes will for the future be made in the
same things, by like agents, and by the like ways,- considers in one thing
the possibility of having any of its simple ideas changed, and in another
the possibility of making that change; and so comes by that idea which
we call power. Thus we say, Fire has a power to melt gold, i.e. to destroy
the consistency of its insensible parts, and consequently its hardness,
and make it fluid; and gold has a power to be melted; that the sun has
a power to blanch wax, and wax a power to be blanched by the sun, whereby
the yellowness is destroyed, and whiteness made to exist in its room. In
which, and the like cases, the power we consider is in reference to the
change of perceivable ideas. For we cannot observe any alteration to be
made in, or operation upon anything, but by the observable change of its
sensible ideas; nor conceive any alteration to be made, but by conceiving
a change of some of its ideas.
2. Power, active and passive. Power thus considered is two-fold, viz.
as able to make, or able to receive any change. The one may be called active,
and the other passive power. Whether matter be not wholly destitute of
active power, as its author, God, is truly above all passive power; and
whether the intermediate state of created spirits be not that alone which
is capable of both active and passive power, may be worth consideration.
I shall not now enter into that inquiry, my present business being not
to search into the original of power, but how we come by the idea of it.
But since active powers make so great a part of our complex ideas of natural
substances, (as we shall see hereafter,) and I mention them as such, according
to common apprehension; yet they being not, perhaps, so truly active powers
as our hasty thoughts are apt to represent them, I judge it not amiss,
by this intimation, to direct our minds to the consideration of God and
spirits, for the clearest idea of active power.
3. Power includes relation. I confess power includes in it some kind
of relation, (a relation to action or change,) as indeed which of our ideas,
of what kind soever, when attentively considered, does not? For, our ideas
of extension, duration, and number, do they not all contain in them a secret
relation of the parts? Figure and motion have something relative in them
much more visibly. And sensible qualities, as colours and smells, &c.,
what are they but the powers of different bodies, in relation to our perception,
&c.? And, if considered in the things themselves, do they not depend
on the bulk, figure, texture, and motion of the parts? All which include
some kind of relation in them. Our idea therefore of power, I think, may
well have a place amongst other simple ideas, and be considered as one
of them; being one of those that make a principal ingredient in our complex
ideas of substances, as we shall hereafter have occasion to observe.
4. The clearest idea of active power had from spirit. We are abundantly
furnished with the idea of passive power by almost all sorts of sensible
things. In most of them we cannot avoid observing their sensible qualities,
nay, their very substances, to be in a continual flux. And therefore with
reason we look on them as liable still to the same change. Nor have we
of active power (which is the more proper signification of the word power)
fewer instances. Since whatever change is observed, the mind must collect
a power somewhere able to make that change, as well as a possibility in
the thing itself to receive it. But yet, if we will consider it attentively,
bodies, by our senses, do not afford us so clear and distinct an idea of
active power, as we have from reflection on the operations of our minds.
For all power relating to action, and there being but two sorts of action
whereof we have an idea, viz. thinking and motion, let us consider whence
we have the clearest ideas of the powers which produce these actions. (1)
Of thinking, body affords us no idea at all; it is only from reflection
that we have that. (2) Neither have we from body any idea of the beginning
of motion. A body at rest affords us no idea of any active power to move;
and when it is set in motion itself, that motion is rather a passion than
an action in it. For, when the ball obeys the motion of a billiard-stick,
it is not any action of the ball, but bare passion. Also when by impulse
it sets another ball in motion that lay in its way, it only communicates
the motion it had received from another, and loses in itself so much as
the other received: which gives us but a very obscure idea of an active
power of moving in body, whilst we observe it only to transfer, but not
produce any motion. For it is but a very obscure idea of power which reaches
not the production of the action, but the continuation of the passion.
For so is motion in a body impelled by another; the continuation of the
alteration made in it from rest to motion being little more an action,
than the continuation of the alteration of its figure by the same blow
is an action. The idea of the beginning of motion we have only from reflection
on what passes in ourselves; where we find by experience, that, barely
by willing it, barely by a thought of the mind, we can move the parts of
our bodies, which were before at rest. So that it seems to me, we have,
from the observation of the operation of bodies by our senses, but a very
imperfect obscure idea of active power; since they afford us not any idea
in themselves of the power to begin any action, either motion or thought.
But if, from the impulse bodies are observed to make one upon another,
any one thinks he has a clear idea of power, it serves as well to my purpose;
sensation being one of those ways whereby the mind comes by its ideas:
only I thought it worth while to consider here, by the way, whether the
mind doth not receive its idea of active power clearer from reflection
on its own operations, than it doth from any external sensation.
5. Will and understanding two powers in mind or spirit. This, at least,
I think evident,- That we find in ourselves a power to begin or forbear,
continue or end several actions of our minds, and motions of our bodies,
barely by a thought or preference of the mind ordering, or as it were commanding,
the doing or not doing such or such a particular action. This power which
the mind has thus to order the consideration of any idea, or the forbearing
to consider it; or to prefer the motion of any part of the body to its
rest, and vice versa, in any particular instance, is that which we call
the Will. The actual exercise of that power, by directing any particular
action, or its forbearance, is that which we call volition or willing.
The forbearance of that action, consequent to such order or command of
the mind, is called voluntary. And whatsoever action is performed without
such a thought of the mind, is called involuntary. The power of perception
is that which we call the Understanding. Perception, which we make the
act of the understanding, is of three sorts:- 1. The perception of ideas
in our minds. 2. The perception of the signification of signs. 3. The perception
of the connexion or repugnancy, agreement or disagreement, that there is
between any of our ideas. All these are attributed to the understanding,
or perceptive power, though it be the two latter only that use allows us
to say we understand.
6. Faculties, not real beings. These powers of the mind, viz. of perceiving,
and of preferring, are usually called by another name. And the ordinary
way of speaking is, that the understanding and will are two faculties of
the mind; a word proper enough, if it be used, as all words should be,
so as not to breed any confusion in men's thoughts, by being supposed (as
I suspect it has been) to stand for some real beings in the soul that performed
those actions of understanding and volition. For when we say the will is
the commanding and superior faculty of the soul; that it is or is not free;
that it determines the inferior faculties; that it follows the dictates
of the understanding, &c.,- though these and the like expressions,
by those that carefully attend to their own ideas, and conduct their thoughts
more by the evidence of things than the sound of words, may be understood
in a clear and distinct sense- yet I suspect, I say, that this way of speaking
of faculties has misled many into a confused notion of so many distinct
agents in us, which had their several provinces and authorities, and did
command, obey, and perform several actions, as so many distinct beings;
which has been no small occasion of wrangling, obscurity, and uncertainty,
in questions relating to them.
7. Whence the ideas of liberty and necessity. Every one, I think, finds
in himself a power to begin or forbear, continue or put an end to several
actions in himself. From the consideration of the extent of this power
of the mind over the actions of the man, which everyone finds in himself,
arise the ideas of liberty and necessity.
8. Liberty, what. All the actions that we have any idea of reducing
themselves, as has been said, to these two, viz. thinking and motion; so
far as a man has power to think or not to think, to move or not to move,
according to the preference or direction of his own mind, so far is a man
free. Wherever any performance or forbearance are not equally in a man's
power; wherever doing or not doing will not equally follow upon the preference
of his mind directing it, there he is not free, though perhaps the action
may be voluntary. So that the idea of liberty is, the idea of a power in
any agent to do or forbear any particular action, according to the determination
or thought of the mind, whereby either of them is preferred to the other:
where either of them is not in the power of the agent to be produced by
him according to his volition, there he is not at liberty; that agent is
under necessity. So that liberty cannot be where there is no thought, no
volition, no will; but there may be thought, there may be will, there may
be volition, where there is no liberty. A little consideration of an obvious
instance or two may make this clear.
9. Supposes understanding and will. A tennis-ball, whether in motion
by the stroke of a racket, or lying still at rest, is not by any one taken
to be a free agent. If we inquire into the reason, we shall find it is
because we conceive not a tennis-ball to think, and consequently not to
have any volition, or preference of motion to rest, or vice versa; and
therefore has not liberty, is not a free agent; but all its both motion
and rest come under our idea of necessary, and are so called. Likewise
a man falling into the water, (a bridge breaking under him), has not herein
liberty, is not a free agent. For though he has volition, though he prefers
his not falling to falling; yet the forbearance of that motion not being
in his power, the stop or cessation of that motion follows not upon his
volition; and therefore therein he is not free. So a man striking himself,
or his friend, by a convulsive motion of his arm, which it is not in his
power, by volition or the direction of his mind, to stop or forbear, nobody
thinks he has in this liberty; every one pities him, as acting by necessity
and constraint.
10. Belongs not to volition. Again: suppose a man be carried, whilst
fast asleep, into a room where is a person he longs to see and speak with;
and be there locked fast in, beyond his power to get out: he awakes, and
is glad to find himself in so desirable company, which he stays willingly
in, i.e. prefers his stay to going away. I ask, is not this stay voluntary?
I think nobody will doubt it: and yet, being locked fast in, it is evident
he is not at liberty not to stay, he has not freedom to be gone. So that
liberty is not an idea belonging to volition, or preferring; but to the
person having the power of doing, or forbearing to do, according as the
mind shall choose or direct. Our idea of liberty reaches as far as that
power, and no farther. For wherever restraint comes to check that power,
or compulsion takes away that indifferency of ability to act, or to forbear
acting, there liberty, and our notion of it, presently ceases.
11. Voluntary opposed to involuntary, not to necessary. We have instances
enough, and often more than enough, in our own bodies. A man's heart beats,
and the blood circulates, which it is not in his power by any thought or
volition to stop; and therefore in respect of these motions, where rest
depends not on his choice, nor would follow the determination of his mind,
if it should prefer it, he is not a free agent. Convulsive motions agitate
his legs, so that though he wills it ever so much, he cannot by any power
of his mind stop their motion, (as in that odd disease called chorea sancti
viti), but he is perpetually dancing; he is not at liberty in this action,
but under as much necessity of moving, as a stone that falls, or a tennis-ball
struck with a racket. On the other side, a palsy or the stocks hinder his
legs from obeying the determination of his mind, if it would thereby transfer
his body to another place. In all these there is want of freedom; though
the sitting still, even of a paralytic, whilst he prefers it to a removal,
is truly voluntary. Voluntary, then, is not opposed to necessary, but to
involuntary. For a man may prefer what he can do, to what he cannot do;
the state he is in, to its absence or change; though necessity has made
it in itself unalterable.
12. Liberty, what. As it is in the motions of the body, so it is in
the thoughts of our minds: where any one is such, that we have power to
take it up, or lay it by, according to the preference of the mind, there
we are at liberty. A waking man, being under the necessity of having some
ideas constantly in his mind, is not at liberty to think or not to think;
no more than he is at liberty, whether his body shall touch any other or
no: but whether he will remove his contemplation from one idea to another
is many times in his choice; and then he is, in respect of his ideas, as
much at liberty as he is in respect of bodies he rests on; he can at pleasure
remove himself from one to another. But yet some ideas to the mind, like
some motions to the body, are such as in certain circumstances it cannot
avoid, nor obtain their absence by the utmost effort it can use. A man
on the rack is not at liberty to lay by the idea of pain, and divert himself
with other contemplations: and sometimes a boisterous passion hurries our
thoughts, as a hurricane does our bodies, without leaving us the liberty
of thinking on other things, which we would rather choose. But as soon
as the mind regains the power to stop or continue, begin or forbear, any
of these motions of the body without, or thoughts within, according as
it thinks fit to prefer either to the other, we then consider the man as
a free agent again.
13. Necessity, what. Wherever thought is wholly wanting, or the power
to act or forbear according to the direction of thought, there necessity
takes place. This, in an agent capable of volition, when the beginning
or continuation of any action is contrary to that preference of his mind,
is called compulsion; when the hindering or stopping any action is contrary
to his volition, it is called restraint. Agents that have no thought, no
volition at all, are in everything necessary agents.
14. Liberty belongs not to the will. If this be so, (as I imagine it
is,) I leave it to be considered, whether it may not help to put an end
to that long agitated, and, I think, unreasonable, because unintelligible
question, viz. Whether man's will be free or no? For if I mistake not,
it follows from what I have said, that the question itself is altogether
improper; and it is as insignificant to ask whether man's will be free,
as to ask whether his sleep be swift, or his virtue square: liberty being
as little applicable to the will, as swiftness of motion is to sleep, or
squareness to virtue. Every one would laugh at the absurdity of such a
question as either of these: because it is obvious that the modifications
of motion belong not to sleep, nor the difference of figure to virtue;
and when one well considers it, I think he will as plainly perceive that
liberty, which is but a power, belongs only to agents, and cannot be an
attribute or modification of the will, which is also but a power.
15. Volition. Such is the difficulty of explaining and giving clear
notions of internal actions by sounds, that I must here warn my reader,
that ordering, directing, choosing, preferring, &c., which I have made
use of, will not distinctly enough express volition, unless he will reflect
on what he himself does when he wills. For example, preferring, which seems
perhaps best to express the act of volition, does it not precisely. For
though a man would prefer flying to walking, yet who can say he ever wills
it? Volition, it is plain, is an act of the mind knowingly exerting that
dominion it takes itself to have over any part of the man, by employing
it in, or withholding it from, any particular action. And what is the will,
but the faculty to do this? And is that faculty anything more in effect
than a power; the power of the mind to determine its thought, to the producing,
continuing, or stopping any action, as far as it depends on us? For can
it be denied that whatever agent has a power to think on its own actions,
and to prefer their doing or omission either to other, has that faculty
called will? Will, then, is nothing but such a power. Liberty, on the other
side, is the power a man has to do or forbear doing any particular action
according as its doing or forbearance has the actual preference in the
mind; which is the same thing as to say, according as he himself wills
it.
16. Powers, belonging to agents. It is plain then that the will is nothing
but one power or ability, and freedom another power or ability so that,
to ask, whether the will has freedom, is to ask whether one power has another
power, one ability another ability; a question at first sight too grossly
absurd to make a dispute, or need an answer. For, who is it that sees not
that powers belong only to agents, and are attributes only of substances,
and not of powers themselves? So that this way of putting the question
(viz. whether the will be free) is in effect to ask, whether the will be
a substance, an agent, or at least to suppose it, since freedom can properly
be attributed to nothing else. If freedom can with any propriety of speech
be applied to power, it may be attributed to the power that is in a man
to produce, or forbear producing, motion in parts of his body, by choice
or preference; which is that which denominates him free, and is freedom
itself. But if any one should ask, whether freedom were free, he would
be suspected not to understand well what he said; and he would be thought
to deserve Midas's ears, who, knowing that rich was a denomination for
the possession of riches, should demand whether riches themselves were
rich.
17. How the will, instead of the man, is called free. However, the name
faculty, which men have given to this power called the will, and whereby
they have been led into a way of talking of the will as acting, may, by
an appropriation that disguises its true sense, serve a little to palliate
the absurdity; yet the will, in truth, signifies nothing but a power or
ability to prefer or choose: and when the will, under the name of a faculty,
is considered as it is, barely as an ability to do something, the absurdity
in saying it is free, or not free, will easily discover itself For, if
it be reasonable to suppose and talk of faculties as distinct beings that
can act, (as we do, when we say the will orders, and the will is free,)
it is fit that we should make a speaking faculty, and a walking faculty,
and a dancing faculty, by which these actions are produced, which are but
several modes of motion; as well as we make the will and understanding
to be faculties, by which the actions of choosing and perceiving are produced,
which are but several modes of thinking. And we may as properly say that
it is the singing faculty sings, and the dancing faculty dances, as that
the will chooses, or that the understanding conceives; or, as is usual,
that the will directs the understanding, or the understanding obeys or
obeys not the will: it being altogether as proper and intelligible to say
that the power of speaking directs the power of singing, or the power of
singing obeys or disobeys the power of speaking.
18. This way of talking causes confusion of thought. This way of talking,
nevertheless, has prevailed, and, as I guess, produced great confusion.
For these being all different powers in the mind, or in the man, to do
several actions, he exerts them as he thinks fit: but the power to do one
action is not operated on by the power of doing another action. For the
power of thinking operates not on the power of choosing, nor the power
of choosing on the power of thinking; no more than the power of dancing
operates on the power of singing, or the power of singing on the power
of dancing, as any one who reflects on it will easily perceive. And yet
this is it which we say when we thus speak, that the will operates on the
understanding, or the understanding on the will.
19. Powers are relations, not agents. I grant, that this or that actual
thought may be the occasion of volition, or exercising the power a man
has to choose; or the actual choice of the mind, the cause of actual thinking
on this or that thing: as the actual singing of such a tune may be the
cause of dancing such a dance, and the actual dancing of such a dance the
occasion of singing such a tune. But in all these it is not one power that
operates on another: but it is the mind that operates, and exerts these
powers; it is the man that does the action; it is the agent that has power,
or is able to do. For powers are relations, not agents: and that which
has the power or not the power to operate, is that alone which is or is
not free, and not the power itself For freedom, or not freedom, can belong
to nothing but what has or has not a power to act.
20. Liberty belongs not to the will. The attributing to faculties that
which belonged not to them, has given occasion to this way of talking:
but the introducing into discourses concerning the mind, with the name
of faculties, a notion of their operating, has, I suppose, as little advanced
our knowledge in that part of ourselves, as the great use and mention of
the like invention of faculties, in the operations of the body, has helped
us in the knowledge of physic. Not that I deny there are faculties, both
in the body and mind: they both of them have their powers of operating,
else neither the one nor the other could operate. For nothing can operate
that is not able to operate; and that is not able to operate that has no
power to operate. Nor do I deny that those words, and the like, are to
have their place in the common use of languages that have made them current.
It looks like too much affectation wholly to lay them by: and philosophy
itself, though it likes not a gaudy dress, yet, when it appears in public,
must have so much complacency as to be clothed in the ordinary fashion
and language of the country, so far as it can consist with truth and perspicuity.
But the fault has been, that faculties have been spoken of and represented
as so many distinct agents. For, it being asked, what it was that digested
the meat in our stomachs? it was a ready and very satisfactory answer to
say, that it was the digestive faculty. What was it that made anything
come out of the body? the expulsive faculty. What moved? the motive faculty.
And so in the mind, the intellectual faculty, or the understanding, understood;
and the elective faculty, or the will, willed or commanded. This is, in
short, to say, that the ability to digest, digested; and the ability to
move, moved; and the ability to understand, understood. For faculty, ability,
and power, I think, are but different names of the same things: which ways
of speaking, when put into more intelligible words, will, I think, amount
to thus much;- That digestion is performed by something that is able to
digest, motion by something able to move, and understanding by something
able to understand. And, in truth, it would be very strange if it should
be otherwise; as strange as it would be for a man to be free without being
able to be free.
21. But to the agent, or man. To return, then, to the inquiry about
liberty, I think the question is not proper, whether the will be free,
but whether a man be free. Thus, I think,
First, That so far as any one can, by the direction or choice of his
mind, preferring the existence of any action to the non-existence of that
action, and vice versa, make it to exist or not exist, so far he is free.
For if I can, by a thought directing the motion of my finger, make it move
when it was at rest, or vice versa, it is evident, that in respect of that
I am free: and if I can, by a like thought of my mind, preferring one to
the other, produce either words or silence, I am at liberty to speak or
hold my peace: and as far as this power reaches, of acting or not acting,
by the determination of his own thought preferring either, so far is a
man free. For how can we think any one freer, than to have the power to
do what he will? And so far as any one can, by preferring any action to
its not being, or rest to any action, produce that action or rest, so far
can he do what he will. For such a preferring of action to its absence,
is the willing of it: and we can scarce tell how to imagine any being freer,
than to be able to do what he wills. So that in respect of actions within
the reach of such a power in him, a man seems as free as it is possible
for freedom to make him.
22. In respect of willing, a man is not free. But the inquisitive mind
of man, willing to shift off from himself, as far as he can, all thoughts
of guilt, though it be by putting himself into a worse state than that
of fatal necessity, is not content with this: freedom, unless it reaches
further than this, will not serve the turn: and it passes for a good plea,
that a man is not free at all, if he be not as free to will as he is to
act what he wills. Concerning a man's liberty, there yet, therefore, is
raised this further question, Whether a man be free to will? Which I think
is what is meant, when it is disputed whether the will be free. And as
to that I imagine.
23. How a man cannot be free to will. Secondly, That willing, or volition,
being an action, and freedom consisting in a power of acting or not acting,
a man in respect of willing or the act of volition, when any action in
his power is once proposed to his thoughts, as presently to be done, cannot
be free. The reason whereof is very manifest. For, it being unavoidable
that the action depending on his will should exist or not exist, and its
existence or not existence following perfectly the determination and preference
of his will, he cannot avoid willing the existence or non-existence of
that action; it is absolutely necessary that he will the one or the other;
i.e. prefer the one to the other: since one of them must necessarily follow;
and that which does follow follows by the choice and determination of his
mind; that is, by his willing it: for if he did not will it, it would not
be. So that, in respect of the act of willing, a man in such a case is
not free: liberty consisting in a power to act or not to act; which, in
regard of volition, a man, upon such a proposal has not. For it is unavoidably
necessary to prefer the doing or forbearance of an action in a man's power,
which is once so proposed to his thoughts; a man must necessarily will
the one or the other of them; upon which preference or volition, the action
or its forbearance certainly follows, and is truly voluntary. But the act
of volition, or preferring one of the two, being that which he cannot avoid,
a man, in respect of that act of willing, is under a necessity, and so
cannot be free; unless necessity and freedom can consist together, and
a man can be free and bound at once. Besides to make a man free after this
manner, by making the action of willing to depend on his will, there must
be another antecedent will, to determine the acts of this will, and another
to determine that, and so in infinitum: for wherever one stops, the actions
of the last will cannot be free. Nor is any being, as far I can comprehend
beings above me, capable of such a freedom of will, that it can forbear
to will, i.e. to prefer the being or not being of anything in its power,
which it has once considered as such.
24. Liberty is freedom to execute what is willed. This, then, is evident,
That a man is not at liberty to will, or not to will, anything in his power
that he once considers of: liberty consisting in a power to act or to forbear
acting, and in that only. For a man that sits still is said yet to be at
liberty; because he can walk if he wills it. A man that walks is at liberty
also, not because he walks or moves; but because he can stand still if
he wills it. But if a man sitting still has not a power to remove himself,
he is not at liberty; so likewise a man falling down a precipice, though
in motion, is not at liberty, because he cannot stop that motion if he
would. This being so, it is plain that a man that is walking, to whom it
is proposed to give off walking, is not at liberty, whether he will determine
himself to walk, or give off walking or not: he must necessarily prefer
one or the other of them; walking or not walking. And so it is in regard
of all other actions in our power so proposed, which are the far greater
number. For, considering the vast number of voluntary actions that succeed
one another every moment that we are awake in the course of our lives,
there are but few of them that are thought on or proposed to the will,
till the time they are to be done; and in all such actions, as I have shown,
the mind, in respect of willing, has not a power to act or not to act,
wherein consists liberty. The mind, in that case, has not a power to forbear
willing; it cannot avoid some determination concerning them, let the consideration
be as short, the thought as quick as it will, it either leaves the man
in the state he was before thinking, or changes it; continues the action,
or puts an end to it. Whereby it is manifest, that it orders and directs
one, in preference to, or with neglect of the other, and thereby either
the continuation or change becomes unavoidably voluntary.
25. The will determined by something without it. Since then it is plain
that, in most cases, a man is not at liberty, whether he will or no, (for,
when an action in his power is proposed to his thoughts, he cannot forbear
volition; he must determine one way or the other); the next thing demanded
is,- Whether a man be at liberty to will which of the two he pleases, motion
or rest? This question carries the absurdity of it so manifestly in itself,
that one might thereby sufficiently be convinced that liberty concerns
not the will. For, to ask whether a man be at liberty to will either motion
or rest, speaking or silence, which he pleases, is to ask whether a man
can will what he wills, or be pleased with what he is pleased with? A question
which, I think, needs no answer: and they who can make a question of it
must suppose one will to determine the acts of another, and another to
determine that, and so on in infinitum.
26. The ideas of liberty and volition must be defined. To avoid these
and the like absurdities, nothing can be of greater use than to establish
in our minds determined ideas of the things under consideration. If the
ideas of liberty and volition were well fixed in our understandings, and
carried along with us in our minds, as they ought, through all the questions
that are raised about them, I suppose a great part of the difficulties
that perplex men's thoughts, and entangle their understandings, would be
much easier resolved; and we should perceive where the confused signification
of terms, or where the nature of the thing caused the obscurity.
27. Freedom. First, then, it is carefully to be remembered, That freedom
consists in the dependence of the existence, or not existence of any action,
upon our volition of it; and not in the dependence of any action, or its
contrary, on our preference. A man standing on a cliff, is at liberty to
leap twenty yards downwards into the sea, not because he has a power to
do the contrary action, which is to leap twenty yards upwards, for that
he cannot do; but he is therefore free, because he has a power to leap
or not to leap. But if a greater force than his, either holds him fast,
or tumbles him down, he is no longer free in that case; because the doing
or forbearance of that particular action is no longer in his power. He
that is a close prisoner in a room twenty feet square, being at the north
side of his chamber, is at liberty to walk twenty feet southward, because
he can walk or not walk it; but is not, at the same time, at liberty to
do the contrary, i.e. to walk twenty feet northward.
In this, then, consists freedom, viz. in our being able to act or not
to act, according as we shall choose or will.
28. What volition and action mean. Secondly, we must remember, that
volition or willing is an act of the mind directing its thought to the
production of any action, and thereby exerting its power to produce it.
To avoid multiplying of words, I would crave leave here, under the word
action, to comprehend the forbearance too of any action proposed: sitting
still, or holding one's peace, when walking or speaking are proposed, though
mere forbearances, requiring as much the determination of the will, and
being as often weighty in their consequences, as the contrary actions,
may, on that consideration, well enough pass for actions too: but this
I say, that I may not be mistaken, if (for brevity's sake) I speak thus.
29. What determines the will. Thirdly, the will being nothing but a
power in the mind to direct the operative faculties of a man to motion
or rest, as far as they depend on such direction; to the question, What
is it determines the will? the true and proper answer is, The mind. For
that which determines the general power of directing, to this or that particular
direction, is nothing but the agent itself exercising the power it has
that particular way. If this answer satisfies not, it is plain the meaning
of the question, What determines the will? is this,- What moves the mind,
in every particular instance, to determine its general power of directing,
to this or that particular motion or rest? And to this I answer,- The motive
for continuing in the same state or action, is only the present satisfaction
in it; the motive to change is always some uneasiness: nothing setting
us upon the change of state, or upon any new action, but some uneasiness.
This is the great motive that works on the mind to put it upon action,
which for shortness' sake we will call determining of the will, which I
shall more at large explain.
30. Will and desire must not be confounded. But, in the way to it, it
will be necessary to premise, that, though I have above endeavoured to
express the act of volition, by choosing, preferring, and the like terms,
that signify desire as well as volition, for want of other words to mark
that act of the mind whose proper name is willing or volition; yet, it
being a very simple act, whosoever desires to understand what it is, will
better find it by reflecting on his own mind, and observing what it does
when it wills, than by any variety of articulate sounds whatsoever. This
caution of being careful not to be misled by expressions that do not enough
keep up the difference between the will and several acts of the mind that
are quite distinct from it, I think the more necessary, because I find
the will often confounded with several of the affections, especially desire,
and one put for the other; and that by men who would not willingly be thought
not to have had very distinct notions of things, and not to have writ very
clearly about them. This, I imagine, has been no small occasion of obscurity
and mistake in this matter; and therefore is, as much as may be, to be
avoided. For he that shall turn his thoughts inwards upon what passes in
his mind when he wills, shall see that the will or power of volition is
conversant about nothing but our own actions; terminates there; and reaches
no further; and that volition is nothing but that particular determination
of the mind, whereby, barely by a thought the mind endeavours to give rise,
continuation, or stop, to any action which it takes to be in its power.
This, well considered, plainly shows that the will is perfectly distinguished
from desire; which, in the very same action, may have a quite contrary
tendency from that which our will sets us upon. A man, whom I cannot deny,
may oblige me to use persuasions to another, which, at the same time I
am speaking, I may wish may not prevail on him. In this case, it is plain
the will and desire run counter. I will the action; that tends one way,
whilst my desire tends another, and that the direct contrary way. A man
who, by a violent fit of the gout in his limbs, finds a doziness in his
head, or a want of appetite in his stomach removed, desires to be eased
too of the pain of his feet or hands, (for wherever there is pain, there
is a desire to be rid of it), though yet, whilst he apprehends that the
removal of the pain may translate the noxious humour to a more vital part,
his will is never determined to any one action that may serve to remove
this pain. Whence it is evident that desiring and willing are two distinct
acts of the mind; and consequently, that the will, which is but the power
of volition, is much more distinct from desire.
31. Uneasiness determines the will. To return, then, to the inquiry,
what is it that determines the will in regard to our actions? And that,
upon second thoughts, I am apt to imagine is not, as is generally supposed,
the greater good in view; but some (and for the most part the most pressing)
uneasiness a man is at present under. This is that which successively determines
the will, and sets us upon those actions we perform. This uneasiness we
may call, as it is, desire; which is an uneasiness of the mind for want
of some absent good. All pain of the body, of what sort soever, and disquiet
of the mind, is uneasiness: and with this is always joined desire, equal
to the pain or uneasiness felt; and is scarce distinguishable from it.
For desire being nothing but an uneasiness in the want of an absent good,
in reference to any pain felt, ease is that absent good; and till that
ease be attained, we may call it desire; nobody feeling pain that he wishes
not to be eased of, with a desire equal to that pain, and inseparable from
it. Besides this desire of ease from pain, there is another of absent positive
good; and here also the desire and uneasiness are equal. As much as we
desire any absent good, so much are we in pain for it. But here all absent
good does not, according to the greatness it has, or is acknowledged to
have, cause pain equal to that greatness; as all pain causes desire equal
to itself: because the absence of good is not always a pain, as the presence
of pain is. And therefore absent good may be looked on and considered without
desire. But so much as there is anywhere of desire, so much there is of
uneasiness.
32. Desire is uneasiness. That desire is a state of uneasiness, every
one who reflects on himself will quickly find. Who is there that has not
felt in desire what the wise man says of hope, (which is not much different
from it), that it being "deferred makes the heart sick"; and that still
proportionable to the greatness of the desire, which sometimes raises the
uneasiness to that pitch, that it makes people cry out, "Give me children."
give me the thing desired, "or I die." Life itself, and all its enjoyments,
is a burden cannot be borne under the lasting and unremoved pressure of
such an uneasiness.
33. The uneasiness of desire determines the will. Good and evil, present
and absent, it is true, work upon the mind. But that which immediately
determines the will, from time to time, to every voluntary action, is the
uneasiness of desire, fixed on some absent good: either negative, as indolence
to one in pain; or positive, as enjoyment of pleasure. That it is this
uneasiness that determines the will to the successive voluntary actions,
whereof the greatest part of our lives is made up, and by which we are
conducted through different courses to different ends, I shall endeavour
to show, both from experience, and the reason of the thing.
34. This is the spring of action. When a man is perfectly content with
the state he is in- which is when he is perfectly without any uneasiness-
what industry, what action, what will is there left, but to continue in
it? Of this every man's observation will satisfy him. And thus we see our
all-wise Maker, suitably to our constitution and frame, and knowing what
it is that determines the will, has put into man the uneasiness of hunger
and thirst, and other natural desires, that return at their seasons, to
move and determine their wills, for the preservation of themselves, and
the continuation of their species. For I think we may conclude, that, if
the bare contemplation of these good ends to which we are carried by these
several uneasinesses had been sufficient to determine the will, and set
us on work, we should have had none of these natural pains, and perhaps
in this world little or no pain at all. "It is better to marry than to
burn," says St. Paul, where we may see what it is that chiefly drives men
into the enjoyments of a conjugal life. A little burning felt pushes us
more powerfully than greater pleasures in prospect draw or allure.
35. The greatest positive good determines not the will, but present
uneasiness alone. It seems so established and settled a maxim, by the general
consent of all mankind, that good, the greater good, determines the will,
that I do not at all wonder that, when I first published my thoughts on
this subject I took it for granted; and I imagine that, by a great many,
I shall be thought more excusable for having then done so, than that now
I have ventured to recede from so received an opinion. But yet, upon a
stricter inquiry, I am forced to conclude that good, the greater good,
though apprehended and acknowledged to be so, does not determine the will,
until our desire, raised proportionably to it, makes us uneasy in the want
of it. Convince a man never so much, that plenty has its advantages over
poverty; make him see and own, that the handsome conveniences of life are
better than nasty penury: yet, as long as he is content with the latter,
and finds no uneasiness in it, he moves not; his will never is determined
to any action that shall bring him out of it. Let a man be ever so well
persuaded of the advantages of virtue, that it is as necessary to a man
who has any great aims in this world, or hopes in the next, as food to
life: yet, till he hungers or thirsts after righteousness, till he feels
an uneasiness in the want of it, his will will not be determined to any
action in pursuit of this confessed greater good; but any other uneasiness
he feels in himself shall take place, and carry his will to other actions.
On the other side, let a drunkard see that his health decays, his estate
wastes; discredit and diseases, and the want of all things, even of his
beloved drink, attends him in the course he follows: yet the returns of
uneasiness to miss his companions, the habitual thirst after his cups at
the usual time, drives him to the tavern, though he has in his view the
loss of health and plenty, and perhaps of the joys of another life: the
least of which is no inconsiderable good, but such as he confesses is far
greater than the tickling of his palate with a glass of wine, or the idle
chat of a soaking club. It is not want of viewing the greater good; for
he sees and acknowledges it, and, in the intervals of his drinking hours,
will take resolutions to pursue the greater good; but when the uneasiness
to miss his accustomed delight returns, the great acknowledged good loses
its hold, and the present uneasiness determines the will to the accustomed
action; which thereby gets stronger footing to prevail against the next
occasion, though he at the same time makes secret promises to himself that
he will do so no more; this is the last time he will act against the attainment
of those greater goods. And thus he is, from time to time, in the state
of that unhappy complainer, Video meliora, proboque, deteriora sequor:
which sentence, allowed for true, and made good by constant experience,
may in this, and possibly no other way, be easily made intelligible.
36. Because the removal of uneasiness is the first step to happiness.
If we inquire into the reason of what experience makes so evident in fact,
and examine, why it is uneasiness alone operates on the will, and determines
it in its choice, we shall find that, we being capable but of one determination
of the will to one action at once, the present uneasiness that we are under
does naturally determine the will, in order to that happiness which we
all aim at in all our actions. For, as much as whilst we are under any
uneasiness, we cannot apprehend ourselves happy, or in the way to it; pain
and uneasiness being, by every one, concluded and felt to be inconsistent
with happiness, spoiling the relish even of those good things which we
have: a little pain serving to mar all the pleasure we rejoiced in. And,
therefore, that which of course determines the choice of our will to the
next action will always be- the removing of pain, as long as we have any
left, as the first and necessary step towards happiness.
37. Because uneasiness alone is present. Another reason why it is uneasiness
alone determines the will, is this: because that alone is present and,
it is against the nature of things, that what is absent should operate
where it is not. It may be said that absent good may, by contemplation,
be brought home to the mind and made present. The idea of it indeed may
be in the mind, and viewed as present there; but nothing will be in the
mind as a present good, able to counterbalance the removal of any uneasiness
which we are under, till it raises our desire; and the uneasiness of that
has the prevalency in determining the will. Till then, the idea in the
mind of whatever is good is there only, like other ideas, the object of
bare unactive speculation; but operates not on the will, nor sets us on
work; the reason whereof I shall show by and by. How many are to be found
that have had lively representations set before their minds of the unspeakable
joys of heaven, which they acknowledge both possible and probable too,
who yet would be content to take up with their happiness here? And so the
prevailing uneasiness of their desires, let loose after the enjoyments
of this life, take their turns in the determining their wills; and all
that while they take not one step, are not one jot moved, towards the good
things of another life, considered as ever so great.
38. Because all who allow the joys of heaven possible, pursue them not.
Were the will determined by the views of good, as it appears in contemplation
greater or less to the understanding, which is the state of all absent
good, and that which, in the received opinion, the will is supposed to
move to, and to be moved by,- I do not see how it could ever get loose
from the infinite eternal joys of heaven, once proposed and considered
as possible. For, all absent good, by which alone, barely proposed, and
coming in view, the will is thought to be determined, and so to set us
on action, being only possible, but not infallibly certain, it is unavoidable
that the infinitely greater possible good should regularly and constantly
determine the will in all the successive actions it directs; and then we
should keep constantly and steadily in our course towards heaven, without
ever standing still, or directing our actions to any other end: the eternal
condition of a future state infinitely outweighing the expectation of riches,
or honour, or any other worldly pleasure which we can propose to ourselves,
though we should grant these the more probable to be obtained: for nothing
future is yet in possession, and so the expectation even of these may deceive
us. If it were so that the greater good in view determines the will, so
great a good, once proposed, could not but seize the will, and hold it
fast to the pursuit of this infinitely greatest good, without ever letting
it go again: for the will having a power over, and directing the thoughts,
as well as other actions, would, if it were so, hold the contemplation
of the mind fixed to that good.
39. But any great uneasiness is never neglected. This would be the state
of the mind, and regular tendency of the will in all its determinations,
were it determined by that which is considered and in view the greater
good. But that it is not so, is visible in experience; the infinitely greatest
confessed good being often neglected, to satisfy the successive uneasiness
of our desires pursuing trifles. But, though the greatest allowed, even
ever-lasting unspeakable, good, which has sometimes moved and affected
the mind, does not stedfastly hold the will, yet we see any very great
and prevailing uneasiness having once laid hold on the will, let it not
go; by which we may be convinced, what it is that determines the will.
Thus any vehement pain of the body; the ungovernable passion of a man violently
in love; or the impatient desire of revenge, keeps the will steady and
intent; and the will, thus determined, never lets the understanding lay
by the object, but all the thoughts of the mind and powers of the body
are uninterruptedly employed that way, by the determination of the will,
influenced by that topping uneasiness, as long as it lasts; whereby it
seems to me evident, that the will, or power of setting us upon one action
in preference to all others, is determined in us by uneasiness: and whether
this be not so, I desire every one to observe in himself.
40. Desire accompanies all uneasiness. I have hitherto chiefly instanced
in the uneasiness of desire, as that which determines the will: because
that is the chief and most sensible; and the will seldom orders any action,
nor is there any voluntary action performed, without some desire accompanying
it; which I think is the reason why the will and desire are so often confounded.
But yet we are not to look upon the uneasiness which makes up, or at least
accompanies, most of the other passions, as wholly excluded in the case.
Aversion, fear, anger, envy, shame, &c. have each their uneasinesses
too, and thereby influence the will. These passions are scarce any of them,
in life and practice, simple and alone, and wholly unmixed with others;
though usually, in discourse and contemplation, that carries the name which
operates strongest, and appears most in the present state of the mind.
Nay, there is, I think, scarce any of the passions to be found without
desire joined with it. I am sure wherever there is uneasiness, there is
desire. For we constantly desire happiness; and whatever we feel of uneasiness,
so much it is certain we want of happiness; even in our own opinion, let
our state and condition otherwise be what it will. Besides, the present
moment not being our eternity, whatever our enjoyment be, we look beyond
the present, and desire goes with our foresight, and that still carries
the will with it. So that even in joy itself, that which keeps up the action
whereon the enjoyment depends, is the desire to continue it, and fear to
lose it: and whenever a greater uneasiness than that takes place in the
mind, the will presently is by that determined to some new action, and
the present delight neglected.
41. The most pressing uneasiness naturally determines the will. But
we being in this world beset with sundry uneasinesses, distracted with
different desires, the next inquiry naturally will be,- Which of them has
the precedency in determining the will to the next action? and to that
the answer is,- That ordinarily which is the most pressing of those that
are judged capable of being then removed. For, the will being the power
of directing our operative faculties to some action, for some end, cannot
at any time be moved towards what is judged at that time unattainable:
that would be to suppose an intelligent being designedly to act for an
end, only to lose its labour; for so it is to act for what is judged not
attainable; and therefore very great uneasinesses move not the will, when
they are judged not capable of a cure: they in that case put us not upon
endeavours. But, these set apart, the most important and urgent uneasiness
we at that time feel, is that which ordinarily determines the will, successively,
in that train of voluntary actions which makes up our lives. The greatest
present uneasiness is the spur to action, that is constantly most felt,
and for the most part determines the will in its choice of the next action.
For this we must carry along with us, that the proper and only object of
the will is some action of ours, and nothing else. For we producing nothing
by our willing it, but some action in our power, it is there the will terminates,
and reaches no further.
42. All desire happiness. If it be further asked,- What it is moves
desire? I answer,- happiness, and that alone. Happiness and misery are
the names of two extremes, the utmost bounds whereof we know not; it is
what "eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, nor hath it entered into the
heart of man to conceive." But of some degrees of both we have very lively
impressions; made by several instances of delight and joy on the one side,
and torment and sorrow on the other; which, for shortness' sake, I shall
comprehend under the names of pleasure and pain; there being pleasure and
pain of the mind as well as the body,-"With him is fulness of joy, and
pleasure for evermore." Or, to speak truly, they are all of the mind; though
some have their rise in the mind from thought, others in the body from
certain modifications of motion.
43. Happiness and misery, good and evil, what they are. Happiness, then,
in its full extent, is the utmost pleasure we are capable of, and misery
the utmost pain; and the lowest degree of what can be called happiness
is so much ease from all pain, and so much present pleasure, as without
which any one cannot be content. Now, because pleasure and pain are produced
in us by the operation of certain objects, either on our minds or our bodies,
and in different degrees; therefore, what has an aptness to produce pleasure
in us is that we call good, and what is apt to produce pain in us we call
evil; for no other reason but for its aptness to produce pleasure and pain
in us, wherein consists our happiness and misery. Further, though what
is apt to produce any degree of pleasure be in itself good; and what is
apt to produce any degree of pain be evil; yet it often happens that we
do not call it so when it comes in competition with a greater of its sort;
because, when they come in competition, the degrees also of pleasure and
pain have justly a preference. So that if we will rightly estimate what
we call good and evil, we shall find it lies much in comparison: for the
cause of every less degree of pain, as well as every greater degree of
pleasure, has the nature of good, and vice versa.
44. What good is desired, what not. Though this be that which is called
good and evil, and all good be the proper object of desire in general;
yet all good, even seen and confessed to be so, does not necessarily move
every particular man's desire; but only that part, or so much of it as
is considered and taken to make a necessary part of his happiness. All
other good, however great in reality or appearance, excites not a man's
desires who looks not on it to make a part of that happiness wherewith
he, in his present thoughts, can satisfy himself. Happiness, under this
view, every one constantly pursues, and desires what makes any part of
it: other things, acknowledged to be good, he can look upon without desire,
pass by, and be content without. There is nobody, I think, so senseless
as to deny that there is pleasure in knowledge: and for the pleasures of
sense, they have too many followers to let it be questioned whether men
are taken with them or no. Now, let one man place his satisfaction in sensual
pleasures, another in the delight of knowledge: though each of them cannot
but confess, there is great pleasure in what the other pursues; yet, neither
of them making the other's delight a part of his happiness, their desires
are not moved, but each is satisfied without what the other enjoys; and
so his will is not determined to the pursuit of it. But yet, as soon as
the studious man's hunger and thirst make him uneasy, he, whose will was
never determined to any pursuit of good cheer, poignant sauces, delicious
wine, by the pleasant taste he has found in them, is, by the uneasiness
of hunger and thirst, presently determined to eating and drinking, though
possibly with great indifferency, what wholesome food comes in his way.
And, on the other side, the epicure buckles to study, when shame, or the
desire to recommend himself to his mistress, shall make him uneasy in the
want of any sort of knowledge. Thus, how much soever men are in earnest
and constant in pursuit of happiness, yet they may have a clear view of
good, great and confessed good, without being concerned for it, or moved
by it, if they think they can make up their happiness without it. Though
as to pain, that they are always concerned for; they can feel no uneasiness
without being moved. And therefore, being uneasy in the want of whatever
is judged necessary to their happiness, as soon as any good appears to
make a part of their portion of happiness, they begin to desire it.
45. Why the greatest good is not always desired. This, I think, any
one may observe in himself and others,- That the greater visible good does
not always raise men's desires in proportion to the greatness it appears,
and is acknowledged, to have: though every little trouble moves us, and
sets us on work to get rid of it. The reason whereof is evident from the
nature of our happiness and misery itself. All present pain, whatever it
be, makes a part of our present misery. but all absent good does not at
any time make a necessary part of our present happiness, nor the absence
of it make a part of our misery. If it did, we should be constantly and
infinitely miserable; there being infinite degrees of happiness which are
not in our possession. All uneasiness therefore being removed, a moderate
portion of good serves at present to content men; and a few degrees of
pleasure, in a succession of ordinary enjoyments, make up a happiness wherein
they can be satisfied. If this were not so, there could be no room for
those indifferent and visibly trifling actions, to which our wills are
so often determined, and wherein we voluntarily waste so much of our lives;
which remissness could by no means consist with a constant determination
of will or desire to the greatest apparent good. That this is so, I think
few people need go far from home to be convinced. And indeed in this life
there are not many whose happiness reaches so far as to afford them a constant
train of moderate mean pleasures, without any mixture of uneasiness; and
yet they could be content to stay here for ever: though they cannot deny,
but that it is possible there may be a state of eternal durable joys after
this life, far surpassing all the good that is to be found here. Nay, they
cannot but see that it is more possible than the attainment and continuation
of that pittance of honour, riches, or pleasure which they pursue, and
for which they neglect that eternal state. But yet, in full view of this
difference, satisfied of the possibility of a perfect, secure, and lasting
happiness in a future state, and under a clear conviction that it is not
to be had here,- whilst they bound their happiness within some little enjoyment
or aim of this life, and exclude the joys of heaven from making any necessary
part of it,- their desires are not moved by this greater apparent good,
nor their wills determined to any action, or endeavour for its attainment.
46. Why not being desired, it moves not the will. The ordinary necessities
of our lives fill a great part of them with the uneasinesses of hunger,
thirst, heat, cold, weariness, with labour, and sleepiness, in their constant
returns, &c. To which, if, besides accidental harms, we add the fantastical
uneasiness (as itch after honour, power, or riches, &c.) which acquired
habits, by fashion, example, and education, have settled in us, and a thousand
other irregular desires, which custom has made natural to us, we shall
find that a very little part of our life is so vacant from these uneasinesses,
as to leave us free to the attraction of remoter absent good. We are seldom
at ease, and free enough from the solicitation of our natural or adopted
desires, but a constant succession of uneasinesses out of that stock which
natural wants or acquired habits have heaped up, take the will in their
turns; and no sooner is one action dispatched, which by such a determination
of the will we are set upon, but another uneasiness is ready to set us
on work. For, the removing of the pains we feel, and are at present pressed
with, being the getting out of misery, and consequently the first thing
to be done in order to happiness,- absent good, though thought on, confessed,
and appearing to be good, not making any part of this unhappiness in its
absence, is justled out, to make way for the removal of those uneasinesses
we feel; till due and repeated contemplation has brought it nearer to our
mind, given some relish of it, and raised in us some desire: which then
beginning to make a part of our present uneasiness, stands upon fair terms
with the rest to be satisfied, and so, according to its greatness and pressure,
comes in its turn to determine the will.
47. Due consideration raises desire. And thus, by a due consideration,
and examining any good proposed, it is in our power to raise our desires
in a due proportion to the value of that good, whereby in its turn and
place it may come to work upon the will, and be pursued. For good, though
appearing and allowed ever so great, yet till it has raised desires in
our minds, and thereby made us uneasy in its want, it reaches not our wills;
we are not within the sphere of its activity, our wills being under the
determination only of those uneasinesses which are present to us, which
(whilst we have any) are always soliciting, and ready at hand to give the
will its next determination. The balancing, when there is any in the mind,
being only, which desire shall be next satisfied, which uneasiness first
removed. Whereby it comes to pass that, as long as any uneasiness, any
desire, remains in our mind, there is no room for good, barely as such,
to come at the will, or at all to determine it. Because, as has been said,
the first step in our endeavours after happiness being to get wholly out
of the confines of misery, and to feel no part of it, the will can be at
leisure for nothing else, till every uneasiness we feel be perfectly removed.
which, in the multitude of wants and desires we are beset with in this
imperfect state, we are not like to be ever freed from in this world.
48. The power to suspend the prosecution of any desire makes way for
consideration. There being in us a great many uneasinesses, always soliciting
and ready to determine the will, it is natural, as I have said, that the
greatest and most pressing should determine the will to the next action;
and so it does for the most part, but not always. For, the mind having
in most cases, as is evident in experience, a power to suspend the execution
and satisfaction of any of its desires; and so all, one after another;
is at liberty to consider the objects of them, examine them on all sides,
and weigh them with others. In this lies the liberty man has; and from
the not using of it right comes all that variety of mistakes, errors, and
faults which we run into in the conduct of our lives, and our endeavours
after happiness; whilst we precipitate the determination of our wills,
and engage too soon, before due examination. To prevent this, we have a
power to suspend the prosecution of this or that desire; as every one daily
may experiment in himself. This seems to me the source of all liberty;
in this seems to consist that which is (as I think improperly) called free-will.
For, during this suspension of any desire, before the will be determined
to action, and the action (which follows that determination) done, we have
opportunity to examine, view, and judge of the good or evil of what we
are going to do; and when, upon due examination, we have judged, we have
done our duty, all that we can, or ought to do, in pursuit of our happiness;
and it is not a fault, but a perfection of our nature, to desire, will,
and act according to the last result of a fair examination.
49. To be determined by our own judgment, is no restraint to liberty.
This is so far from being a restraint or diminution of freedom, that it
is the very improvement and benefit of it; it is not an abridgment, it
is the end and use of our liberty; and the further we are removed from
such a determination, the nearer we are to misery and slavery. A perfect
indifference in the mind, not determinable by its last judgment of the
good or evil that is thought to attend its choice, would be so far from
being an advantage and excellency of any intellectual nature, that it would
be as great an imperfection, as the want of indifferency. to act, or not
to act, till determined by the will, would be an imperfection on the other
side. A man is at liberty to lift up his hand to his head, or let it rest
quiet: he is perfectly indifferent in either; and it would be an imperfection
in him, if he wanted that power, if he were deprived of that indifferency.
But it would be as great an imperfection, if he had the same indifferency,
whether he would prefer the lifting up his hand, or its remaining in rest,
when it would save his head or eyes from a blow he sees coming: it is as
much a perfection, that desire, or the power of preferring, should be determined
by good, as that the power of acting should be determined by the will;
and the certainer such determination is, the greater is the perfection.
Nay, were we determined by anything but the last result of our own minds,
judging of the good or evil of any action, we were not free; the very end
of our freedom being, that we may attain the good we choose. And therefore,
every man is put under a necessity, by his constitution as an intelligent
being, to be determined in willing by his own thought and judgment what
is best for him to do: else he would be under the determination of some
other than himself, which is want of liberty. And to deny that a man's
will, in every determination, follows his own judgment, is to say, that
a man wills and acts for an end that he would not have, at the time that
he wills and acts for it. For if he prefers it in his present thoughts
before any other, it is plain he then thinks better of it, and would have
it before any other; unless he can have and not have it, will and not will
it, at the same time; a contradiction too manifest to be admitted.
50. The freest agents are so determined. If we look upon those superior
beings above us, who enjoy perfect happiness, we shall have reason to judge
that they are more steadily determined in their choice of good than we;
and yet we have no reason to think they are less happy, or less free, than
we are. And if it were fit for such poor finite creatures as we are to
pronounce what infinite wisdom and goodness could do, I think we might
say, that God himself cannot choose what is not good; the freedom of the
Almighty hinders not his being determined by what is best.
51. A constant determination to a pursuit of happiness no abridgment
of liberty. But to give a right view of this mistaken part of liberty let
me ask,- Would any one be a changeling, because he is less determined by
wise considerations than a wise man? Is it worth the name of freedom to
be at liberty to play the fool, and draw shame and misery upon a man's
self? If to break loose from the conduct of reason, and to want that restraint
of examination and judgment which keeps us from choosing or doing the worse,
be liberty, true liberty, madmen and fools are the only freemen: but yet,
I think, nobody would choose to be mad for the sake of such liberty, but
he that is mad already. The constant desire of happiness, and the constraint
it puts upon us to act for it, nobody, I think, accounts an abridgment
of liberty, or at least an abridgment of liberty to be complained of. God
Almighty himself is under the necessity of being happy; and the more any
intelligent being is so, the nearer is its approach to infinite perfection
and happiness. That, in this state of ignorance, we short-sighted creatures
might not mistake true felicity, we are endowed with a power to suspend
any particular desire, and keep it from determining the will, and engaging
us in action. This is standing still, where we are not sufficiently assured
of the way: examination is consulting a guide. The determination of the
will upon inquiry, is following the direction of that guide: and he that
has a power to act or not to act, according as such determination directs,
is a free agent: such determination abridges not that power wherein liberty
consists. He that has his chains knocked off, and the prison doors set
open to him, is perfectly at liberty, because he may either go or stay,
as he best likes; though his preference be determined to stay, by the darkness
of the night, or illness of the weather, or want of other lodging. He ceases
not to be free; though the desire of some convenience to be had there absolutely
determines his preference, and makes him stay in his prison.
52. The necessity of pursuing true happiness the foundation of liberty.
As therefore the highest perfection of intellectual nature lies in a careful
and constant pursuit of true and solid happiness; so the care of ourselves,
that we mistake not imaginary for real happiness, is the necessary foundation
of our liberty. The stronger ties we have to an unalterable pursuit of
happiness in general, which is our greatest good, and which, as such, our
desires always follow, the more are we free from any necessary determination
of our will to any particular action, and from a necessary compliance with
our desire, set upon any particular, and then appearing preferable good,
till we have duly examined whether it has a tendency to, or be inconsistent
with, our real happiness: and therefore, till we are as much informed upon
this inquiry as the weight of the matter, and the nature of the case demands,
we are, by the necessity of preferring and pursuing true happiness as our
greatest good, obliged to suspend the satisfaction of our desires in particular
cases.
53. Power to suspend. This is the hinge on which turns the liberty of
intellectual beings, in their constant endeavours after, and a steady prosecution
of true felicity,- That they can suspend this prosecution in particular
cases, till they have looked before them, and informed themselves whether
that particular thing which is then proposed or desired lie in the way
to their main end, and make a real part of that which is their greatest
good. For, the inclination and tendency of their nature to happiness is
an obligation and motive to them, to take care not to mistake or miss it;
and so necessarily puts them upon caution, deliberation, and wariness,
in the direction of their particular actions, which are the means to obtain
it. Whatever necessity determines to the pursuit of real bliss, the same
necessity, with the same force, establishes suspense, deliberation, and
scrutiny of each successive desire, whether the satisfaction of it does
not interfere with our true happiness, and mislead us from it. This, as
seems to me, is the great privilege of finite intellectual beings; and
I desire it may be well considered, whether the great inlet and exercise
of all the liberty men have, are capable of, or can be useful to them,
and that whereon depends the turn of their actions, does not lie in this,-
That they can suspend their desires, and stop them from determining their
wills to any action, till they have duly and fairly examined the good and
evil of it, as far forth as the weight of the thing requires. This we are
able to do; and when we have done it, we have done our duty, and all that
is in our power; and indeed all that needs. For, since the will supposes
knowledge to guide its choice, all that we can do is to hold our wills
undetermined, till we have examined the good and evil of what we desire.
What follows after that, follows in a chain of consequences, linked one
to another, all depending on the last determination of the judgment, which,
whether it shall be upon a hasty and precipitate view, or upon a due and
mature examination, is in our power; experience showing us, that in most
cases, we are able to suspend the present satisfaction of any desire.
54. Government of our passions the right improvement of liberty. But
if any extreme disturbance (as sometimes it happens) possesses our whole
mind, as when the pain of the rack, an impetuous uneasiness, as of love,
anger, or any other violent passion, running away with us, allows us not
the liberty of thought, and we are not masters enough of our own minds
to consider thoroughly and examine fairly;- God, who knows our frailty,
pities our weakness, and requires of us no more than we are able to do,
and sees what was and what was not in our power, will judge as a kind and
merciful Father. But the forbearance of a too hasty compliance with our
desires, the moderation and restraint of our passions, so that our understandings
may be free to examine, and reason unbiased give its judgment, being that
whereon a right direction of our conduct to true happiness depends; it
is in this we should employ our chief care and endeavours. In this we should
take pains to suit the relish of our minds to the true intrinsic good or
ill that is in things; and not permit an allowed or supposed possible great
and weighty good to slip out of our thoughts, without leaving any relish,
any desire of itself there, till, by a due consideration of its true worth,
we have formed appetites in our minds suitable to it, and made ourselves
uneasy in the want of it, or in the fear of losing it. And how much this
is in every one's power, by making resolutions to himself, such as he may
keep, is easy for every one to try. Nor let any one say, he cannot govern
his passions, nor hinder them from breaking out, and carrying him into
action; for what he can do before a prince or a great man, he can do alone,
or in the presence of God, if he will.
55. How men come to pursue different, and often evil, courses. From
what has been said, it is easy to give an account how it comes to pass,
that, though all men desire happiness, yet their wills carry them so contrarily;
and consequently some of them to what is evil. And to this I say, that
the various and contrary choices that men make in the world do not argue
that they do not all pursue good; but that the same thing is not good to
every man alike. This variety of pursuits shows, that every one does not
place his happiness in the same thing, or choose the same way to it. Were
all the concerns of man terminated in this life, why one followed study
and knowledge, and another hawking and hunting: why one chose luxury and
debauchery, and another sobriety and riches, would not be because every
one of these did not aim at his own happiness; but because their happiness
was placed in different things. And therefore it was a right answer of
the physician to his patient that had sore eyes:- If you have more pleasure
in the taste of wine than in the use of your sight, wine is good for you;
but if the pleasure of seeing be greater to you than that of drinking,
wine is naught.
56. All men seek happiness, but not of the same sort. The mind has a
different relish, as well as the palate; and you will as fruitlessly endeavour
to delight all men with riches or glory (which yet some men place their
happiness in) as you would to satisfy all men's hunger with cheese or lobsters;
which, though very agreeable and delicious fare to some, are to others
extremely nauseous and offensive: and many persons would with reason prefer
the griping of an hungry belly to those dishes which are a feast to others.
Hence it was, I think, that the philosophers of old did in vain inquire,
whether summum bonum consisted in riches, or bodily delights, or virtue,
or contemplation: and they might have as reasonably disputed, whether the
best relish were to be found in apples, plums, or nuts, and have divided
themselves into sects upon it. For, as pleasant tastes depend not on the
things themselves, but on their agreeableness to this or that particular
palate, wherein there is great variety; so the greatest happiness consists
in the having those things which produce the greatest pleasure, and in
the absence of those which cause any disturbance, any pain. Now these,
to different men, are very different things. If, therefore, men in this
life only have hope; if in this life only they can enjoy, it is not strange
nor unreasonable, that they should seek their happiness by avoiding all
things that disease them here, and by pursuing all that delight them; wherein
it will be no wonder to find variety and difference. For if there be no
prospect beyond the grave, the inference is certainly right- "Let us eat
and drink," let us enjoy what we "for to-morrow we shall die." This, I
think, may serve to show us the reason, why, though all men's desires tend
to happiness, yet they are not moved by the same object. Men may choose
different things, and yet all choose right; supposing them only like a
company of poor insects; whereof some are bees, delighted with flowers
and their sweetness; others beetles, delighted with other kinds of viands,
which having enjoyed for a season, they would cease to be, and exist no
more for ever.
57. Power to suspend volition explains responsibility for ill choice.
These things, duly weighed, will give us, as I think, a clear view into
the state of human liberty. Liberty, it is plain, consists in a power to
do, or not to do; to do, or forbear doing, as we will. This cannot be denied.
But this seeming to comprehend only the actions of a man consecutive to
volition, it is further inquired,- Whether he be at liberty to will or
no? And to this it has been answered, that, in most cases, a man is not
at liberty to forbear the act of volition: he must exert an act of his
will, whereby the action proposed is made to exist or not to exist. But
yet there is a case wherein a man is at liberty in respect of willing;
and that is the choosing of a remote good as an end to be pursued. Here
a man may suspend the act of his choice from being determined for or against
the thing proposed, till he has examined whether it be really of a nature,
in itself and consequences, to make him happy or not. For, when he has
once chosen it, and thereby it is become a part of his happiness, it raises
desire, and that proportionably gives him uneasiness; which determines
his will, and sets him at work in pursuit of his choice on all occasions
that offer. And here we may see how it comes to pass that a man may justly
incur punishment, though it be certain that, in all the particular actions
that he wills, he does, and necessarily does, will that which he then judges
to be good. For, though his will be always determined by that which is
judged good by his understanding, yet it excuses him not; because, by a
too hasty choice of his own making, he has imposed on himself wrong measures
of good and evil; which, however false and fallacious, have the same influence
on all his future conduct, as if they were true and right. He has vitiated
his own palate, and must be answerable to himself for the sickness and
death that follows from it. The eternal law and nature of things must not
be altered to comply with his ill-ordered choice. If the neglect or abuse
of the liberty he had, to examine what would really and truly make for
his happiness, misleads him, the miscarriages that follow on it must be
imputed to his own election. He had a power to suspend his determination;
it was given him, that he might examine, and take care of his own happiness,
and look that he were not deceived. And he could never judge, that it was
better to be deceived than not, in a matter of so great and near concernment.
58. Why men choose what makes them miserable. What has been said may
also discover to us the reason why men in this world prefer different things,
and pursue happiness by contrary courses. But yet, since men are always
constant and in earnest in matters of happiness and misery, the question
still remains, How men come often to prefer the worse to the better; and
to choose that, which, by their own confession, has made them miserable?
59. The causes of this. To account for the various and contrary ways
men take, though all aim at being happy, we must consider whence the various
uneasinesses that determine the will, in the preference of each voluntary
action, have their rise:
(1) From bodily pain. Some of them come from causes not in our power;
such as are often the pains of the body from want, disease, or outward
injuries, as the rack, &c.; which, when present and violent, operate
for the most part forcibly on the will, and turn the courses of men's lives
from virtue, piety, and religion, and what before they judged to lead to
happiness; every one not endeavouring, or, through disuse, not being able,
by the contemplation of remote and future good, to raise in himself desires
of them strong enough to counterbalance the uneasiness he feels in those
bodily torments, and to keep his will steady in the choice of those actions
which lead to future happiness. A neighbouring country has been of late
a tragical theatre from which we might fetch instances, if there needed
any, and the world did not in all countries and ages furnish examples enough
to confirm that received observation, Necessitas cogit ad turpia; and therefore
there is great reason for us to pray, "Lead us not into temptation."
(2) From wrong desires arising from wrong judgments. Other uneasinesses
arise from our desires of absent good; which desires always bear proportion
to, and depend on, the judgment we make, and the relish we have of any
absent good; in both which we are apt to be variously misled, and that
by our own fault.
60. Our judgment of present good or evil always right. In the first
place, I shall consider the wrong judgments men make of future good and
evil, whereby their desires are misled. For, as to present happiness and
misery, when that alone comes into consideration, and the consequences
are quite removed, a man never chooses amiss: he knows what best pleases
him, and that he actually prefers. Things in their present enjoyment are
what they seem: the apparent and real good are, in this case, always the
same. For, the pain or pleasure being just so great and no greater than
it is felt, the present good or evil is really so much as it appears. And
therefore were every action of ours concluded within itself, and drew no
consequences after it, we should undoubtedly never err in our choice of
good: we should always infallibly prefer the best. Were the pains of honest
industry, and of starving with hunger and cold set together before us,
nobody would be in doubt which to choose: were the satisfaction of a lust
and the joys of heaven offered at once to any one's present possession,
he would not balance, or err in the determination of his choice.
61. Our wrong judgments have regard to future good and evil only. But
since our voluntary actions carry not all the happiness and misery that
depend on them along with them in their present performance, but are the
precedent causes of good and evil, which they draw after them, and bring
upon us, when they themselves are past and cease to be; our desires look
beyond our present enjoyments, and carry the mind out to absent good, according
to the necessity which we think there is of it, to the making or increase
of our happiness. It is our opinion of such a necessity that gives it its
attraction: without that, we are not moved by absent good. For, in this
narrow scantling of capacity which we are accustomed to and sensible of
here, wherein we enjoy but one pleasure at once, which, when all uneasiness
is away, is, whilst it lasts, sufficient to make us think ourselves happy,
it is not all remote and even apparent good that affects us. Because the
indolency and enjoyment we have, sufficing for our present happiness, we
desire not to venture the change; since we judge that we are happy already,
being content, and that is enough. For who is content is happy. But as
soon as any new uneasiness comes in, this happiness is disturbed, and we
are set afresh on work in the pursuit of happiness.
62. From a wrong judgment of what makes a necessary part of their happiness.
Their aptness therefore to conclude that they can be happy without it,
is one great occasion that men often are not raised to the desire of the
greatest absent good. For, whilst such thoughts possess them, the joys
of a future state move them not; they have little concern or uneasiness
about them; and the will, free from the determination of such desires,
is left to the pursuit of nearer satisfactions, and to the removal of those
uneasinesses which it then feels, in its want of and longings after them.
Change but a man's view of these things; let him see that virtue and religion
are necessary to his happiness; let him look into the future state of bliss
or misery, and see there God, the righteous judge, ready to "render to
every man according to his deeds; to them who by patient continuance in
well-doing seek for glory, and honour, and immortality, eternal life; but
unto every soul that doth evil, indignation and wrath, tribulation and
anguish." To him, I say, who hath a prospect of the different state of
perfect happiness or misery that attends all men after this life, depending
on their behaviour here, the measures of good and evil that govern his
choice are mightily changed. For, since nothing of pleasure and pain in
this life can bear any proportion to the endless happiness or exquisite
misery of an immortal soul hereafter, actions in his power will have their
preference, not according to the transient pleasure or pain that accompanies
or follows them here, but as they serve to secure that perfect durable
happiness hereafter.
63. A more particular account of wrong judgments. But, to account more
particularly for the misery that men often bring on themselves, notwithstanding
that they do all in earnest pursue happiness, we must consider how things
come to be represented to our desires under deceitful appearances: and
that is by the judgment pronouncing wrongly concerning them. To see how
far this reaches, and what are the causes of wrong judgment, we must remember
that things are judged good or bad in a double sense:-
First, That which is properly good or bad, is nothing but barely pleasure
or pain.
Secondly, But because not only present pleasure and pain, but that also
which is apt by its efficacy or consequences to bring it upon us at a distance,
is a proper object of our desires, and apt to move a creature that has
foresight; therefore things also that draw after them pleasure and pain,
are considered as good and evil.
64. No one chooses misery willingly, but only by wrong judgment. The
wrong judgment that misleads us, and makes the will often fasten on the
worse side, lies in misreporting upon the various comparisons of these.
The wrong judgment I am here speaking of is not what one man may think
of the determination of another, but what every man himself must confess
to be wrong. For, since I lay it for a certain ground, that every intelligent
being really seeks happiness, which consists in the enjoyment of pleasure,
without any considerable mixture of uneasiness; it is impossible anyone
should willingly put into his own draught any bitter ingredient, or leave
out anything in his power that would tend to his satisfaction, and the
completing of his happiness, but only by a wrong judgment. I shall not
here speak of that mistake which is the consequence of invincible error,
which scarce deserves the name of wrong judgment; but of that wrong judgment
which every man himself must confess to be so.
65. Men may err in comparing present and future. (1) Therefore, as to
present pleasure and pain, the mind, as has been said, never mistakes that
which is really good or evil; that which is the greater pleasure, or the
greater pain, is really just as it appears. But, though present pleasure
and pain show their difference and degrees so plainly as not to leave room
to mistake; yet, when we compare present pleasure or pain with future,
(which is usually the case in most important determinations of the will,)
we often make wrong judgments of them; taking our measures of them in different
positions of distance. Objects near our view are apt to be thought greater
than those of a larger size that are more remote. And so it is with pleasures
and pains: the present is apt to carry it; and those at a distance have
the disadvantage in the comparison. Thus most men, like spendthrift heirs,
are apt to judge a little in hand better than a great deal to come; and
so, for small matters in possession, part with greater ones in reversion.
But that this is a wrong judgment every one must allow, let his pleasure
consist in whatever it will: since that which is future will certainly
come to be present; and then, having the same advantage of nearness, will
show itself in its full dimensions, and discover his wilful mistake who
judged of it by unequal measures. Were the pleasure of drinking accompanied,
the very moment a man takes off his glass, with that sick stomach and aching
head which, in some men, are sure to follow not many hours after, I think
nobody, whatever pleasure he had in his cups, would, on these conditions,
ever let wine touch his lips; which yet he daily swallows, and the evil
side comes to be chosen only by the fallacy of a little difference in time.
But, if pleasure or pain can be so lessened only by a few hours' removal,
how much more will it be so by a further distance, to a man that will not,
by a right judgment, do what time will, i.e. bring it home upon himself,
and consider it as present, and there take its true dimensions? This is
the way we usually impose on ourselves, in respect of bare pleasure and
pain, or the true degrees of happiness or misery: the future loses its
just proportion, and what is present obtains the preference as the greater.
I mention not here the wrong judgment, whereby the absent are not only
lessened, but reduced to perfect nothing; when men enjoy what they can
in present, and make sure of that, concluding amiss that no evil will thence
follow. For that lies not in comparing the greatness of future good and
evil, which is that we are here speaking of; but in another sort of wrong
judgment, which is concerning good or evil, as it is considered to be the
cause and procurement of pleasure or pain that will follow from it.
66. Causes of our judging amiss when we compare present pleasure and
pain with future. The cause of our judging amiss, when we compare our present
pleasure or pain with future, seems to me to be the weak and narrow constitution
of our minds. We cannot well enjoy two pleasures at once; much less any
pleasure almost, whilst pain possesses us. The present pleasure, if it
be not very languid, and almost none at all, fills our narrow souls, and
so takes up the whole mind that it scarce leaves any thought of things
absent: or if among our pleasures there are some which are not strong enough
to exclude the consideration of things at a distance, yet we have so great
an abhorrence of pain, that a little of it extinguishes all our pleasures.
A little bitter mingled in our cup, leaves no relish of the sweet. Hence
it comes that, at any rate, we desire to be rid of the present evil, which
we are apt to think nothing absent can equal; because, under the present
pain, we find not ourselves capable of any the least degree of happiness.
Men's daily complaints are a loud proof of this: the pain that any one
actually feels is still of all other the worst; and it is with anguish
they cry out,- "Any rather than this: nothing can be so intolerable as
what I now suffer." And therefore our whole endeavours and thoughts are
intent to get rid of the present evil, before all things, as the first
necessary condition to our happiness; let what will follow. Nothing, as
we passionately think, can exceed, or almost equal, the uneasiness that
sits so heavy upon us. And because the abstinence from a present pleasure
that offers itself is a pain, nay, oftentimes a very great one, the desire
being inflamed by a near and tempting object, it is no wonder that that
operates after the same manner pain does, and lessens in our thoughts what
is future; and so forces us, as it were blindfold, into its embraces.
67. Absent good unable to counterbalance present uneasiness. Add to
this, that absent good, or, which is the same thing, future pleasure,-
especially if of a sort we are unacquainted with,- seldom is able to counterbalance
any uneasiness, either of pain or desire, which is present. For, its greatness
being no more than what shall be really tasted when enjoyed, men are apt
enough to lessen that; to make it give place to any present desire; and
conclude with themselves that, when it comes to trial, it may possibly
not answer the report or opinion that generally passes of it: they having
often found that, not only what others have magnified, but even what they
themselves have enjoyed with great pleasure and delight at one time, has
proved insipid or nauseous at another; and therefore they see nothing in
it for which they should forego a present enjoyment. But that this is a
false way of judging, when applied to the happiness of another life, they
must confess; unless they will say, God cannot make those happy he designs
to be so. For that being intended for a state of happiness, it must certainly
be agreeable to everyone's wish and desire: could we suppose their relishes
as different there as they are here, yet the manna in heaven will suit
every one's palate. Thus much of the wrong judgment we make of present
and future pleasure and pain, when they are compared together, and so the
absent considered as future.
68. Wrong judgment in considering consequences of actions. (II) As to
things good or bad in their consequences, and by the aptness that is in
them to procure us good or evil in the future, we judge amiss several ways.
1. When we judge that so much evil does not really depend on them as
in truth there does.
2. When we judge that, though the consequence be of that moment, yet
it is not of that certainty, but that it may otherwise fall out, or else
by some means be avoided; as by industry, address, change, repentance,
&c.
That these are wrong ways of judging, were easy to show in every particular,
if I would examine them at large singly: but I shall only mention this
in general, viz. that it is a very wrong and irrational way of proceeding,
to venture a greater good for a less, upon uncertain guesses; and before
a due examination be made, proportionable to the weightiness of the matter,
and the concernment it is to us not to mistake. This I think every one
must confess, especially if he considers the usual cause of this wrong
judgment, whereof these following are some:-
69. Causes of this. (i) Ignorance: He that judges without informing
himself to the utmost that he is capable, cannot acquit himself of judging
amiss.
(ii) Inadvertency: When a man overlooks even that which he does know.
This is an affected and present ignorance, which misleads our judgments
as much as the other. Judging is, as it were, balancing an account, and
determining on which side the odds lie. If therefore either side be huddled
up in haste, and several of the sums that should have gone into the reckoning
be overlooked and left out, this precipitancy causes as wrong a judgment
as if it were a perfect ignorance. That which most commonly causes this
is, the prevalency of some present pleasure or pain, heightened by our
feeble passionate nature, most strongly wrought on by what is present.
To check this precipitancy, our understanding and reason were given us,
if we will make a right use of them, to search and see, and then judge
thereupon. Without liberty, the understanding would be to no purpose: and
without understanding, liberty (if it could be) would signify nothing.
If a man sees what would do him good or harm, what would make him happy
or miserable, without being able to move himself one step towards or from
it, what is he the better for seeing? And he that is at liberty to ramble
in perfect darkness, what is his liberty better than if he were driven
up and down as a bubble by the force of the wind? The being acted by a
blind impulse from without, or from within, is little odds. The first,
therefore, and great use of liberty is to hinder blind precipitancy; the
principal exercise of freedom is to stand still, open the eyes, look about,
and take a view of the consequence of what we are going to do, as much
as the weight of the matter requires. How much sloth and negligence, heat
and passion, the prevalency of fashion or acquired indispositions do severally
contribute, on occasion, to these wrong judgments, I shall not here further
inquire. I shall only add one other false judgment, which I think necessary
to mention, because perhaps it is little taken notice of, though of great
influence.
70. Wrong judgment of what is necessary to our happiness. All men desire
happiness, that is past doubt: but, as has been already observed, when
they are rid of pain, they are apt to take up with any pleasure at hand,
or that custom has endeared to them; to rest satisfied in that; and so
being happy, till some new desire, by making them uneasy, disturbs that
happiness, and shows them that they are not so, they look no further; nor
is the will determined to any action in pursuit of any other known or apparent
good. For since we find that we cannot enjoy all sorts of good, but one
excludes another; we do not fix our desires on every apparent greater good,
unless it be judged to be necessary to our happiness: if we think we can
be happy without it, it moves us not. This is another occasion to men of
judging wrong; when they take not that to be necessary to their happiness
which really is so. This mistake misleads us, both in the choice of the
good we aim at, and very often in the means to it, when it is a remote
good. But, which way ever it be, either by placing it where really it is
not, or by neglecting the means as not necessary to it;- when a man misses
his great end, happiness, he will acknowledge he judged not right. That
which contributes to this mistake is the real or supposed unpleasantness
of the actions which are the way to this end; it seeming so preposterous
a thing to men, to make themselves unhappy in order to happiness, that
they do not easily bring themselves to it.
71. We can change the agreeableness or disagreeableness in things. The
last inquiry, therefore, concerning this matter is,- Whether it be in a
man's power to change the pleasantness and unpleasantness that accompanies
any sort of action? And as to that, it is plain, in many cases he can.
Men may and should correct their palates, and give relish to what either
has, or they suppose has none. The relish of the mind is as various as
that of the body, and like that too may be altered; and it is a mistake
to think that men cannot change the displeasingness or indifferency that
is in actions into pleasure and desire, if they will do but what is in
their power. A due consideration will do it in some cases; and practice,
application, and custom in most. Bread or tobacco may be neglected where
they are shown to be useful to health, because of an indifferency or disrelish
to them; reason and consideration at first recommends, and begins their
trial, and use finds, or custom makes them pleasant. That this is so in
virtue too, is very certain. Actions are pleasing or displeasing, either
in themselves, or considered as a means to a greater and more desirable
end. The eating of a well-seasoned dish, suited to a man's palate, may
move the mind by the delight itself that accompanies the eating, without
reference to any other end; to which the consideration of the pleasure
there is in health and strength (to which that meat is subservient) may
add a new gusto, able to make us swallow an ill-relished potion. In the
latter of these, any action is rendered more or less pleasing, only by
the contemplation of the end, and the being more or less persuaded of its
tendency to it, or necessary connexion with it: but the pleasure of the
action itself is best acquired or increased by use and practice. Trials
often reconcile us to that, which at a distance we looked on with aversion;
and by repetitions wear us into a liking of what possibly, in the first
essay, displeased us. Habits have powerful charms, and put so strong attractions
of easiness and pleasure into what we accustom ourselves to, that we cannot
forbear to do, or at least be easy in the omission of, actions, which habitual
practice has suited, and thereby recommends to us. Though this be very
visible, and every one's experience shows him he can do so; yet it is a
part in the conduct of men towards their happiness, neglected to a degree,
that it will be possibly entertained as a paradox, if it be said, that
men can make things or actions more or less pleasing to themselves; and
thereby remedy that, to which one may justly impute a great deal of their
wandering. Fashion and the common opinion having settled wrong notions,
and education and custom ill habits, the just values of things are misplaced,
and the palates of men corrupted. Pains should be taken to rectify these;
and contrary habits change our pleasures, and give a relish to that which
is necessary or conducive to our happiness. This every one must confess
he can do; and when happiness is lost, and misery overtakes him, he will
confess he did amiss in neglecting it, and condemn himself for it; and
I ask every one, whether he has not often done so?
72. Preference of vice to virtue a manifest wrong judgment. I shall
not now enlarge any further on the wrong judgments and neglect of what
is in their power, whereby men mislead themselves. This would make a volume,
and is not my business. But whatever false notions, or shameful neglect
of what is in their power, may put men out of their way to happiness, and
distract them, as we see, into so different courses of life, this yet is
certain, that morality, established upon its true foundations, cannot but
determine the choice in any one that will but consider: and he that will
not be so far a rational creature as to reflect seriously upon infinite
happiness and misery, must needs condemn himself as not making that use
of his understanding he should. The rewards and punishments of another
life, which the Almighty has established, as the enforcements of his law,
are of weight enough to determine the choice, against whatever pleasure
or pain this life can show, when the eternal state is considered but in
its bare possibility, which nobody can make any doubt of. He that will
allow exquisite and endless happiness to be but the possible consequence
of a good life here, and the contrary state the possible reward of a bad
one, must own himself to judge very much amiss if he does not conclude,-
That a virtuous life, with the certain expectation of everlasting bliss,
which may come, is to be preferred to a vicious one, with the fear of that
dreadful state of misery, which it is very possible may overtake the guilty;
or, at best, the terrible uncertain hope of annihilation. This is evidently
so, though the virtuous life here had nothing but pain, and the vicious
continual pleasure: which yet is, for the most part, quite otherwise, and
wicked men have not much the odds to brag of, even in their present possession;
nay, all things rightly considered, have, I think, even the worse part
here. But when infinite happiness is put into one scale, against infinite
misery in the other; if the worst that comes to the pious man, if he mistakes,
be the best that the wicked can attain to, if he be in the right, who can
without madness run the venture? Who in his wits would choose to come within
a possibility of infinite misery; which if he miss, there is yet nothing
to be got by that hazard? Whereas, on the other side, the sober man ventures
nothing against infinite happiness to be got, if his expectation comes
not to pass. If the good man be in the right, he is eternally happy; if
he mistakes, he's not miserable, he feels nothing. On the other side, if
the wicked man be in the right, he is not happy; if he mistakes, he is
infinitely miserable. Must it not be a most manifest wrong judgment that
does not presently see to which side, in this case, the preference is to
be given? I have forborne to mention anything of the certainty or probability
of a future state, designing here to show the wrong judgment that any one
must allow he makes, upon his own principles, laid how he pleases, who
prefers the short pleasures of a vicious life upon any consideration, whilst
he knows, and cannot but be certain, that a future life is at least possible.
73. Recapitulation- liberty of indifferency. To conclude this inquiry
into human liberty, which, as it stood before, I myself from the beginning
fearing, and a very judicious friend of mine, since the publication, suspecting
to have some mistake in it, though he could not particularly show it me,
I was put upon a stricter review of this chapter. Wherein lighting upon
a very easy and scarce observable slip I had made, in putting one seemingly
indifferent word for another that discovery opened to me this present view,
which here, in this second edition, I submit to the learned world, and
which, in short, is this: Liberty is a power to act or not to act, according
as the mind directs. A power to direct the operative faculties to motion
or rest in particular instances is that which we call the will. That which
in the train of our voluntary actions determines the will to any change
of operation is some present uneasiness, which is, or at least is always
accompanied with that of desire. Desire is always moved by evil, to fly
it: because a total freedom from pain always makes a necessary part of
our happiness: but every good, nay, every greater good, does not constantly
move desire, because it may not make, or may not be taken to make, part
of our happiness. For all that we desire, is only to be happy. But, though
this general desire of happiness operates constantly and invariably, yet
the satisfaction of any particular desire can be suspended from determining
the will to any subservient action, till we have maturely examined whether
the particular apparent good which we then desire makes a part of our real
happiness, or be consistent or inconsistent with it. The result of our
judgment upon that examination is what ultimately determines the man; who
could not be free if his will were determined by anything but his own desire,
guided by his own judgment. I know that liberty, by some, is placed in
an indifferency of the man; antecedent to the determination of his will.
I wish they who lay so much stress on such an antecedent indifferency,
as they call it, had told us plainly, whether this supposed indifferency
be antecedent to the thought and judgment of the understanding, as well
as to the decree of the will. For it is pretty hard to state it between
them, i.e. immediately after the judgment of the understanding, and before
the determination of the will: because the determination of the will immediately
follows the judgment of the understanding: and to place liberty in an indifferency,
antecedent to the thought and judgment of the understanding, seems to me
to place liberty in a state of darkness, wherein we can neither see nor
say anything of it; at least it places it in a subject incapable of it,
no agent being allowed capable of liberty, but in consequence of thought
and judgment. I am not nice about phrases, and therefore consent to say
with those that love to speak so, that liberty is placed in indifferency,
but it is an indifferency which remains after the judgment of the understanding,
yea, even after the determination of the will: and that is an indifferency
not of the man, (for after he has once judged which is best, viz. to do
or forbear, he is no longer indifferent,) but an indifferency of the operative
powers of the man, which remaining equally able to operate or to forbear
operating after as before the decree of the will, are in a state, which,
if one pleases, may be called indifferency; and as far as this indifferency
reaches, a man is free, and no further: v.g. I have the ability to move
my hand, or to let it rest; that operative power is indifferent to move
or not to move my hand. I am then, in that respect perfectly free; my will
determines that operative power to rest: I am yet free, because the indifferency
of that my operative power to act, or not to act, still remains; the power
of moving my hand is not at all impaired by the determination of my will,
which at present orders rest; the indifferency of that power to act, or
not to act, is just as it was before, as will appear, if the will puts
it to the trial, by ordering the contrary. But if, during the rest of my
hand, it be seized with a sudden palsy, the indifferency of that operative
power is gone, and with it my liberty; I have no longer freedom in that
respect, but am under a necessity of letting my hand rest. On the other
side, if my hand be put into motion by a convulsion, the indifferency of
that operative faculty is taken away by that motion; and my liberty in
that case is lost, for I am under a necessity of having my hand move. I
have added this, to show in what sort of indifferency liberty seems to
me to consist, and not in any other, real or imaginary.
74. Active and passive power, in motions and in thinking. True notions
concerning the nature and extent of liberty are of so great importance,
that I hope I shall be pardoned this digression, which my attempt to explain
it has led me into. The ideas of will, volition, liberty, and necessity,
in this Chapter of Power, came naturally in my way. In a former edition
of this Treatise I gave an account of my thoughts concerning them, according
to the light I then had. And now, as a lover of truth, and not a worshipper
of my own doctrines, I own some change of my opinion; which I think I have
discovered ground for. In what I first writ, I with an unbiased indifferency
followed truth, whither I thought she led me. But neither being so vain
as to fancy infallibility, nor so disingenuous as to dissemble my mistakes
for fear of blemishing my reputation, I have, with the same sincere design
for truth only, not been ashamed to publish what a severer inquiry has
suggested. It is not impossible but that some may think my former notions
right; and some (as I have already found) these latter; and some neither.
I shall not at all wonder at this variety in men's opinions: impartial
deductions of reason in controverted points being so rare, and exact ones
in abstract notions not so very easy, especially if of any length. And,
therefore, I should think myself not a little beholden to any one, who
would, upon these or any other grounds, fairly clear this subject of liberty
from any difficulties that may yet remain.
Before I close this chapter, it may perhaps be to our purpose, and help
to give us clearer conceptions about power, if we make our thoughts take
a little more exact survey of action. I have said above, that we have ideas
but of two sorts of action, viz. motion and thinking. These, in truth,
though called and counted actions, yet, if nearly considered, will not
be found to be always perfectly so. For, if I mistake not, there are instances
of both kinds, which, upon due consideration, will be found rather passions
than actions; and consequently so far the effects barely of passive powers
in those subjects, which yet on their accounts are thought agents. For,
in these instances, the substance that hath motion or thought receives
the impression, whereby it is put into that action, purely from without,
and so acts merely by the capacity it has to receive such an impression
from some external agent; and such power is not properly an active power,
but a mere passive capacity in the subject. Sometimes the substance or
agent puts itself into action by its own power, and this is properly active
power. Whatsoever modification a substance has, whereby it produces any
effect, that is called action: v.g. a solid substance, by motion, operates
on or alters the sensible ideas of another substance, and therefore this
modification of motion we call action. But yet this motion in that solid
substance is, when rightly considered, but a passion, if it received it
only from some external agent. So that the active power of motion is in
no substance which cannot begin motion in itself or in another substance
when at rest. So likewise in thinking, a power to receive ideas or thoughts
from the operation of any external substance is called a power of thinking:
but this is but a passive power, or capacity. But to be able to bring into
view ideas out of sight at one's own choice, and to compare which of them
one thinks fit, this is an active power. This reflection may be of some
use to preserve us from mistakes about powers and actions, which grammar,
and the common frame of languages, may be apt to lead us into. Since what
is signified by verbs that grammarians call active, does not always signify
action: v.g. this proposition: I see the moon, or a star, or I feel the
heat of the sun, though expressed by a verb active, does not signify any
action in me, whereby I operate on those substances, but only the reception
of the ideas of light, roundness, and heat; wherein I am not active, but
barely passive, and cannot, in that position of my eyes or body, avoid
receiving them. But when I turn my eyes another way, or remove my body
out of the sunbeams, I am properly active; because of my own choice, by
a power within myself, I put myself into that motion. Such an action is
the product of active power.
75. Summary of our original ideas. And thus I have, in a short draught,
given a view of our original ideas, from whence all the rest are derived,
and of which they are made up; which, if I would consider as a philosopher,
and examine on what causes they depend, and of what they are made, I believe
they all might be reduced to these very few primary and original ones,
viz.
Extension,
Solidity,
Mobility, or the power of being moved; which by our senses we receive
from body:
Perceptivity, or the power of perception, or thinking;
Motivity, or the power of moving: which by reflection we receive from
our minds.
I crave leave to make use of these two new words, to avoid the danger
of being mistaken in the use of those which are equivocal.
To which if we add
Existence,
Duration,
Number, which belong both to the one and the other, we have, perhaps,
all the original ideas on which the rest depend. For by these, I imagine,
might be explained the nature of colours, sounds, tastes, smells, and all
other ideas we have, if we had but faculties acute enough to perceive the
severally modified extensions and motions of these minute bodies, which
produce those several sensations in us. But my present purpose being only
to inquire into the knowledge the mind has of things, by those ideas and
appearances which God has fitted it to receive from them, and how the mind
comes by that knowledge; rather than into their causes or manner of production,
I shall not, contrary to the design of this Essay, set myself to inquire
philosophically into the peculiar constitution of bodies, and the configuration
of parts, whereby they have the power to produce in us the ideas of their
sensible qualities. I shall not enter any further into that disquisition;
it sufficing to my purpose to observe, that gold or saffron has a power
to produce in us the idea of yellow, and snow or milk, the idea of white,
which we can only have by our sight; without examining the texture of the
parts of those bodies, or the particular figures or motion of the particles
which rebound from them, to cause in us that particular sensation: though,
when we go beyond the bare ideas in our minds, and would inquire into their
causes, we cannot conceive anything else to be in any sensible object,
whereby it produces different ideas in us, but the different bulk, figure,
number, texture, and motion of its insensible parts.
Chapter XXII: Of Mixed Modes
1. Mixed modes, what. Having treated of simple modes in the foregoing chapters,
and given several instances of some of the most considerable of them, to
show what they are, and how we come by them; we are now in the next place
to consider those we call mixed modes; such are the complex ideas we mark
by the names obligation, drunkenness, a lie, &c.; which consisting
of several combinations of simple ideas of different kinds, I have called
mixed modes, to distinguish them from the more simple modes, which consist
only of simple ideas of the same kind. These mixed modes, being also such
combinations of simple ideas as are not looked upon to be characteristical
marks of any real beings that have a steady existence, but scattered and
independent ideas put together by the mind, are thereby distinguished from
the complex ideas of substances.
2. Made by the mind. That the mind, in respect of its simple ideas,
is wholly passive, and receives them all from the existence and operations
of things, such as sensation or reflection offers them, without being able
to make any one idea, experience shows us. But if we attentively consider
these ideas I call mixed modes, we are now speaking of, we shall find their
original quite different. The mind often exercises an active power in making
these several combinations. For, it being once furnished with simple ideas,
it can put them together in several compositions, and so make variety of
complex ideas, without examining whether they exist so together in nature.
And hence I think it is that these ideas are called notions: as if they
had their original, and constant existence, more in the thoughts of men,
than in the reality of things; and to form such ideas, it sufficed that
the mind put the parts of them together, and that they were consistent
in the understanding, without considering whether they had any real being:
though I do not deny but several of them might be taken from observation,
and the existence of several simple ideas so combined, as they are put
together in the understanding. For the man who first framed the idea of
hypocrisy, might have either taken it at first from the observation of
one who made show of good qualities which he had not; or else have framed
that idea in his mind without having any such pattern to fashion it by.
For it is evident that, in the beginning of languages and societies of
men, several of those complex ideas, which were consequent to the constitutions
established amongst them, must needs have been in the minds of men, before
they existed anywhere else; and that many names that stood for such complex
ideas were in use, and so those ideas framed, before the combinations they
stood for ever existed.
3. Sometimes got by the explication of their names. Indeed, now that
languages are made, and abound with words standing for such combinations,
an usual way of getting these complex ideas is, by the explication of those
terms that stand for them. For, consisting of a company of simple ideas
combined, they may, by words standing for those simple ideas, be represented
to the mind of one who understands those words, though that complex combination
of simple ideas were never offered to his mind by the real existence of
things. Thus a man may come to have the idea of sacrilege or murder, by
enumerating to him the simple ideas which these words stand for; without
ever seeing either of them committed.
4. The name ties the parts of mixed modes into one idea. Every mixed
mode consisting of many distinct simple ideas, it seems reasonable to inquire,
Whence it has its unity; and how such a precise multitude comes to make
but one idea; since that combination does not always exist together in
nature? To which I answer, it is plain it has its unity from an act of
the mind, combining those several simple ideas together, and considering
them as one complex one, consisting of those parts; and the mark of this
union, or that which is looked on generally to complete it, is one name
given to that combination. For it is by their names that men commonly regulate
their account of their distinct species of mixed modes, seldom allowing
or considering any number of simple ideas to make one complex one, but
such collections as there be names for. Thus, though the killing of an
old man be as fit in nature to be united into one complex idea, as the
killing a man's father; yet, there being no name standing precisely for
the one, as there is the name of parricide to mark the other, it is not
taken for a particular complex idea, nor a distinct species of actions
from that of killing a young man, or any other man.
5. The cause of making mixed modes. If we should inquire a little further,
to see what it is that occasions men to make several combinations of simple
ideas into distinct, and, as it were, settled modes, and neglect others,
which in the nature of things themselves, have as much an aptness to be
combined and make distinct ideas, we shall find the reason of it to be
the end of language; which being to mark, or communicate men's thoughts
to one another with all the dispatch that may be, they usually make such
collections of ideas into complex modes, and affix names to them, as they
have frequent use of in their way of living and conversation, leaving others,
which they have but seldom an occasion to mention, loose and without names
that tie them together: they rather choosing to enumerate (when they have
need) such ideas as make them up, by the particular names that stand for
them, than to trouble their memories by multiplying of complex ideas with
names to them, which they seldom or never have any occasion to make use
of.
6. Why words in one language have none answering in another. This shows
us how it comes to pass that there are in every language many particular
words which cannot be rendered by any one single word of another. For the
several fashions, customs, and manners of one nation, making several combinations
of ideas familiar and necessary in one, which another people have had never
an occasion to make, or perhaps so much as take notice of, names come of
course to be annexed to them, to avoid long periphrases in things of daily
conversation; and so they become so many distinct complex ideas in their
minds. Thus ostrhakismos amongst the Greeks, and proscriptio amongst the
Romans, were words which other languages had no names that exactly answered;
because they stood for complex ideas which were not in the minds of the
men of other nations. Where there was no such custom, there was no notion
of any such actions; no use of such combinations of ideas as were united,
and, as it were, tied together, by those terms: and therefore in other
countries there were no names for them.
7. And languages change. Hence also we may see the reason, why languages
constantly change, take up new and lay by old terms. Because change of
customs and opinions bringing with it new combinations of ideas, which
it is necessary frequently to think on and talk about, new names, to avoid
long descriptions, are annexed to them; and so they become new species
of complex modes. What a number of different ideas are by this means wrapped
up in one short sound, and how much of our time and breath is thereby saved,
any one will see, who will but take the pains to enumerate all the ideas
that either reprieve or appeal stand for; and instead of either of those
names, use a periphrasis, to make any one understand their meaning.
8. Mixed modes, where they exist. Though I shall have occasion to consider
this more at large when I come to treat of Words and their use, yet I could
not avoid to take this much notice here of the names of mixed modes; which
being fleeting and transient combinations of simple ideas, which have but
a short existence anywhere but in the minds of men, and there too have
no longer any existence than whilst they are thought on, have not so much
anywhere the appearance of a constant and lasting existence as in their
names: which are therefore, in this sort of ideas, very apt to be taken
for the ideas themselves. For, if we should inquire where the idea of a
triumph or apotheosis exists, it is evident they could neither of them
exist altogether anywhere in the things themselves, being actions that
required time to their performance, and so could never all exist together;
and as to the minds of men, where the ideas of these actions are supposed
to be lodged, they have there too a very uncertain existence: and therefore
we are apt to annex them to the names that excite them in us.
9. How we get the ideas of mixed modes. There are therefore three ways
whereby we get these complex ideas of mixed modes:- (1) By experience and
observation of things themselves: thus, by seeing two men wrestle or fence,
we get the idea of wrestling or fencing. (2) By invention, or voluntary
putting together of several simple ideas in our own minds: so he that first
invented printing or etching, had an idea of it in his mind before it ever
existed. (3) Which is the most usual way, by explaining the names of actions
we never saw, or motions we cannot see; and by enumerating, and thereby,
as it were, setting before our imaginations all those ideas which go to
the making them up, and are the constituent parts of them. For, having
by sensation and reflection stored our minds with simple ideas, and by
use got the names that stand for them, we can by those means represent
to another any complex idea we would have him conceive; so that it has
in it no simple ideas but what he knows, and has with us the same name
for. For all our complex ideas are ultimately resolvable into simple ideas,
of which they are compounded and originally made up, though perhaps their
immediate ingredients, as I may so say, are also complex ideas. Thus, the
mixed mode which the word lie stands for is made of these simple ideas:-
(1) Articulate sounds. (2) Certain ideas in the mind of the speaker. (3)
Those words the signs of those ideas. (4) Those signs put together, by
affirmation or negation, otherwise than the ideas they stand for are in
the mind of the speaker. I think I need not go any further in the analysis
of that complex idea we call a lie: what I have said is enough to show
that it is made up of simple ideas. And it could not be but an offensive
tediousness to my reader, to trouble him with a more minute enumeration
of every particular simple idea that goes to this complex one; which, from
what has been said, he cannot but be able to make out to himself. The same
may be done in all our complex ideas whatsoever; which, however compounded
and decompounded, may at last be resolved into simple ideas, which are
all the materials of knowledge or thought we have, or can have. Nor shall
we have reason to fear that the mind is hereby stinted to too scanty a
number of ideas, if we consider what an inexhaustible stock of simple modes
number and figure alone afford us. How far then mixed modes, which admit
of the various combinations of different simple ideas, and their infinite
modes, are from being few and scanty, we may easily imagine. So that, before
we have done, we shall see that nobody need be afraid he shall not have
scope and compass enough for his thoughts to range in, though they be,
as I pretend, confined only to simple ideas, received from sensation or
reflection, and their several combinations.
10. Motion, thinking, and power have been most modified. It is worth
our observing, which of all our simple ideas have been most modified, and
had most mixed ideas made out of them, with names given to them. And those
have been these three:- thinking and motion (which are the two ideas which
comprehend in them all action,) and power, from whence these actions are
conceived to flow. These simple ideas, I say, of thinking, motion, and
power, have been those which have been most modified; and out of whose
modifications have been made most complex modes, with names to them. For
action being the great business of mankind, and the whole matter about
which all laws are conversant, it is no wonder that the several modes of
thinking and motion should be taken notice of, the ideas of them observed,
and laid up in the memory, and have names assigned to them; without which
laws could be but ill made, or vice and disorders repressed. Nor could
any communication be well had amongst men without such complex ideas, with
names to them: and therefore men have settled names, and supposed settled
ideas in their minds, of modes of actions, distinguished by their causes,
means, objects, ends, instruments, time, place, and other circumstances;
and also of their powers fitted for those actions: v.g. boldness is the
power to speak or do what we intend, before others, without fear or disorder;
and the Greeks call the confidence of speaking by a peculiar name, parrhesia:
which power or ability in man of doing anything, when it has been acquired
by frequent doing the same thing, is that idea we name habit; when it is
forward, and ready upon every occasion to break into action, we call it
disposition. Thus, testiness is a disposition or aptness to be angry.
To conclude: Let us examine any modes of action, v.g. consideration
and assent, which are actions of the mind; running and speaking, which
are actions of the body; revenge and murder, which are actions of both
together, and we shall find them but so many collections of simple ideas,
which, together, make up the complex ones signified by those names.
11. Several words seeming to signify action, signify but the effect.
Power being the source from whence all action proceeds, the substances
wherein these powers are, when they exert this power into act, are called
causes, and the substances which thereupon are produced, or the simple
ideas which are introduced into any subject by the exerting of that power,
are called effects. The efficacy whereby the new substance or idea is produced
is called, in the subject exerting that power, action; but in the subject
wherein any simple idea is changed or produced, it is called passion: which
efficacy, however various, and the effects almost infinite, yet we can,
I think, conceive it, in intellectual agents, to be nothing else but modes
of thinking and willing; in corporeal agents, nothing else but modifications
of motion. I say, I think we cannot conceive it to be any other but these
two. For whatever sort of action besides these produce any effects, I confess
myself to have no notion nor idea of; and so it is quite remote from my
thoughts, apprehensions, and knowledge; and as much in the dark to me as
five other senses, or as the ideas of colours to a blind man. And therefore
many words which seem to express some action, signify nothing of the action
or modus operandi at all, but barely the effect, with some circumstances
of the subject wrought on, or cause operating: v.g. creation, annihilation,
contain in them no idea of the action or manner whereby they are produced,
but barely of the cause, and the thing done. And when a countryman says
the cold freezes water, though the word freezing seems to import some action,
yet truly it signifies nothing but the effect, viz. that water that was
before fluid is become hard and consistent, without containing any idea
of the action whereby it is done.
12. Mixed modes made also of other ideas than those of power and action.
I think I shall not need to remark here that, though power and action make
the greatest part of mixed modes, marked by names, and familiar in the
minds and mouths of men, yet other simple ideas, and their several combinations,
are not excluded: much less, I think, will it be necessary for me to enumerate
all the mixed modes which have been settled, with names to them. That would
be to make a dictionary of the greatest part of the words made use of in
divinity, ethics, law, and politics, and several other sciences. All that
is requisite to my present design, is to show what sort of ideas those
are which I call mixed modes; how the mind comes by them; and that they
are compositions made up of simple ideas got from sensation and reflection;
which I suppose I have done.
Chapter XXIII: Of our Complex Ideas of Substances
1. Ideas of particular substances, how made. The mind being, as I have
declared, furnished with a great number of the simple ideas, conveyed in
by the senses as they are found in exterior things, or by reflection on
its own operations, takes notice also that a certain number of these simple
ideas go constantly together; which being presumed to belong to one thing,
and words being suited to common apprehensions, and made use of for quick
dispatch, are called, so united in one subject, by one name; which, by
inadvertency, we are apt afterward to talk of and consider as one simple
idea, which indeed is a complication of many ideas together: because, as
I have said, not imagining how these simple ideas can subsist by themselves,
we accustom ourselves to suppose some substratum wherein they do subsist,
and from which they do result, which therefore we call substance.
2. Our obscure idea of substance in general. So that if any one will
examine himself concerning his notion of pure substance in general, he
will find he has no other idea of it at all, but only a supposition of
he knows not what support of such qualities which are capable of producing
simple ideas in us; which qualities are commonly called accidents. If any
one should be asked, what is the subject wherein colour or weight inheres,
he would have nothing to say, but the solid extended parts; and if he were
demanded, what is it that solidity and extension adhere in, he would not
be in a much better case than the Indian before mentioned who, saying that
the world was supported by a great elephant, was asked what the elephant
rested on; to which his answer was- a great tortoise: but being again pressed
to know what gave support to the broad-backed tortoise, replied- something,
he knew not what. And thus here, as in all other cases where we use words
without having clear and distinct ideas, we talk like children: who, being
questioned what such a thing is, which they know not, readily give this
satisfactory answer, that it is something: which in truth signifies no
more, when so used, either by children or men, but that they know not what;
and that the thing they pretend to know, and talk of, is what they have
no distinct idea of at all, and so are perfectly ignorant of it, and in
the dark. The idea then we have, to which we give the general name substance,
being nothing but the supposed, but unknown, support of those qualities
we find existing, which we imagine cannot subsist sine re substante, without
something to support them, we call that support substantia; which, according
to the true import of the word, is, in plain English, standing under or
upholding.
3. Of the sorts of substances. An obscure and relative idea of substance
in general being thus made we come to have the ideas of particular sorts
of substances, by collecting such combinations of simple ideas as are,
by experience and observation of men's senses, taken notice of to exist
together; and are therefore supposed to flow from the particular internal
constitution, or unknown essence of that substance. Thus we come to have
the ideas of a man, horse, gold, water, &c.; of which substances, whether
any one has any other clear idea, further than of certain simple ideas
co-existent together, I appeal to every one's own experience. It is the
ordinary qualities observable in iron, or a diamond, put together, that
make the true complex idea of those substances, which a smith or a jeweller
commonly knows better than a philosopher; who, whatever substantial forms
he may talk of, has no other idea of those substances, than what is framed
by a collection of those simple ideas which are to be found in them: only
we must take notice, that our complex ideas of substances, besides all
those simple ideas they are made up of, have always the confused idea of
something to which they belong, and in which they subsist: and therefore
when we speak of any sort of substance, we say it is a thing having such
or such qualities; as body is a thing that is extended, figured, and capable
of motion; spirit, a thing capable of thinking; and so hardness, friability,
and power to draw iron, we say, are qualities to be found in a loadstone.
These, and the like fashions of speaking, intimate that the substance is
supposed always something besides the extension, figure, solidity, motion,
thinking, or other observable ideas, though we know not what it is.
4. No clear or distinct idea of substance in general. Hence, when we
talk or think of any particular sort of corporeal substances, as horse,
stone, &c., though the idea we have of either of them be but the complication
or collection of those several simple ideas of sensible qualities, which
we used to find united in the thing called horse or stone; yet, because
we cannot conceive how they should subsist alone, nor one in another, we
suppose them existing in and supported by some common subject; which support
we denote by the name substance, though it be certain we have no clear
or distinct idea of that thing we suppose a support.
5. As clear an idea of spiritual substance as of corporeal substance.
The same thing happens concerning the operations of the mind, viz. thinking,
reasoning, fearing, &c., which we concluding not to subsist of themselves,
nor apprehending how they can belong to body, or be produced by it, we
are apt to think these the actions of some other substance, which we call
spirit; whereby yet it is evident that, having no other idea or notion
of matter, but something wherein those many sensible qualities which affect
our senses do subsist; by supposing a substance wherein thinking, knowing,
doubting, and a power of moving, &c., do subsist, we have as clear
a notion of the substance of spirit, as we have of body; the one being
supposed to be (without knowing what it is) the substratum to those simple
ideas we have from without; and the other supposed (with a like ignorance
of what it is) to be the substratum to those operations we experiment in
ourselves within. It is plain then, that the idea of corporeal substance
in matter is as remote from our conceptions and apprehensions, as that
of spiritual substance, or spirit: and therefore, from our not having any
notion of the substance of spirit, we can no more conclude its non-existence,
than we can, for the same reason, deny the existence of body; it being
as rational to affirm there is no body, because we have no clear and distinct
idea of the substance of matter, as to say there is no spirit, because
we have no clear and distinct idea of the substance of a spirit.
6. Our ideas of particular sorts of substances. Whatever therefore be
the secret abstract nature of substance in general, all the ideas we have
of particular distinct sorts of substances are nothing but several combinations
of simple ideas, coexisting in such, though unknown, cause of their union,
as makes the whole subsist of itself It is by such combinations of simple
ideas, and nothing else, that we represent particular sorts of substances
to ourselves; such are the ideas we have of their several species in our
minds; and such only do we, by their specific names, signify to others,
v.g. man, horse, sun, water, iron: upon hearing which words, every one
who understands the language, frames in his mind a combination of those
several simple ideas which he has usually observed, or fancied to exist
together under that denomination; all which he supposes to rest in and
be, as it were, adherent to that unknown common subject, which inheres
not in anything else. Though, in the meantime, it be manifest, and every
one, upon inquiry into his own thoughts, will find, that he has no other
idea of any substance, v.g. let it be gold, horse, iron, man, vitriol,
bread, but what he has barely of those sensible qualities, which he supposes
to inhere; with a supposition of such a substratum as gives, as it were,
a support to those qualities or simple ideas, which he has observed to
exist united together. Thus, the idea of the sun,- what is it but an aggregate
of those several simple ideas, bright, hot, roundish, having a constant
regular motion, at a certain distance from us, and perhaps some other:
as he who thinks and discourses of the sun has been more or less accurate
in observing those sensible qualities, ideas, or properties, which are
in that thing which he calls the sun.
7. Their active and passive powers a great part of our complex ideas
of substances. For he has the perfectest idea of any of the particular
sorts of substances, who has gathered, and put together, most of those
simple ideas which do exist in it; among which are to be reckoned its active
powers, and passive capacities, which, though not simple ideas, yet in
this respect, for brevity's sake, may conveniently enough be reckoned amongst
them. Thus, the power of drawing iron is one of the ideas of the complex
one of that substance we call a loadstone; and a power to be so drawn is
a part of the complex one we call iron: which powers pass for inherent
qualities in those subjects. Because every substance, being as apt, by
the powers we observe in it, to change some sensible qualities in other
subjects, as it is to produce in us those simple ideas which we receive
immediately from it, does, by those new sensible qualities introduced into
other subjects, discover to us those powers which do thereby mediately
affect our senses, as regularly as its sensible qualities do it immediately:
v.g. we immediately by our senses perceive in fire its heat and colour;
which are, if rightly considered, nothing but powers in it to produce those
ideas in us: we also by our senses perceive the colour and brittleness
of charcoal, whereby we come by the knowledge of another power in fire,
which it has to change the colour and consistency of wood. By the former,
fire immediately, by the latter, it mediately discovers to us these several
powers; which therefore we look upon to be a part of the qualities of fire,
and so make them a part of the complex idea of it. For all those powers
that we take cognizance of, terminating only in the alteration of some
sensible qualities in those subjects on which they operate, and so making
them exhibit to us new sensible ideas, therefore it is that I have reckoned
these powers amongst the simple ideas which make the complex ones of the
sort? of substances; though these powers considered in themselves, are
truly complex ideas. And in this looser sense I crave leave to be understood,
when I name any of these potentialities among the simple ideas which we
recollect in our minds when we think of particular substances. For the
powers that are severally in them are necessary to be considered, if we
will have true distinct notions of the several sorts of substances.
8. And why. Nor are we to wonder that powers make a great part of our
complex ideas of substances; since their secondary qualities are those
which in most of them serve principally to distinguish substances one from
another, and commonly make a considerable part of the complex idea of the
several sorts of them. For, our senses failing us in the discovery of the
bulk, texture, and figure of the minute parts of bodies, on which their
real constitutions and differences depend, we are fain to make use of their
secondary qualities as the characteristical notes and marks whereby to
frame ideas of them in our minds, and distinguish them one from another:
all which secondary qualities, as has been shown, are nothing but bare
powers. For the colour and taste of opium are, as well as its soporific
or anodyne virtues, mere powers, depending on its primary qualities, whereby
it is fitted to produce different operations on different parts of our
bodies.
9. Three sorts of ideas make our complex ones of corporeal substances.
The ideas that make our complex ones of corporeal substances, are of these
three sorts. First, the ideas of the primary qualities of things, which
are discovered by our senses, and are in them even when we perceive them
not; such are the bulk, figure, number, situation, and motion of the parts
of bodies; which are really in them, whether we take notice of them or
not. Secondly, the sensible secondary qualities, which, depending on these,
are nothing but the powers those substances have to produce several ideas
in us by our senses; which ideas are not in the things themselves, otherwise
than as anything is in its cause. Thirdly, the aptness we consider in any
substance, to give or receive such alterations of primary qualities, as
that the substance so altered should produce in us different ideas from
what it did before; these are called active and passive powers: all which
powers, as far as we have any notice or notion of them, terminate only
in sensible simple ideas. For whatever alteration a loadstone has the power
to make in the minute particles of iron, we should have no notion of any
power it had at all to operate on iron, did not its sensible motion discover
it: and I doubt not, but there are a thousand changes, that bodies we daily
handle have a power to use in one another, which we never suspect, because
they never appear in sensible effects.
10. Powers thus make a great part of our complex ideas of particular
substances. Powers therefore justly make a great part of our complex ideas
of substances. He that will examine his complex idea of gold, will find
several of its ideas that make it up to be only powers; as the power of
being melted, but of not spending itself in the fire; of being dissolved
in aqua regia, are ideas as necessary to make up our complex idea of gold,
as its colour and weight: which, if duly considered, are also nothing but
different powers. For, to speak truly, yellowness is not actually in gold,
but is a power in gold to produce that idea in us by our eyes, when placed
in a due light: and the heat, which we cannot leave out of our ideas of
the sun, is no more really in the sun, than the white colour it introduces
into wax. These are both equally powers in the sun, operating, by the motion
and figure of its sensible parts, so on a man, as to make him have the
idea of heat; and so on wax, as to make it capable to produce in a man
the idea of white.
11. The now secondary qualities of bodies would disappear, if we could
discover the primary ones of their minute parts. Had we senses acute enough
to discern the minute particles of bodies, and the real constitution on
which their sensible qualities depend, I doubt not but they would produce
quite different ideas in us: and that which is now the yellow colour of
gold, would then disappear, and instead of it we should see an admirable
texture of parts, of a certain size and figure. This microscopes plainly
discover to us; for what to our naked eyes produces a certain colour, is,
by thus augmenting the acuteness of our senses, discovered to be quite
a different thing; and the thus altering, as it were, the proportion of
the bulk of the minute parts of a coloured object to our usual sight, produces
different ideas from what it did before. Thus, sand or pounded glass, which
is opaque, and white to the naked eye, is pellucid in a microscope; and
a hair seen in this way, loses its former colour, and is, in a great measure,
pellucid, with a mixture of some bright sparkling colours, such as appear
from the refraction of diamonds, and other pellucid bodies. Blood, to the
naked eye, appears all red; but by a good microscope, wherein its lesser
parts appear, shows only some few globules of red, swimming in a pellucid
liquor, and how these red globules would appear, if glasses could be found
that could yet magnify them a thousand or ten thousand times more, is uncertain.
12. Our faculties for discovery of the qualities and powers of substances
suited to our state. The infinite wise Contriver of us, and all things
about us, hath fitted our senses, faculties, and organs, to the conveniences
of life, and the business we have to do here. We are able, by our senses,
to know and distinguish things: and to examine them so far as to apply
them to our uses, and several ways to accommodate the exigences of this
life. We have insight enough into their admirable contrivances and wonderful
effects, to admire and magnify the wisdom, power, and goodness of their
Author. Such a knowledge as this, which is suited to our present condition,
we want not faculties to attain. But it appears not that God intended we
should have a perfect, clear, and adequate knowledge of them: that perhaps
is not in the comprehension of any finite being. We are furnished with
faculties (dull and weak as they are) to discover enough in the creatures
to lead us to the knowledge of the Creator, and the knowledge of our duty;
and we are fitted well enough with abilities to provide for the conveniences
of living: these are our business in this world. But were our senses altered,
and made much quicker and acuter, the appearance and outward scheme of
things would have quite another face to us; and, I am apt to think, would
be inconsistent with our being, or at least well-being, in this part of
the universe which we inhabit. He that considers how little our constitution
is able to bear a remove into parts of this air, not much higher than that
we commonly breath in, will have reason to be satisfied, that in this globe
of earth allotted for our mansion, the all-wise Architect has suited our
organs, and the bodies that are to affect them, one to another. If our
sense of hearing were but a thousand times quicker than it is, how would
a perpetual noise distract us. And we should in the quietest retirement
be less able to sleep or meditate than in the middle of a sea-fight. Nay,
if that most instructive of our senses, seeing, were in any man a thousand
or a hundred thousand times more acute than it is by the best microscope,
things several millions of times less than the smallest object of his sight
now would then be visible to his naked eyes, and so he would come nearer
to the discovery of the texture and motion of the minute parts of corporeal
things; and in many of them, probably get ideas of their internal constitutions:
but then he would be in a quite different world from other people: nothing
would appear the same to him and others: the visible ideas of everything
would be different. So that I doubt, whether he and the rest of men could
discourse concerning the objects of sight, or have any communication about
colours, their appearances being so wholly different. And perhaps such
a quickness and tenderness of sight could not endure bright sunshine, or
so much as open daylight; nor take in but a very small part of any object
at once, and that too only at a very near distance. And if by the help
of such microscopical eyes (if I may so call them) a man could penetrate
further than ordinary into the secret composition and radical texture of
bodies, he would not make any great advantage by the change, if such an
acute sight would not serve to conduct him to the market and exchange;
if he could not see things he was to avoid, at a convenient distance; nor
distinguish things he had to do with by those sensible qualities others
do. He that was sharp-sighted enough to see the configuration of the minute
particles of the spring of a clock, and observe upon what peculiar structure
and impulse its elastic motion depends, would no doubt discover something
very admirable: but if eyes so framed could not view at once the hand,
and the characters of the hour-plate, and thereby at a distance see what
o'clock it was, their owner could not be much benefited by that acuteness;
which, whilst it discovered the secret contrivance of the parts of the
machine, made him lose its use.
13. Conjecture about the corporeal organs of some spirits. And here
give me leave to propose an extravagant conjecture of mine, viz. That since
we have some reason (if there be any credit to be given to the report of
things that our philosophy cannot account for) to imagine, that Spirits
can assume to themselves bodies of different bulk, figure, and conformation
of parts- whether one great advantage some of them have over us may not
lie in this, that they can so frame and shape to themselves organs of sensation
or perception, as to suit them to their present design, and the circumstances
of the object they would consider. For how much would that man exceed all
others in knowledge, who had but the faculty so to alter the structure
of his eyes, that one sense, as to make it capable of all the several degrees
of vision which the assistance of glasses (casually at first lighted on)
has taught us to conceive? What wonders would he discover, who could so
fit his eyes to all sorts of objects, as to see when he pleased the figure
and motion of the minute particles in the blood, and other juices of animals,
as distinctly as he does, at other times, the shape and motion of the animals
themselves? But to us, in our present state, unalterable organs, so contrived
as to discover the figure and motion of the minute parts of bodies, whereon
depend those sensible qualities we now observe in them, would perhaps be
of no advantage. God has no doubt made them so as is best for us in our
present condition. He hath fitted us for the neighbourhood of the bodies
that surround us, and we have to do with; and though we cannot, by the
faculties we have, attain to a perfect knowledge of things, yet they will
serve us well enough for those ends above-mentioned, which are our great
concernment. I beg my reader's pardon for laying before him so wild a fancy
concerning the ways of perception of beings above us; but how extravagant
soever it be, I doubt whether we can imagine anything about the knowledge
of angels but after this manner, some way or other in proportion to what
we find and observe in ourselves. And though we cannot but allow that the
infinite power and wisdom of God may frame creatures with a thousand other
faculties and ways of perceiving things without them than what we have,
yet our thoughts can go no further than our own: so impossible it is for
us to enlarge our very guesses beyond the ideas received from our own sensation
and reflection. The supposition, at least, that angels do sometimes assume
bodies, needs not startle us; since some of the most ancient and most learned
Fathers of the church seemed to believe that they had bodies: and this
is certain, that their state and way of existence is unknown to us.
14. Our specific ideas of substances. But to return to the matter in
hand,- the ideas we have of substances, and the ways we come by them. I
say, our specific ideas of substances are nothing else but a collection
of a certain number of simple ideas, considered as united in one thing.
These ideas of substances, though they are commonly simple apprehensions,
and the names of them simple terms, yet in effect are complex and compounded.
Thus the idea which an Englishman signifies by the name swan, is white
colour, long neck, red beak, black legs, and whole feet, and all these
of a certain size, with a power of swimming in the water, and making a
certain kind of noise, and perhaps, to a man who has long observed this
kind of birds, some other properties: which all terminate in sensible simple
ideas, all united in one common subject.
15. Our ideas of spiritual substances, as clear as of bodily substances.
Besides the complex ideas we have of material sensible substances, of which
I have last spoken,- by the simple ideas we have taken from those operations
of our own minds, which we experiment daily in ourselves, as thinking,
understanding, willing, knowing, and power of beginning motion, &c.,
co-existing in some substance, we are able to frame the complex idea of
an immaterial spirit. And thus, by putting together the ideas of thinking,
perceiving, liberty, and power of moving themselves and other things, we
have as clear a perception and notion of immaterial substances as we have
of material. For putting together the ideas of thinking and willing, or
the power of moving or quieting corporeal motion, joined to substance,
of which we have no distinct idea, we have the idea of an immaterial spirit;
and by putting together the ideas of coherent solid parts, and a power
of being moved, joined with substance, of which likewise we have no positive
idea, we have the idea of matter. The one is as clear and distinct an idea
as the other: the idea of thinking, and moving a body, being as clear and
distinct ideas as the ideas of extension, solidity, and being moved. For
our idea of substance is equally obscure, or none at all, in both; it is
but a supposed I know not what, to support those ideas we call accidents.
It is for want reflection that we are apt to think that our senses show
us nothing but material things. Every act of sensation, when duly considered,
gives us an equal view of both parts of nature, the corporeal and spiritual.
For whilst I know, by seeing or hearing, &c., that there is some corporeal
being without me, the object of that sensation, I do more certainly know,
that there is some spiritual being within me that sees and hears. This,
I must be convinced, cannot be the action of bare insensible matter; nor
ever could be, without an immaterial thinking being.
16. No idea of abstract substance either in body or spirit. By the complex
idea of extended, figured, coloured, and all other sensible qualities,
which is all that we know of it, we are as far from the idea of the substance
of body, as if we knew nothing at all: nor after all the acquaintance and
familiarity which we imagine we have with matter, and the many qualities
men assure themselves they perceive and know in bodies, will it perhaps
upon examination be found, that they have any more or clearer primary ideas
belonging to body, than they have belonging to immaterial spirit.
17. Cohesion of solid parts and impulse, the primary ideas peculiar
to body. The primary ideas we have peculiar to body, as contradistinguished
to spirit, are the cohesion of solid, and consequently separable, parts,
and a power of communicating motion by impulse. These, I think, are the
original ideas proper and peculiar to body; for figure is but the consequence
of finite extension.
18. Thinking and motivity the primary ideas peculiar to spirit. The
ideas we have belonging and peculiar to spirit, are thinking, and will,
or a power of putting body into motion by thought, and, which is consequent
to it, liberty. For, as body cannot but communicate its motion by impulse
to another body, which it meets with at rest, so the mind can put bodies
into motion, or forbear to do so, as it pleases. The ideas of existence,
duration, and mobility, are common to them both.
19. Spirits capable of motion. There is no reason why it should be thought
strange, that I make mobility belong to spirit; for having no other idea
of motion, but change of distance with other beings that are considered
as at rest; and finding that spirits, as well as bodies, cannot operate
but where they are; and that spirits do operate at several times in several
places, I cannot but attribute change of place to all finite spirits: (for
of the Infinite Spirit I speak not here). For my soul, being a real being
as well as my body, is certainly as capable of changing distance with any
other body, or being, as body itself; and so is capable of motion. And
if a mathematician can consider a certain distance, or a change of that
distance between two points, one may certainly conceive a distance, and
a change of distance, between two spirits; and so conceive their motion,
their approach or removal, one from another.
20. Proof of this. Every one finds in himself that his soul can think,
will, and operate on his body in the place where that is, but cannot operate
on a body, or in a place, an hundred miles distant from it. Nobody can
imagine that his soul can think or move a body at Oxford, whilst he is
at London; and cannot but know, that, being united to his body, it constantly
changes place all the whole journey between Oxford and London, as the coach
or horse does that carries him, and I think may be said to be truly all
that while in motion: or if that will not be allowed to afford us a clear
idea enough of its motion, its being separated from the body in death,
I think, will; for to consider it as going out of the body, or leaving
it, and yet to have no idea of its motion, seems to me impossible.
21. God immoveable, because infinite. If it be said by any one that
it cannot change place, because it hath none, for the spirits are not in
loco, but ubi; I suppose that way of talking will not now be of much weight
to many, in an age that is not much disposed to admire, or suffer themselves
to be deceived by such unintelligible ways of speaking. But if any one
thinks there is any sense in that distinction, and that it is applicable
to our present purpose, I desire him to put it into intelligible English;
and then from thence draw a reason to show that immaterial spirits are
not capable of motion. Indeed motion cannot be attributed to God; not because
he is an immaterial, but because he is an infinite spirit.
22. Our complex idea of an immaterial spirit and our complex idea of
body compared. Let us compare, then, our complex idea of an immaterial
spirit with our complex idea of body, and see whether there be any more
obscurity in one than in the other, and in which most. Our idea of body,
as I think, is an extended solid substance, capable of communicating motion
by impulse: and our idea of soul, as an immaterial spirit, is of a substance
that thinks, and has a power of exciting motion in body, by willing, or
thought. These, I think, are our complex ideas of soul and body, as contradistinguished;
and now let us examine which has most obscurity in it, and difficulty to
be apprehended. I know that people whose thoughts are immersed in matter,
and have so subjected their minds to their senses that they seldom reflect
on anything beyond them, are apt to say, they cannot comprehend a thinking
thing, which perhaps is true: but I affirm, when they consider it well,
they can no more comprehend an extended thing.
23. Cohesion of solid parts in body as hard to be conceived as thinking
in a soul. If any one says he knows not what it is thinks in him, he means
he knows not what the substance is of that thinking thing: No more, say
I, knows he what the substance is of that solid thing. Further, if he says
he knows not how he thinks, I answer, Neither knows he how he is extended,
how the solid parts of body are united, or cohere together to make extension.
For though the pressure of the particles of air may account for the cohesion
of several parts of matter that are grosser than the particles of air,
and have pores less than the corpuscles of air, yet the weight or pressure
of the air will not explain, nor can be a cause of the coherence of the
particles of air themselves. And if the pressure of the aether, or any
subtiler matter than the air, may unite, and hold fast together, the parts
of a particle of air, as well as other bodies, yet it cannot make bonds
for itself, and hold together the parts that make up every the least corpuscle
of that materia subtilis. So that that hypothesis, how ingeniously soever
explained, by showing that the parts of sensible bodies are held together
by the pressure of other external insensible bodies, reaches not the parts
of the aether itself; and by how much the more evident it proves, that
the parts of other bodies are held together by the external pressure of
the aether, and can have no other conceivable cause of their cohesion and
union, by so much the more it leaves us in the dark concerning the cohesion
of the parts of the corpuscles of the aether itself: which we can neither
conceive without parts, they being bodies, and divisible, nor yet how their
parts cohere, they wanting that cause of cohesion which is given of the
cohesion of the parts of all other bodies.
24. Not explained by an ambient fluid. But, in truth, the pressure of
any ambient fluid, how great soever, can be no intelligible cause of the
cohesion of the solid parts of matter. For, though such a pressure may
hinder the avulsion of two polished superficies, one from another, in a
line perpendicular to them, as in the experiment of two polished marbles;
yet it can never in the least hinder the separation by a motion, in a line
parallel to those surfaces. Because the ambient fluid, having a full liberty
to succeed in each point of space, deserted by a lateral motion, resists
such a motion of bodies, so joined, no more than it would resist the motion
of that body were it on all sides environed by that fluid, and touched
no other body; and therefore, if there were no other cause of cohesion,
all parts of bodies must be easily separable by such a lateral sliding
motion. For if the pressure of the aether be the adequate cause of cohesion,
wherever that cause operates not, there can be no cohesion. And since it
cannot operate against a lateral separation, (as has been shown), therefore
in every imaginary plane, intersecting any mass of matter, there could
be no more cohesion than of two polished surfaces, which will always, notwithstanding
any imaginable pressure of a fluid, easily slide one from another. So that
perhaps, how clear an idea soever we think we have of the extension of
body, which is nothing but the cohesion of solid parts, he that shall well
consider it in his mind, may have reason to conclude, That it is as easy
for him to have a clear idea how the soul thinks as how body is extended.
For, since body is no further, nor otherwise, extended, than by the union
and cohesion of its solid parts, we shall very ill comprehend the extension
of body, without understanding wherein consists the union and cohesion
of its parts; which seems to me as incomprehensible as the manner of thinking,
and how it is performed.
25. We can as little understand how the parts cohere in extension, as
how our spirits perceive or move. I allow it is usual for most people to
wonder how any one should find a difficulty in what they think they every
day observe. Do we not see (will they be ready to say) the parts of bodies
stick firmly together? Is there anything more common? And what doubt can
there be made of it? And the like, I say, concerning thinking and voluntary
motion. Do we not every moment experiment it in ourselves, and therefore
can it be doubted? The matter of fact is clear, I confess; but when we
would a little nearer look into it, and consider how it is done, there
I think we are at a loss, both in the one and the other; and can as little
understand how the parts of body cohere, as how we ourselves perceive or
move. I would have any one intelligibly explain to me, how the parts of
gold, or brass, (that but now in fusion were as loose from one another
as the particles of water, or the sands of an hour-glass), come in a few
moments to be so united, and adhere so strongly one to another, that the
utmost force of men's arms cannot separate them? A considering man will,
I suppose, be here at a loss to satisfy his own, or another man's understanding.
26. The cause of coherence of atoms in extended substances incomprehensible.
The little bodies that compose that fluid we call water, are so extremely
small, that I have never heard of any one, who, by a microscope, (and yet
I have heard of some that have magnified to ten thousand; nay, to much
above a hundred thousand times), pretended to perceive their distinct bulk,
figure, or motion; and the particles of water are also so perfectly loose
one from another, that the least force sensibly separates them. Nay, if
we consider their perpetual motion, we must allow them to have no cohesion
one with another; and yet let but a sharp cold come, and they unite, they
consolidate; these little atoms cohere, and are not, without great force,
separable. He that could find the bonds that tie these heaps of loose little
bodies together so firmly; he that could make known the cement that makes
them stick so fast one to another, would discover a great and yet unknown
secret: and yet when that was done, would he be far enough from making
the extension of body (which is the cohesion of its solid parts) intelligible,
till he could show wherein consisted the union, or consolidation of the
parts of those bonds, or of that cement, or of the least particle of matter
that exists. Whereby it appears that this primary and supposed obvious
quality of body will be found, when examined, to be as incomprehensible
as anything belonging to our minds, and a solid extended substance as hard
to be conceived as a thinking immaterial one, whatever difficulties some
would raise against it.
27. The supposed pressure brought to explain cohesion is unintelligible.
For, to extend our thoughts a little further, that pressure which is brought
to explain the cohesion of bodies is as unintelligible as the cohesion
itself. For if matter be considered, as no doubt it is, finite, let any
one send his contemplation to the extremities of the universe, and there
see what conceivable hoops, what bond he can imagine to hold this mass
of matter in so close a pressure together; from whence steel has its firmness,
and the parts of a diamond their hardness and indissolubility. If matter
be finite, it must have its extremes; and there must be something to hinder
it from scattering asunder. If, to avoid this difficulty, any one will
throw himself into the supposition and abyss of infinite matter, let him
consider what light he thereby brings to the cohesion of body, and whether
he be ever the nearer making it intelligible, by resolving it into a supposition
the most absurd and most incomprehensible of all other: so far is our extension
of body (which is nothing but the cohesion of solid parts) from being clearer,
or more distinct, when we would inquire into the nature, cause, or manner
of it, than the idea of thinking.
28. Communication of motion by impulse, or by thought, equally unintelligible.
Another idea we have of body is, the power of communication of motion by
impulse; and of our souls, the power of exciting motion by thought. These
ideas, the one of body, the other of our minds, every day's experience
clearly furnishes us with: but if here again we inquire how this is done,
we are equally in the dark. For, in the communication of motion by impulse,
wherein as much motion is lost to one body as is got to the other, which
is the ordinariest case, we can have no other conception, but of the passing
of motion out of one body into another; which, I think, is as obscure and
inconceivable as how our minds move or stop our bodies by thought, which
we every moment find they do. The increase of motion by impulse, which
is observed or believed sometimes to happen, is yet harder to be understood.
We have by daily experience clear evidence of motion produced both by impulse
and by thought; but the manner how, hardly comes within our comprehension:
we are equally at a loss in both. So that, however we consider motion,
and its communication, either from body or spirit, the idea which belongs
to spirit is at least as clear as that which belongs to body. And if we
consider the active power of moving, or, as I may call it, motivity, it
is much clearer in spirit than body; since two bodies, placed by one another
at rest, will never afford us the idea of a power in the one to move the
other, but by a borrowed motion: whereas the mind every day affords us
ideas of an active power of moving of bodies; and therefore it is worth
our consideration, whether active power be not the proper attribute of
spirits, and passive power of matter. Hence may be conjectured that created
spirits are not totally separate from matter, because they are both active
and passive. Pure spirit, viz. God, is only active; pure matter is only
passive; those beings that are both active and passive, we may judge to
partake of both. But be that as it will, I think, we have as many and as
clear ideas belonging to spirit as we have belonging to body, the substance
of each being equally unknown to us; and the idea of thinking in spirit,
as clear as of extension in body; and the communication of motion by thought,
which we attribute to spirit, is as evident as that by impulse, which we
ascribe to body. Constant experience makes us sensible of both these, though
our narrow understandings can comprehend neither. For, when the mind would
look beyond those original ideas we have from sensation or reflection,
and penetrate into their causes, and manner of production, we find still
it discovers nothing but its own short-sightedness.
29. Summary. To conclude. Sensation convinces us that there are solid
extended substances; and reflection, that there are thinking ones: experience
assures us of the existence of such beings, and that the one hath a power
to move body by impulse, the other by thought; this we cannot doubt of.
Experience, I say, every moment furnishes us with the clear ideas both
of the one and the other. But beyond these ideas, as received from their
proper sources, our faculties will not reach. If we would inquire further
into their nature, causes, and manner, we perceive not the nature of extension
clearer than we do of thinking. If we would explain them any further, one
is as easy as the other; and there is no more difficulty to conceive how
a substance we know not should, by thought, set body into motion, than
how a substance we know not should, by impulse, set body into motion. So
that we are no more able to discover wherein the ideas belonging to body
consist, than those belonging to spirit. From whence it seems probable
to me, that the simple ideas we receive from sensation and reflection are
the boundaries of our thoughts; beyond which the mind, whatever efforts
it would make, is not able to advance one jot; nor can it make any discoveries,
when it would pry into the nature and hidden causes of those ideas.
30. Our idea of spirit and our idea of body compared. So that, in short,
the idea we have of spirit, compared with the idea we have of body, stands
thus: the substance of spirits is unknown to us; and so is the substance
of body equally unknown to us. Two primary qualities or properties of body,
viz. solid coherent parts and impulse, we have distinct clear ideas of:
so likewise we know, and have distinct clear ideas, of two primary qualities
or properties of spirit, viz. thinking, and a power of action; i.e. a power
of beginning or stopping several thoughts or motions. We have also the
ideas of several qualities inherent in bodies, and have the clear distinct
ideas of them; which qualities are but the various modifications of the
extension of cohering solid parts, and their motion. We have likewise the
ideas of the several modes of thinking viz. believing, doubting, intending,
fearing, hoping; all which are but the several modes of thinking. We have
also the ideas of willing, and moving the body consequent to it, and with
the body itself too; for, as has been shown, spirit is capable of motion.
31. The notion of spirit involves no more difficulty in it than that
of body. Lastly, if this notion of immaterial spirit may have, perhaps,
some difficulties in it not easily to be explained, we have therefore no
more reason to deny or doubt the existence of such spirits, than we have
to deny or doubt the existence of body; because the notion of body is cumbered
with some difficulties very hard, and perhaps impossible to be explained
or understood by us. For I would fain have instanced anything in our notion
of spirit more perplexed, or nearer a contradiction, than the very notion
of body includes in it; the divisibility in infinitum of any finite extension
involving us, whether we grant or deny it, in consequences impossible to
be explicated or made in our apprehensions consistent; consequences that
carry greater difficulty, and more apparent absurdity, than anything can
follow from the notion of an immaterial knowing substance.
32. We know nothing of things beyond our simple ideas of them. Which
we are not at all to wonder at, since we having but some few superficial
ideas of things, discovered to us only by the senses from without, or by
the mind, reflecting on what it experiments in itself within, have no knowledge
beyond that, much less of the internal constitution, and true nature of
things, being destitute of faculties to attain it. And therefore experimenting
and discovering in ourselves knowledge, and the power of voluntary motion,
as certainly as we experiment, or discover in things without us, the cohesion
and separation of solid parts, which is the extension and motion of bodies;
we have as much reason to be satisfied with our notion of immaterial spirit,
as with our notion of body, and the existence of the one as well as the
other. For it being no more a contradiction that thinking should exist
separate and independent from solidity, than it is a contradiction that
solidity should exist separate and independent from thinking, they being
both but simple ideas, independent one from another: and having as clear
and distinct ideas in us of thinking, as of solidity, I know not why we
may not as well allow a thinking thing without solidity, i.e. immaterial,
to exist, as a solid thing without thinking, i.e. matter, to exist; especially
since it is not harder to conceive how thinking should exist without matter,
than how matter should think. For whensoever we would proceed beyond these
simple ideas we have from sensation and reflection, and dive further into
the nature of things, we fall presently into darkness and obscurity, perplexedness
and difficulties, and can discover nothing further but our own blindness
and ignorance. But whichever of these complex ideas be clearest, that of
body, or immaterial spirit, this is evident, that the simple ideas that
make them up are no other than what we have received from sensation or
reflection: and so is it of all our other ideas of substances, even of
God himself.
33. Our complex idea of God. For if we examine the idea we have of the
incomprehensible Supreme Being, we shall find that we come by it the same
way; and that the complex ideas we have both of God, and separate spirits,
are made of the simple ideas we receive from reflection: v.g. having, from
what we experiment in ourselves, got the ideas of existence and duration;
of knowledge and power; of pleasure and happiness; and of several other
qualities and powers, which it is better to have than to be without; when
we would frame an idea the most suitable we can to the Supreme Being, we
enlarge every one of these with our idea of infinity; and so putting them
together, make our complex idea of God. For that the mind has such a power
of enlarging some of its ideas, received from sensation and reflection,
has been already shown.
34. Our complex idea of God as infinite. If I find that I know some
few things, and some of them, or all, perhaps imperfectly, I can frame
an idea of knowing twice as many; which I can double again, as often as
I can add to number; and thus enlarge my idea of knowledge, by extending
its comprehension to all things existing, or possible. The same also I
can do of knowing them more perfectly; i.e. all their qualities, powers,
causes, consequences, and relations, &c., till all be perfectly known
that is in them, or can any way relate to them: and thus frame the idea
of infinite or boundless knowledge. The same may also be done of power,
till we come to that we call infinite; and also of the duration of existence,
without beginning or end, and so frame the idea of an eternal being. The
degrees or extent wherein we ascribe existence, power, wisdom, and all
other perfections (which we can have any ideas of) to that sovereign Being,
which we call God, being all boundless and infinite, we frame the best
idea of him our minds are capable of: all which is done, I say, by enlarging
those simple ideas we have taken from the operations of our own minds,
by reflection; or by our senses, from exterior things, to that vastness
to which infinity can extend them.
35. God in his own essence incognisable. For it is infinity, which,
joined to our ideas of existence, power, knowledge, &c., makes that
complex idea, whereby we represent to ourselves, the best we can, the Supreme
Being. For, though in his own essence (which certainly we do not know,
not knowing the real essence of a pebble, or a fly, or of our own selves)
God be simple and uncompounded; yet I think I may say we have no other
idea of him, but a complex one of existence, knowledge, power, happiness,
&c., infinite and eternal: which are all distinct ideas, and some of
them, being relative, are again compounded of others: all which being,
as has been shown, originally got from sensation and reflection, go to
make up the idea or notion we have of God.
36. No ideas in our complex ideas of spirits, but those got from sensation
or reflection. This further is to be observed, that there is no idea we
attribute to God, bating infinity, which is not also a part of our complex
idea of other spirits. Because, being capable of no other simple ideas,
belonging to anything but body, but those which by reflection we receive
from the operation of our own minds, we can attribute to spirits no other
but what we receive from thence: and all the difference we can put between
them, in our contemplation of spirits, is only in the several extents and
degrees of their knowledge, power, duration, happiness, &c. For that
in our ideas, as well of spirits as of other things, we are restrained
to those we receive from sensation and reflection, is evident from hence,-
That, in our ideas of spirits, how much soever advanced in perfection beyond
those of bodies, even to that of infinite, we cannot yet have any idea
of the manner wherein they discover their thoughts one to another: though
we must necessarily conclude that separate spirits, which are beings that
have perfecter knowledge and greater happiness than we, must needs have
also a perfecter way of communicating their thoughts than we have, who
are fain to make use of corporeal signs, and particular sounds; which are
therefore of most general use, as being the best and quickest we are capable
of. But of immediate communication having no experiment in ourselves, and
consequently no notion of it at all, we have no idea how spirits, which
use not words, can with quickness, or much less how spirits that have no
bodies can be masters of their own thoughts, and communicate or conceal
them at pleasure, though we cannot but necessarily suppose they have such
a power.
37. Recapitulation. And thus we have seen what kind of ideas we have
of substances of all kinds, wherein they consist, and how we came by them.
From whence, I think, it is very evident,
First, That all our ideas of the several sorts of substances are nothing
but collections of simple ideas: with a supposition of something to which
they belong, and in which they subsist: though of this supposed something
we have no clear distinct idea at all.
Secondly, That all the simple ideas, that thus united in one common
substratum, make up our complex ideas of several sorts of substances, are
no other but such as we have received from sensation or reflection. So
that even in those which we think we are most intimately acquainted with,
and that come nearest the comprehension of our most enlarged conceptions,
we cannot go beyond those simple ideas. And even in those which seem most
remote from all we have to do with, and do infinitely surpass anything
we can perceive in ourselves by reflection; or discover by sensation in
other things, we can attain to nothing but those simple ideas, which we
originally received from sensation or reflection; as is evident in the
complex ideas we have of angels, and particularly of God himself.
Thirdly, That most of the simple ideas that make up our complex ideas
of substances, when truly considered, are only powers, however we are apt
to take them for positive qualities; v.g. the greatest part of the ideas
that make our complex idea of gold are yellowness, great weight, ductility,
fusibility, and solubility in aqua regia, &c., all united together
in an unknown substratum: all which ideas are nothing else but so many
relations to other substances; and are not really in the gold, considered
barely in itself, though they depend on those real and primary qualities
of its internal constitution, whereby it has a fitness differently to operate,
and be operated on by several other substances.
Chapter XXIV: Of Collective Ideas of Substances
1. A collective idea is one idea. Besides these complex ideas of several
single substances, as of man, horse, gold, violet, apple, &c., the
mind hath also complex collective ideas of substances; which I so call,
because such ideas are made up of many particular substances considered
together, as united into one idea, and which so joined are looked on as
one; v.g. the idea of such a collection of men as make an army, though
consisting of a great number of distinct substances, is as much one idea
as the idea of a man: and the great collective idea of all bodies whatsoever,
signified by the name world, is as much one idea as the idea of any the
least particle of matter in it; it sufficing to the unity of any idea,
that it be considered as one representation or picture, though made up
of ever so many particulars.
2. Made by the power of composing in the mind. These collective ideas
of substances the mind makes, by its power of composition, and uniting
severally either simple or complex ideas into one, as it does, by the same
faculty, make the complex ideas of particular substances, consisting of
an aggregate of divers simple ideas, united in one substance. And as the
mind, by putting together the repeated ideas of unity, makes the collective
mode, or complex idea, of any number, as a score, or a gross, &c.,-
so, by putting together several particular substances, it makes collective
ideas of substances, as a troop, an army, a swarm, a city, a fleet; each
of which every one finds that he represents to his own mind by one idea,
in one view; and so under that notion considers those several things as
perfectly one, as one ship, or one atom. Nor is it harder to conceive how
an army of ten thousand men should make one idea, than how a man should
make one idea; it being as easy to the mind to unite into one the idea
of a great number of men, and consider it as one, as it is to unite into
one particular all the distinct ideas that make up the composition of a
man, and consider them all together as one.
3. Artificial things that are made up of distinct substances are our
collective ideas. Amongst such kind of collective ideas are to be counted
most part of artificial things, at least such of them as are made up of
distinct substances: and, in truth, if we consider all these collective
ideas aright, as army, constellation, universe, as they are united into
so many single ideas, they are but the artificial draughts of the mind;
bringing things very remote, and independent on one another, into one view,
the better to contemplate and discourse of them, united into one conception,
and signified by one name. For there are no things so remote, nor so contrary,
which the mind cannot, by this art of composition, bring into one idea;
as is visible in that signified by the name universe.
Chapter XXV: Of Relation
1. Relation, what. Besides the ideas, whether simple or complex, that the
mind has of things as they are in themselves, there are others it gets
from their comparison one with another. The understanding, in the consideration
of anything, is not confined to that precise object: it can carry an idea
as it were beyond itself, or at least look beyond it, to see how it stands
in conformity to any other. When the mind so considers one thing, that
it does as it were bring it to, and set it by another, and carries its
view from one to the other- this is, as the words import, relation and
respect; and the denominations given to positive things, intimating that
respect, and serving as marks to lead the thoughts beyond the subject itself
denominated to something distinct from it, are what we call relatives;
and the things so brought together, related. Thus, when the mind considers
Caius as such a positive being, it takes nothing into that idea but what
really exists in Caius; v.g. when I consider him as a man, I have nothing
in my mind but the complex idea of the species, man. So likewise, when
I say Caius is a white man, I have nothing but the bare consideration of
a man who hath that white colour. But when I give Caius the name husband,
I intimate some other person; and when I give him the name whiter, I intimate
some other thing: in both cases my thought is led to something beyond Caius,
and there are two things brought into consideration. And since any idea,
whether simple or complex, may be the occasion why the mind thus brings
two things together, and as it were takes a view of them at once, though
still considered as distinct: therefore any of our ideas may be the foundation
of relation. As in the above-mentioned instance, the contract and ceremony
of marriage with Sempronia is the occasion of the denomination and relation
of husband; and the colour white the occasion why he is said to be whiter
than free-stone.
2. Ideas of relations without correlative terms, not easily apprehended.
These and the like relations, expressed by relative terms that have others
answering them, with a reciprocal intimation, as father and son, bigger
and less, cause and effect, are very obvious to every one, and everybody
at first sight perceives the relation. For father and son, husband and
wife, and such other correlative terms, seem so nearly to belong one to
another, and, through custom, do so readily chime and answer one another
in people's memories, that, upon the naming of either of them, the thoughts
are presently carried beyond the thing so named; and nobody overlooks or
doubts of a relation, where it is so plainly intimated. But where languages
have failed to give correlative names, there the relation is not always
so easily taken notice of. Concubine is, no doubt, a relative name, as
well as a wife: but in languages where this and the like words have not
a correlative term, there people are not so apt to take them to be so,
as wanting that evident mark of relation which is between correlatives,
which seem to explain one another, and not to be able to exist, but together.
Hence it is, that many of those names, which, duly considered, do include
evident relations, have been called external denominations. But all names
that are more than empty sounds must signify some idea, which is either
in the thing to which the name is applied, and then it is positive, and
is looked on as united to and existing in the thing to which the denomination
is given; or else it arises from the respect the mind finds in it to something
distinct from it, with which it considers it, and then it includes a relation.
3. Some seemingly absolute terms contain relations. Another sort of
relative terms there is, which are not looked on to be either relative,
or so much as external denominations: which yet, under the form and appearance
of signifying something absolute in the subject, do conceal a tacit, though
less observable, relation. Such are the seemingly positive terms of old,
great, imperfect, &c., whereof I shall have occasion to speak more
at large in the following chapters.
4. Relation different from the things related. This further may be observed,
That the ideas of relation may be the same in men who have far different
ideas of the things that are related, or that are thus compared: v.g. those
who have far different ideas of a man, may yet agree in the notion of a
father; which is a notion superinduced to the substance, or man, and refers
only to an act of that thing called man whereby he contributed to the generation
of one of his own kind, let man be what it will.
5. Change of relation may be without any change in the things related.
The nature therefore of relation consists in the referring or comparing
two things one to another; from which comparison one or both comes to be
denominated. And if either of those things be removed, or cease to be,
the relation ceases, and the denomination consequent to it, though the
other receive in itself no alteration at all: v.g. Caius, whom I consider
to-day as a father, ceases to be so to-morrow, only by the death of his
son, without any alteration made in himself. Nay, barely by the mind's
changing the object to which it compares anything, the same thing is capable
of having contrary denominations at the same time: v.g. Caius, compared
to several persons, may be truly be said to be older and younger, stronger
and weaker, &c.
6. Relation only betwixt two things. Whatsoever doth or can exist, or
be considered as one thing is positive: and so not only simple ideas and
substances, but modes also, are positive beings: though the parts of which
they consist are very often relative one to another: but the whole together
considered as one thing, and producing in us the complex idea of one thing,
which idea is in our minds, as one picture, though an aggregate of divers
parts, and under one name, it is a positive or absolute thing, or idea.
Thus a triangle, though the parts thereof compared one to another be relative,
yet the idea of the whole is a positive absolute idea. The same may be
said of a family, a tune, &c.; for there can be no relation but betwixt
two things considered as two things. There must always be in relation two
ideas or things, either in themselves really separate, or considered as
distinct, and then a ground or occasion for their comparison.
7. All things capable of relation. Concerning relation in general, these
things may be considered:
First, That there is no one thing, whether simple idea, substance, mode,
or relation, or name of either of them, which is not capable of almost
an infinite number of considerations in reference to other things: and
therefore this makes no small part of men's thoughts and words: v.g. one
single man may at once be concerned in, and sustain all these following
relations, and many more, viz. father, brother, son, grandfather, grandson,
father-in-law, son-in-law, husband, friend, enemy, subject, general, judge,
patron, client, professor, European, Englishman, islander, servant, master,
possessor, captain, superior, inferior, bigger, less, older, younger, contemporary,
like, unlike, &c., to an almost infinite number: he being capable of
as many relations as there can be occasions of comparing him to other things,
in any manner of agreement, disagreement, or respect whatsoever. For, as
I said, relation is a way of comparing or considering two things together,
and giving one or both of them some appellation from that comparison; and
sometimes giving even the relation itself a name.
8. Our ideas of relations often clearer than of the subjects related.
Secondly, This further may be considered concerning relation, that though
it be not contained in the real existence of things, but something extraneous
and superinduced, yet the ideas which relative words stand for are often
clearer and more distinct than of those substances to which they do belong.
The notion we have of a father or brother is a great deal clearer and more
distinct than that we have of a man; or, if you will, paternity is a thing
whereof it is easier to have a clear idea, than of humanity; and I can
much easier conceive what a friend is, than what God; because the knowledge
of one action, or one simple idea, is oftentimes sufficient to give me
the notion of a relation; but to the knowing of any substantial being,
an accurate collection of sundry ideas is necessary. A man, if he compares
two things together, can hardly be supposed not to know what it is wherein
he compares them: so that when he compares any things together, he cannot
but have a very clear idea of that relation. The ideas, then, of relations,
are capable at least of being more perfect and distinct in our minds than
those of substances. Because it is commonly hard to know all the simple
ideas which are really in any substance, but for the most part easy enough
to know the simple ideas that make up any relation I think on, or have
a name for: v.g. comparing two men in reference to one common parent, it
is very easy to frame the ideas of brothers, without having yet the perfect
idea of a man. For significant relative words, as well as others, standing
only for ideas; and those being all either simple, or made up of simple
ones, it suffices for the knowing the precise idea the relative term stands
for, to have a clear conception of that which is the foundation of the
relation; which may be done without having a perfect and clear idea of
the thing it is attributed to. Thus, having the notion that one laid the
egg out of which the other was hatched, I have a clear idea of the relation
of dam and chick between the two cassiowaries in St. James's Park; though
perhaps I have but a very obscure and imperfect idea of those birds themselves.
9. Relations all terminate in simple ideas. Thirdly, Though there be
a great number of considerations wherein things may be compared one with
another, and so a multitude of relations, yet they all terminate in, and
are concerned about those simple ideas, either of sensation or reflection,
which I think to be the whole materials of all our knowledge. To clear
this, I shall show it in the most considerable relations that we have any
notion of; and in some that seem to be the most remote from sense or reflection:
which yet will appear to have their ideas from thence, and leave it past
doubt that the notions we have of them are but certain simple ideas, and
so originally derived from sense or reflection.
10. Terms leading the mind beyond the subject denominated, are relative.
Fourthly, That relation being the considering of one thing with another
which is extrinsical to it, it is evident that all words that necessarily
lead the mind to any other ideas than are supposed really to exist in that
thing to which the words are applied are relative words: v.g. a man, black,
merry, thoughtful, thirsty, angry, extended; these and the like are all
absolute, because they neither signify nor intimate anything but what does
or is supposed really to exist in the man thus denominated; but father,
brother, king, husband, blacker, merrier, &c., are words which, together
with the thing they denominate, imply also something else separate and
exterior to the existence of that thing.
11. All relatives made up of simple ideas. Having laid down these premises
concerning relation in general, I shall now proceed to show, in some instances,
how all the ideas we have of relation are made up, as the others are, only
of simple ideas; and that they all, how refined or remote from sense soever
they seem, terminate at last in simple ideas. I shall begin with the most
comprehensive relation, wherein all things that do, or can exist, are concerned,
and that is the relation of cause and effect: the idea whereof, how derived
from the two fountains of all our knowledge, sensation and reflection,
I shall in the next place consider.
Chapter XXVI: Of Cause and Effect, and other Relations
1. Whence the ideas of cause and effect got. In the notice that our senses
take of the constant vicissitude of things, we cannot but observe that
several particular, both qualities and substances, begin to exist; and
that they receive this their existence from the due application and operation
of some other being. From this observation we get our ideas of cause and
effect. That which produces any simple or complex idea we denote by the
general name, cause, and that which is produced, effect. Thus, finding
that in that substance which we call wax, fluidity, which is a simple idea
that was not in it before, is constantly produced by the application of
a certain degree of heat we call the simple idea of heat, in relation to
fluidity in wax, the cause of it, and fluidity the effect. So also, finding
that the substance, wood, which is a certain collection of simple ideas
so called, by the application of fire, is turned into another substance,
called ashes; i.e., another complex idea, consisting of a collection of
simple ideas, quite different from that complex idea which we call wood;
we consider fire, in relation to ashes, as cause, and the ashes, as effect.
So that whatever is considered by us to conduce or operate to the producing
any particular simple idea, or collection of simple ideas, whether substance
or mode, which did not before exist, hath thereby in our minds the relation
of a cause, and so is denominated by us.
2. Creation, generation, making, alteration. Having thus, from what
our senses are able to discover in the operations of bodies on one another,
got the notion of cause and effect, viz. that a cause is that which makes
any other thing, either simple idea, substance, or mode, begin to be; and
an effect is that which had its beginning from some other thing; the mind
finds no great difficulty to distinguish the several originals of things
into two sorts:-
First, When the thing is wholly made new, so that no part thereof did
ever exist before; as when a new particle of matter doth begin to exist,
in rerum natura, which had before no being, and this we call creation.
Secondly, When a thing is made up of particles, which did all of them
before exist; but that very thing, so constituted of pre-existing particles,
which, considered all together, make up such a collection of simple ideas,
had not any existence before, as this man, this egg, rose, or cherry, &c.
And this, when referred to a substance, produced in the ordinary course
of nature by internal principle, but set on work by, and received from,
some external agent, or cause, and working by insensible ways which we
perceive not, we call generation. When the cause is extrinsical, and the
effect produced by a sensible separation, or juxta-position of discernible
parts, we call it making; and such are all artificial things. When any
simple idea is produced, which was not in that subject before, we call
it alteration. Thus a man is generated, a picture made; and either of them
altered, when any new sensible quality or simple idea is produced in either
of them, which was not there before: and the things thus made to exist,
which were not there before, are effects; and those things which operated
to the existence, causes. In which, and all other cases, we may observe,
that the notion of cause and effect has its rise from ideas received by
sensation or reflection; and that this relation, how comprehensive soever,
terminates at last in them. For to have the idea of cause and effect, it
suffices to consider any simple idea or substance, as beginning to exist,
by the operation of some other, without knowing the manner of that operation.
3. Relations of time. Time and place are also the foundations of very
large relations; and all finite beings at least are concerned in them.
But having already shown in another place how we get those ideas, it may
suffice here to intimate, that most of the denominations of things received
from time are only relations. Thus, when any one says that Queen Elizabeth
lived sixty-nine, and reigned forty-five years, these words import only
the relation of that duration to some other, and mean no more but this,
That the duration of her existence was equal to sixty-nine, and the duration
of her government to forty-five annual revolutions of the sun; and so are
all words, answering, How Long? Again, William the Conqueror invaded England
about the year 1066; which means this, That, taking the duration from our
Saviour's time till now for one entire great length of time, it shows at
what distance this invasion was from the two extremes; and so do all words
of time answering to the question, When, which show only the distance of
any point of time from the period of a longer duration, from which we measure,
and to which we thereby consider it as related.
4. Some ideas of time supposed positive and found to be relative. There
are yet, besides those, other words of time, that ordinarily are thought
to stand for positive ideas, which yet will, when considered, be found
to be relative; such as are, young, old, &c., which include and intimate
the relation anything has to a certain length of duration, whereof we have
the idea in our minds. Thus, having settled in our thoughts the idea of
the ordinary duration of a man to be seventy years, when we say a man is
young, we mean that his age is yet but a small part of that which usually
men attain to; and when we denominate him old, we mean that his duration
is run out almost to the end of that which men do not usually exceed. And
so it is but comparing the particular age or duration of this or that man,
to the idea of that duration which we have in our minds, as ordinarily
belonging to that sort of animals: which is plain in the application of
these names to other things; for a man is called young at twenty years,
and very young at seven years old: but yet a horse we call old at twenty,
and a dog at seven years, because in each of these we compare their age
to different ideas of duration, which are settled in our minds as belonging
to these several sorts of animals, in the ordinary course of nature. But
the sun and stars, though they have outlasted several generations of men,
we call not old, because we do not know what period God hath set to that
sort of beings. This term belonging properly to those things which we can
observe in the ordinary course of things, by a natural decay, to come to
an end in a certain period of time; and so have in our minds, as it were,
a standard to which we can compare the several parts of their duration;
and, by the relation they bear thereunto, call them young or old; which
we cannot, therefore, do to a ruby or a diamond, things whose usual periods
we know not.
5. Relations of place and extension. The relation also that things have
to one another in their places and distances is very obvious to observe;
as above, below, a mile distant from Charing-cross, in England, and in
London. But as in duration, so in extension and bulk, there are some ideas
that are relative which we signify by names that are thought positive;
as great and little are truly relations. For here also, having, by observation,
settled in our minds the ideas of the bigness of several species of things
from those we have been most accustomed to, we make them as it were the
standards, whereby to denominate the bulk of others. Thus we call a great
apple, such a one as is bigger than the ordinary sort of those we have
been used to; and a little horse, such a one as comes not up to the size
of that idea which we have in our minds to belong ordinarily to horses;
and that will be a great horse to a Welchman, which is but a little one
to a Fleming; they two having, from the different breed of their countries,
taken several-sized ideas to which they compare, and in relation to which
they denominate their great and their little.
6. Absolute terms often stand for relations. So likewise weak and strong
are but relative denominations of power, compared to some ideas we have
at that time of greater or less power. Thus, when we say a weak man, we
mean one that has not so much strength or power to move as usually men
have, or usually those of his size have; which is a comparing his strength
to the idea we have of the usual strength of men, or men of such a size.
The like when we say the creatures are all weak things; weak there is but
a relative term, signifying the disproportion there is in the power of
God and the creatures. And so abundance of words, in ordinary speech, stand
only for relations (and perhaps the greatest part) which at first sight
seem to have no such signification: v.g. the ship has necessary stores.
Necessary and stores are both relative words; one having a relation to
the accomplishing the voyage intended, and the other to future use. All
which relations, how they are confined to, and terminate in ideas derived
from sensation or reflection, is too obvious to need any explication.
Chapter XXVII: Of Identity and Diversity
1. Wherein identity consists. Another occasion the mind often takes of
comparing, is the very being of things, when, considering anything as existing
at any determined time and place, we compare it with itself existing at
another time, and thereon form the ideas of identity and diversity. When
we see anything to be in any place in any instant of time, we are sure
(be it what it will) that it is that very thing, and not another which
at that same time exists in another place, how like and undistinguishable
soever it may be in all other respects: and in this consists identity,
when the ideas it is attributed to vary not at all from what they were
that moment wherein we consider their former existence, and to which we
compare the present. For we never finding, nor conceiving it possible,
that two things of the same kind should exist in the same place at the
same time, we rightly conclude, that, whatever exists anywhere at any time,
excludes all of the same kind, and is there itself alone. When therefore
we demand whether anything be the same or no, it refers always to something
that existed such a time in such a place, which it was certain, at that
instant, was the same with itself, and no other. From whence it follows,
that one thing cannot have two beginnings of existence, nor two things
one beginning; it being impossible for two things of the same kind to be
or exist in the same instant, in the very same place; or one and the same
thing in different places. That, therefore, that had one beginning, is
the same thing; and that which had a different beginning in time and place
from that, is not the same, but diverse. That which has made the difficulty
about this relation has been the little care and attention used in having
precise notions of the things to which it is attributed.
2. Identity of substances. We have the ideas but of three sorts of substances:
1. God. 2. Finite intelligences. 3. Bodies.
First, God is without beginning, eternal, unalterable, and everywhere,
and therefore concerning his identity there can be no doubt.
Secondly, Finite spirits having had each its determinate time and place
of beginning to exist, the relation to that time and place will always
determine to each of them its identity, as long as it exists.
Thirdly, The same will hold of every particle of matter, to which no
addition or subtraction of matter being made, it is the same. For, though
these three sorts of substances, as we term them, do not exclude one another
out of the same place, yet we cannot conceive but that they must necessarily
each of them exclude any of the same kind out of the same place: or else
the notions and names of identity and diversity would be in vain, and there
could be no such distinctions of substances, or anything else one from
another. For example: could two bodies be in the same place at the same
time; then those two parcels of matter must be one and the same, take them
great or little; nay, all bodies must be one and the same. For, by the
same reason that two particles of matter may be in one place, all bodies
may be in one place: which, when it can be supposed, takes away the distinction
of identity and diversity of one and more, and renders it ridiculous. But
it being a contradiction that two or more should be one, identity and diversity
are relations and ways of comparing well founded, and of use to the understanding.
Identity of modes and relations. All other things being but modes or
relations ultimately terminated in substances, the identity and diversity
of each particular existence of them too will be by the same way determined:
only as to things whose existence is in succession, such as are the actions
of finite beings, v.g. motion and thought, both which consist in a continued
train of succession, concerning their diversity there can be no question:
because each perishing the moment it begins, they cannot exist in different
times, or in different places, as permanent beings can at different times
exist in distant places; and therefore no motion or thought, considered
as at different times, can be the same, each part thereof having a different
beginning of existence.
3. Principium Individuationis. From what has been said, it is easy to
discover what is so much inquired after, the principium individuationis;
and that, it is plain, is existence itself; which determines a being of
any sort to a particular time and place, incommunicable to two beings of
the same kind. This, though it seems easier to conceive in simple substances
or modes; yet, when reflected on, is not more difficult in compound ones,
if care be taken to what it is applied: v.g. let us suppose an atom, i.e.
a continued body under one immutable superficies, existing in a determined
time and place; it is evident, that, considered in any instant of its existence,
it is in that instant the same with itself. For, being at that instant
what it is, and nothing else, it is the same, and so must continue as long
as its existence is continued; for so long it will be the same, and no
other. In like manner, if two or more atoms be joined together into the
same mass, every one of those atoms will be the same, by the foregoing
rule: and whilst they exist united together, the mass, consisting of the
same atoms, must be the same mass, or the same body, let the parts be ever
so differently jumbled. But if one of these atoms be taken away, or one
new one added, it is no longer the same mass or the same body. In the state
of living creatures, their identity depends not on a mass of the same particles,
but on something else. For in them the variation of great parcels of matter
alters not the identity: an oak growing from a plant to a great tree, and
then lopped, is still the same oak; and a colt grown up to a horse, sometimes
fat, sometimes lean, is all the while the same horse: though, in both these
cases, there may be a manifest change of the parts; so that truly they
are not either of them the same masses of matter, though they be truly
one of them the same oak, and the other the same horse. The reason whereof
is, that, in these two cases- a mass of matter and a living body- identity
is not applied to the same thing.
4. Identity of vegetables. We must therefore consider wherein an oak
differs from a mass of matter, and that seems to me to be in this, that
the one is only the cohesion of particles of matter any how united, the
other such a disposition of them as constitutes the parts of an oak; and
such an organization of those parts as is fit to receive and distribute
nourishment, so as to continue and frame the wood, bark, and leaves, &c.,
of an oak, in which consists the vegetable life. That being then one plant
which has such an organization of parts in one coherent body, partaking
of one common life, it continues to be the same plant as long as it partakes
of the same life, though that life be communicated to new particles of
matter vitally united to the living plant, in a like continued organization
conformable to that sort of plants. For this organization, being at any
one instant in any one collection of matter, is in that particular concrete
distinguished from all other, and is that individual life, which existing
constantly from that moment both forwards and backwards, in the same continuity
of insensibly succeeding parts united to the living body of the plant,
it has that identity which makes the same plant, and all the parts of it,
parts of the same plant, during all the time that they exist united in
that continued organization, which is fit to convey that common life to
all the parts so united.
5. Identity of animals. The case is not so much different in brutes
but that any one may hence see what makes an animal and continues it the
same. Something we have like this in machines, and may serve to illustrate
it. For example, what is a watch? It is plain it is nothing but a fit organization
or construction of parts to a certain end, which, when a sufficient force
is added to it, it is capable to attain. If we would suppose this machine
one continued body, all whose organized parts were repaired, increased,
or diminished by a constant addition or separation of insensible parts,
with one common life, we should have something very much like the body
of an animal; with this difference, That, in an animal the fitness of the
organization, and the motion wherein life consists, begin together, the
motion coming from within; but in machines the force coming sensibly from
without, is often away when the organ is in order, and well fitted to receive
it.
6. The identity of man. This also shows wherein the identity of the
same man consists; viz. in nothing but a participation of the same continued
life, by constantly fleeting particles of matter, in succession vitally
united to the same organized body. He that shall place the identity of
man in anything else, but, like that of other animals, in one fitly organized
body, taken in any one instant, and from thence continued, under one organization
of life, in several successively fleeting particles of matter united to
it, will find it hard to make an embryo, one of years, mad and sober, the
same man, by any supposition, that will not make it possible for Seth,
Ismael, Socrates, Pilate, St. Austin, and Caesar Borgia, to be the same
man. For if the identity of soul alone makes the same man; and there be
nothing in the nature of matter why the same individual spirit may not
be united to different bodies, it will be possible that those men, living
in distant ages, and of different tempers, may have been the same man:
which way of speaking must be from a very strange use of the word man,
applied to an idea out of which body and shape are excluded. And that way
of speaking would agree yet worse with the notions of those philosophers
who allow of transmigration, and are of opinion that the souls of men may,
for their miscarriages, be detruded into the bodies of beasts, as fit habitations,
with organs suited to the satisfaction of their brutal inclinations. But
yet I think nobody, could he be sure that the soul of Heliogabalus were
in one of his hogs, would yet say that hog were a man or Heliogabalus.
7. Idea of identity suited to the idea it is applied to. It is not therefore
unity of substance that comprehends all sorts of identity, or will determine
it in every case; but to conceive and judge of it aright, we must consider
what idea the word it is applied to stands for: it being one thing to be
the same substance, another the same man, and a third the same person,
if person, man, and substance, are three names standing for three different
ideas;- for such as is the idea belonging to that name, such must be the
identity; which, if it had been a little more carefully attended to, would
possibly have prevented a great deal of that confusion which often occurs
about this matter, with no small seeming difficulties, especially concerning
personal identity, which therefore we shall in the next place a little
consider.
8. Same man. An animal is a living organized body; and consequently
the same animal, as we have observed, is the same continued life communicated
to different particles of matter, as they happen successively to be united
to that organized living body. And whatever is talked of other definitions,
ingenious observation puts it past doubt, that the idea in our minds, of
which the sound man in our mouths is the sign, is nothing else but of an
animal of such a certain form. Since I think I may be confident, that,
whoever should see a creature of his own shape or make, though it had no
more reason all its life than a cat or a parrot, would call him still a
man; or whoever should hear a cat or a parrot discourse, reason, and philosophize,
would call or think it nothing but a cat or a parrot; and say, the one
was a dull irrational man, and the other a very intelligent rational parrot.
A relation we have in an author of great note, is sufficient to countenance
the supposition of a rational parrot.
His words are: "I had a mind to know, from Prince Maurice's own mouth,
the account of a common, but much credited story, that I had heard so often
from many others, of an old parrot he had in Brazil, during his government
there, that spoke, and asked, and answered common questions, like a reasonable
creature: so that those of his train there generally concluded it to be
witchery or possession; and one of his chaplains, who lived long afterwards
in Holland, would never from that time endure a parrot, but said they all
had a devil in them. I had heard many particulars of this story, and as
severed by people hard to be discredited, which made me ask Prince Maurice
what there was of it. He said, with his usual plainness and dryness in
talk, there was something true, but a great deal false of what had been
reported. I desired to know of him what there was of the first. He told
me short and coldly, that he had heard of such an old parrot when he had
been at Brazil; and though he believed nothing of it, and it was a good
way off, yet he had so much curiosity as to send for it: that it was a
very great and a very old one; and when it came first into the room where
the prince was, with a great many Dutchmen about him, it said presently,
What a company of white men are here! They asked it, what it thought that
man was, pointing to the prince. It answered, Some General or other. When
they brought it close to him, he asked it, D'ou venez-vous? It answered,
De Marinnan. The Prince, A qui estes-vous? The Parrot, A un Portugais.
The Prince, Que fais-tu la? Parrot, Je garde les poulles. The Prince laughed,
and said, Vous gardez les poulles? The Parrot answered, Oui, moi; et je
scai bien faire; and made the chuck four or five times that people use
to make to chickens when they call them. I set down the words of this worthy
dialogue in French, just as Prince Maurice said them to me. I asked him
in what language the parrot spoke, and he said in Brazilian. I asked whether
he understood Brazilian; he said No, but he had taken care to have two
interpreters by him, the one a Dutchman that spoke Brazilian, and the other
a Brazilian that spoke Dutch; that he asked them separately and privately,
and both of them agreed in telling him just the same thing that the parrot
had said. I could not but tell this odd story, because it is so much out
of the way, and from the first hand, and what may pass for a good one;
for I dare say this Prince at least believed himself in all he told me,
having ever passed for a very honest and pious man: I leave it to naturalists
to reason, and to other men to believe, as they please upon it; however,
it is not, perhaps, amiss to relieve or enliven a busy scene sometimes
with such digressions, whether to the purpose or no."
I have taken care that the reader should have the story at large in
the author's own words, because he seems to me not to have thought it incredible;
for it cannot be imagined that so able a man as he, who had sufficiency
enough to warrant all the testimonies he gives of himself, should take
so much pains, in a place where it had nothing to do, to pin so close,
not only on a man whom he mentions as his friend, but on a Prince in whom
he acknowledges very great honesty and piety, a story which, if he himself
thought incredible, he could not but also think ridiculous. The Prince,
it is plain, who vouches this story, and our author, who relates it from
him, both of them call this talker a parrot: and I ask any one else who
thinks such a story fit to be told, whether, if this parrot, and all of
its kind, had always talked, as we have a prince's word for it this one
did,- whether, I say, they would not have passed for a race of rational
animals; but yet, whether, for all that, they would have been allowed to
be men, and not parrots? For I presume it is not the idea of a thinking
or rational being alone that makes the idea of a man in most people's sense:
but of a body, so and so shaped, joined to it: and if that be the idea
of a man, the same successive body not shifted all at once, must, as well
as the same immaterial spirit, go to the making of the same man.
9. Personal identity. This being premised, to find wherein personal
identity consists, we must consider what person stands for;- which, I think,
is a thinking intelligent being, that has reason and reflection, and can
consider itself as itself, the same thinking thing, in different times
and places; which it does only by that consciousness which is inseparable
from thinking, and, as it seems to me, essential to it: it being impossible
for any one to perceive without perceiving that he does perceive. When
we see, hear, smell, taste, feel, meditate, or will anything, we know that
we do so. Thus it is always as to our present sensations and perceptions:
and by this every one is to himself that which he calls self:- it not being
considered, in this case, whether the same self be continued in the same
or divers substances. For, since consciousness always accompanies thinking,
and it is that which makes every one to be what he calls self, and thereby
distinguishes himself from all other thinking things, in this alone consists
personal identity, i.e. the sameness of a rational being: and as far as
this consciousness can be extended backwards to any past action or thought,
so far reaches the identity of that person; it is the same self now it
was then; and it is by the same self with this present one that now reflects
on it, that that action was done.
10. Consciousness makes personal identity. But it is further inquired,
whether it be the same identical substance. This few would think they had
reason to doubt of, if these perceptions, with their consciousness, always
remained present in the mind, whereby the same thinking thing would be
always consciously present, and, as would be thought, evidently the same
to itself. But that which seems to make the difficulty is this, that this
consciousness being interrupted always by forgetfulness, there being no
moment of our lives wherein we have the whole train of all our past actions
before our eyes in one view, but even the best memories losing the sight
of one part whilst they are viewing another; and we sometimes, and that
the greatest part of our lives, not reflecting on our past selves, being
intent on our present thoughts, and in sound sleep having no thoughts at
all, or at least none with that consciousness which remarks our waking
thoughts,- I say, in all these cases, our consciousness being interrupted,
and we losing the sight of our past selves, doubts are raised whether we
are the same thinking thing, i.e. the same substance or no. Which, however
reasonable or unreasonable, concerns not personal identity at all. The
question being what makes the same person; and not whether it be the same
identical substance, which always thinks in the same person, which, in
this case, matters not at all: different substances, by the same consciousness
(where they do partake in it) being united into one person, as well as
different bodies by the same life are united into one animal, whose identity
is preserved in that change of substances by the unity of one continued
life. For, it being the same consciousness that makes a man be himself
to himself, personal identity depends on that only, whether it be annexed
solely to one individual substance, or can be continued in a succession
of several substances. For as far as any intelligent being can repeat the
idea of any past action with the same consciousness it had of it at first,
and with the same consciousness it has of any present action; so far it
is the same personal self For it is by the consciousness it has of its
present thoughts and actions, that it is self to itself now, and so will
be the same self, as far as the same consciousness can extend to actions
past or to come. and would be by distance of time, or change of substance,
no more two persons, than a man be two men by wearing other clothes to-day
than he did yesterday, with a long or a short sleep between: the same consciousness
uniting those distant actions into the same person, whatever substances
contributed to their production.
11. Personal identity in change of substance. That this is so, we have
some kind of evidence in our very bodies, all whose particles, whilst vitally
united to this same thinking conscious self, so that we feel when they
are touched, and are affected by, and conscious of good or harm that happens
to them, as a part of ourselves; i.e. of our thinking conscious self. Thus,
the limbs of his body are to every one a part of Himself; he sympathizes
and is concerned for them. Cut off a hand, and thereby separate it from
that consciousness he had of its heat, cold, and other affections, and
it is then no longer a part of that which is himself, any more than the
remotest part of matter. Thus, we see the substance whereof personal self
consisted at one time may be varied at another, without the change of personal
identity; there being no question about the same person, though the limbs
which but now were a part of it, be cut off.
12. Personality in change of substance. But the question is, Whether
if the same substance which thinks be changed, it can be the same person;
or, remaining the same, it can be different persons?
And to this I answer: First, This can be no question at all to those
who place thought in a purely material animal constitution, void of an
immaterial substance. For, whether their supposition be true or no, it
is plain they conceive personal identity preserved in something else than
identity of substance; as animal identity is preserved in identity of life,
and not of substance. And therefore those who place thinking in an immaterial
substance only, before they can come to deal with these men, must show
why personal identity cannot be preserved in the change of immaterial substances,
or variety of particular immaterial substances, as well as animal identity
is preserved in the change of material substances, or variety of particular
bodies: unless they will say, it is one immaterial spirit that makes the
same life in brutes, as it is one immaterial spirit that makes the same
person in men; which the Cartesians at least will not admit, for fear of
making brutes thinking things too.
13. Whether in change of thinking substances there can be one person.
But next, as to the first part of the question, Whether, if the same thinking
substance (supposing immaterial substances only to think) be changed, it
can be the same person? I answer, that cannot be resolved but by those
who know what kind of substances they are that do think; and whether the
consciousness of past actions can be transferred from one thinking substance
to another. I grant were the same consciousness the same individual action
it could not: but it being a present representation of a past action, why
it may not be possible, that that may be represented to the mind to have
been which really never was, will remain to be shown. And therefore how
far the consciousness of past actions is annexed to any individual agent,
so that another cannot possibly have it, will be hard for us to determine,
till we know what kind of action it is that cannot be done without a reflex
act of perception accompanying it, and how performed by thinking substances,
who cannot think without being conscious of it. But that which we call
the same consciousness, not being the same individual act, why one intellectual
substance may not have represented to it, as done by itself, what it never
did, and was perhaps done by some other agent- why, I say, such a representation
may not possibly be without reality of matter of fact, as well as several
representations in dreams are, which yet whilst dreaming we take for true-
will be difficult to conclude from the nature of things. And that it never
is so, will by us, till we have clearer views of the nature of thinking
substances, be best resolved into the goodness of God; who, as far as the
happiness or misery of any of his sensible creatures is concerned in it,
will not, by a fatal error of theirs, transfer from one to another that
consciousness which draws reward or punishment with it. How far this may
be an argument against those who would place thinking in a system of fleeting
animal spirits, I leave to be considered. But yet, to return to the question
before us, it must be allowed, that, if the same consciousness (which,
as has been shown, is quite a different thing from the same numerical figure
or motion in body) can be transferred from one thinking substance to another,
it will be possible that two thinking substances may make but one person.
For the same consciousness being preserved, whether in the same or different
substances, the personal identity is preserved.
14. Whether, the same immaterial substance remaining, there can be two
persons. As to the second part of the question, Whether the same immaterial
substance remaining, there may be two distinct persons; which question
seems to me to be built on this,- Whether the same immaterial being, being
conscious of the action of its past duration, may be wholly stripped of
all the consciousness of its past existence, and lose it beyond the power
of ever retrieving it again: and so as it were beginning a new account
from a new period, have a consciousness that cannot reach beyond this new
state. All those who hold pre-existence are evidently of this mind; since
they allow the soul to have no remaining consciousness of what it did in
that pre-existent state, either wholly separate from body, or informing
any other body; and if they should not, it is plain experience would be
against them. So that personal identity, reaching no further than consciousness
reaches, a pre-existent spirit not having continued so many ages in a state
of silence, must needs make different persons. Suppose a Christian Platonist
or a Pythagorean should, upon God's having ended all his works of creation
the seventh day, think his soul hath existed ever since; and should imagine
it has revolved in several human bodies; as I once met with one, who was
persuaded his had been the soul of Socrates (how reasonably I will not
dispute; this I know, that in the post he filled, which was no inconsiderable
one, he passed for a very rational man, and the press has shown that he
wanted not parts or learning;)- would any one say, that he, being not conscious
of any of Socrates's actions or thoughts, could be the same person with
Socrates? Let any one reflect upon himself, and conclude that he has in
himself an immaterial spirit, which is that which thinks in him, and, in
the constant change of his body keeps him the same: and is that which he
calls himself: let him also suppose it to be the same soul that was in
Nestor or Thersites, at the siege of Troy, (for souls being, as far as
we know anything of them, in their nature indifferent to any parcel of
matter, the supposition has no apparent absurdity in it), which it may
have been, as well as it is now the soul of any other man: but he now having
no consciousness of any of the actions either of Nestor or Thersites, does
or can he conceive himself the same person with either of them? Can he
be concerned in either of their actions? attribute them to himself, or
think them his own, more than the actions of any other men that ever existed?
So that this consciousness, not reaching to any of the actions of either
of those men, he is no more one self with either of them than if the soul
or immaterial spirit that now informs him had been created, and began to
exist, when it began to inform his present body; though it were never so
true, that the same spirit that informed Nestor's or Thersites' body were
numerically the same that now informs his. For this would no more make
him the same person with Nestor, than if some of the particles of matter
that were once a part of Nestor were now a part of this man; the same immaterial
substance, without the same consciousness, no more making the same person,
by being united to any body, than the same particle of matter, without
consciousness, united to any body, makes the same person. But let him once
find himself conscious of any of the actions of Nestor, he then finds himself
the same person with Nestor.
15. The body, as well as the soul, goes to the making of a man. And
thus may we be able, without any difficulty, to conceive the same person
at the resurrection, though in a body not exactly in make or parts the
same which he had here,- the same consciousness going along with the soul
that inhabits it. But yet the soul alone, in the change of bodies, would
scarce to any one but to him that makes the soul the man, be enough to
make the same man. For should the soul of a prince, carrying with it the
consciousness of the prince's past life, enter and inform the body of a
cobbler, as soon as deserted by his own soul, every one sees he would be
the same person with the prince, accountable only for the prince's actions:
but who would say it was the same man? The body too goes to the making
the man, and would, I guess, to everybody determine the man in this case,
wherein the soul, with all its princely thoughts about it, would not make
another man: but he would be the same cobbler to every one besides himself.
I know that, in the ordinary way of speaking, the same person, and the
same man, stand for one and the same thing. And indeed every one will always
have a liberty to speak as he pleases, and to apply what articulate sounds
to what ideas he thinks fit, and change them as often as he pleases. But
yet, when we will inquire what makes the same spirit, man, or person, we
must fix the ideas of spirit, man, or person in our minds; and having resolved
with ourselves what we mean by them, it will not be hard to determine,
in either of them, or the like, when it is the same, and when not.
16. Consciousness alone unites actions into the same person. But though
the same immaterial substance or soul does not alone, wherever it be, and
in whatsoever state, make the same man; yet it is plain, consciousness,
as far as ever it can be extended- should it be to ages past- unites existences
and actions very remote in time into the same person, as well as it does
the existences and actions of the immediately preceding moment: so that
whatever has the consciousness of present and past actions, is the same
person to whom they both belong. Had I the same consciousness that I saw
the ark and Noah's flood, as that I saw an overflowing of the Thames last
winter, or as that I write now, I could no more doubt that I who write
this now, that saw' the Thames overflowed last winter, and that viewed
the flood at the general deluge, was the same self,- place that self in
what substance you please- than that I who write this am the same myself
now whilst I write (whether I consist of all the same substance, material
or immaterial, or no) that I was yesterday. For as to this point of being
the same self, it matters not whether this present self be made up of the
same or other substances- I being as much concerned, and as justly accountable
for any action that was done a thousand years since, appropriated to me
now by this self-consciousness, as I am for what I did the last moment.
17. Self depends on consciousness, not on substance. Self is that conscious
thinking thing,- whatever substance made up of, (whether spiritual or material,
simple or compounded, it matters not)- which is sensible or conscious of
pleasure and pain, capable of happiness or misery, and so is concerned
for itself, as far as that consciousness extends. Thus every one finds
that, whilst comprehended under that consciousness, the little finger is
as much a part of himself as what is most so. Upon separation of this little
finger, should this consciousness go along with the little finger, and
leave the rest of the body, it is evident the little finger would be the
person, the same person; and self then would have nothing to do with the
rest of the body. As in this case it is the consciousness that goes along
with the substance, when one part is separate from another, which makes
the same person, and constitutes this inseparable self: so it is in reference
to substances remote in time. That with which the consciousness of this
present thinking thing can join itself, makes the same person, and is one
self with it, and with nothing else; and so attributes to itself, and owns
all the actions of that thing, as its own, as far as that consciousness
reaches, and no further; as every one who reflects will perceive.
18. Persons, not substances, the objects of reward and punishment. In
this personal identity is founded all the right and justice of reward and
punishment; happiness and misery being that for which every one is concerned
for himself, and not mattering what becomes of any substance, not joined
to, or affected with that consciousness. For, as it is evident in the instance
I gave but now, if the consciousness went along with the little finger
when it was cut off, that would be the same self which was concerned for
the whole body yesterday, as making part of itself, whose actions then
it cannot but admit as its own now. Though, if the same body should still
live, and immediately from the separation of the little finger have its
own peculiar consciousness, whereof the little finger knew nothing, it
would not at all be concerned for it, as a part of itself, or could own
any of its actions, or have any of them imputed to him.
19. Which shows wherein personal identity consists. This may show us
wherein personal identity consists: not in the identity of substance, but,
as I have said, in the identity of consciousness, wherein if Socrates and
the present mayor of Queinborough agree, they are the same person: if the
same Socrates waking and sleeping do not partake of the same consciousness,
Socrates waking and sleeping is not the same person. And to punish Socrates
waking for what sleeping Socrates thought, and waking Socrates was never
conscious of, would be no more of right, than to punish one twin for what
his brother-twin did, whereof he knew nothing, because their outsides were
so like, that they could not be distinguished; for such twins have been
seen.
20. Absolute oblivion separates what is thus forgotten from the person,
but not from the man. But yet possibly it will still be objected,- Suppose
I wholly lose the memory of some parts of my life, beyond a possibility
of retrieving them, so that perhaps I shall never be conscious of them
again; yet am I not the same person that did those actions, had those thoughts
that I once was conscious of, though I have now forgot them? To which I
answer, that we must here take notice what the word I is applied to; which,
in this case, is the man only. And the same man being presumed to be the
same person, I is easily here supposed to stand also for the same person.
But if it be possible for the same man to have distinct incommunicable
consciousness at different times, it is past doubt the same man would at
different times make different persons; which, we see, is the sense of
mankind in the solemnest declaration of their opinions, human laws not
punishing the mad man for the sober man's actions, nor the sober man for
what the mad man did,- thereby making them two persons: which is somewhat
explained by our way of speaking in English when we say such an one is
"not himself," or is "beside himself"; in which phrases it is insinuated,
as if those who now, or at least first used them, thought that self was
changed; the selfsame person was no longer in that man.
21. Difference between identity of man and of person. But yet it is
hard to conceive that Socrates, the same individual man, should be two
persons. To help us a little in this, we must consider what is meant by
Socrates, or the same individual man.
First, it must be either the same individual, immaterial, thinking substance;
in short, the same numerical soul, and nothing else.
Secondly, or the same animal, without any regard to an immaterial soul.
Thirdly, or the same immaterial spirit united to the same animal.
Now, take which of these suppositions you please, it is impossible to
make personal identity to consist in anything but consciousness; or reach
any further than that does.
For, by the first of them, it must be allowed possible that a man born
of different women, and in distant times, may be the same man. A way of
speaking which, whoever admits, must allow it possible for the same man
to be two distinct persons, as any two that have lived in different ages
without the knowledge of one another's thoughts.
By the second and third, Socrates, in this life and after it, cannot
be the same man any way, but by the same consciousness; and so making human
identity to consist in the same thing wherein we place personal identity,
there will be no difficulty to allow the same man to be the same person.
But then they who place human identity in consciousness only, and not in
something else, must consider how they will make the infant Socrates the
same man with Socrates after the resurrection. But whatsoever to some men
makes a man, and consequently the same individual man, wherein perhaps
few are agreed, personal identity can by us be placed in nothing but consciousness,
(which is that alone which makes what we call self,) without involving
us in great absurdities.
22. But is not a man drunk and sober the same person? why else is he
punished for the fact he commits when drunk, though he be never afterwards
conscious of it? Just as much the same person as a man that walks, and
does other things in his sleep, is the same person, and is answerable for
any mischief he shall do in it. Human laws punish both, with a justice
suitable to their way of knowledge;- because, in these cases, they cannot
distinguish certainly what is real, what counterfeit: and so the ignorance
in drunkenness or sleep is not admitted as a plea. For, though punishment
be annexed to personality, and personality to consciousness, and the drunkard
perhaps be not conscious of what he did, yet human judicatures justly punish
him; because the fact is proved against him, but want of consciousness
cannot be proved for him. But in the Great Day, wherein the secrets of
all hearts shall be laid open, it may be reasonable to think, no one shall
be made to answer for what he knows nothing of, but shall receive his doom,
his conscience accusing or excusing him.
23. Consciousness alone unites remote existences into one person. Nothing
but consciousness can unite remote existences into the same person: the
identity of substance will not do it; for whatever substance there is,
however framed, without consciousness there is no person: and a carcass
may be a person, as well as any sort of substance be so, without consciousness.
Could we suppose two distinct incommunicable consciousnesses acting
the same body, the one constantly by day, the other by night; and, on the
other side, the same consciousness, acting by intervals, two distinct bodies:
I ask, in the first case, whether the day and the night- man would not
be two as distinct persons as Socrates and Plato? And whether, in the second
case, there would not be one person in two distinct bodies, as much as
one man is the same in two distinct clothings? Nor is it at all material
to say, that this same, and this distinct consciousness, in the cases above
mentioned, is owing to the same and distinct immaterial substances, bringing
it with them to those bodies; which, whether true or no, alters not the
case: since it is evident the personal identity would equally be determined
by the consciousness, whether that consciousness were annexed to some individual
immaterial substance or no. For, granting that the thinking substance in
man must be necessarily supposed immaterial, it is evident that immaterial
thinking thing may sometimes part with its past consciousness, and be restored
to it again: as appears in the forgetfulness men often have of their past
actions; and the mind many times recovers the memory of a past consciousness,
which it had lost for twenty years together. Make these intervals of memory
and forgetfulness to take their turns regularly by day and night, and you
have two persons with the same immaterial spirit, as much as in the former
instance two persons with the same body. So that self is not determined
by identity or diversity of substance, which it cannot be sure of, but
only by identity of consciousness.
24. Not the substance with which the consciousness may be united. Indeed
it may conceive the substance whereof it is now made up to have existed
formerly, united in the same conscious being: but, consciousness removed,
that substance is no more itself, or makes no more a part of it, than any
other substance; as is evident in the instance we have already given of
a limb cut off, of whose heat, or cold, or other affections, having no
longer any consciousness, it is no more of a man's self than any other
matter of the universe. In like manner it will be in reference to any immaterial
substance, which is void of that consciousness whereby I am myself to myself:
if there be any part of its existence which I cannot upon recollection
join with that present consciousness whereby I am now myself, it is, in
that part of its existence, no more myself than any other immaterial being.
For, whatsoever any substance has thought or done, which I cannot recollect,
and by my consciousness make my own thought and action, it will no more
belong to me, whether a part of me thought or did it, than if it had been
thought or done by any other immaterial being anywhere existing.
25. Consciousness unites substances, material or spiritual, with the
same personality. I agree, the more probable opinion is, that this consciousness
is annexed to, and the affection of, one individual immaterial substance.
But let men, according to their diverse hypotheses, resolve of that
as they please. This every intelligent being, sensible of happiness or
misery, must grant- that there is something that is himself, that he is
concerned for, and would have happy; that this self has existed in a continued
duration more than one instant, and therefore it is possible may exist,
as it has done, months and years to come, without any certain bounds to
be set to its duration; and may be the same self, by the same consciousness
continued on for the future. And thus, by this consciousness he finds himself
to be the same self which did such and such an action some years since,
by which he comes to be happy or miserable now. In all which account of
self, the same numerical substance is not considered as making the same
self, but the same continued consciousness, in which several substances
may have been united, and again separated from it, which, whilst they continued
in a vital union with that wherein this consciousness then resided, made
a part of that same self. Thus any part of our bodies, vitally united to
that which is conscious in us, makes a part of ourselves: but upon separation
from the vital union by which that consciousness is communicated, that
which a moment since was part of ourselves, is now no more so than a part
of another man's self is a part of me: and it is not impossible but in
a little time may become a real part of another person. And so we have
the same numerical substance become a part of two different persons; and
the same person preserved under the change of various substances. Could
we suppose any spirit wholly stripped of all its memory or consciousness
of past actions, as we find our minds always are of a great part of ours,
and sometimes of them all; the union or separation of such a spiritual
substance would make no variation of personal identity, any more than that
of any particle of matter does. Any substance vitally united to the present
thinking being is a part of that very same self which now is; anything
united to it by a consciousness of former actions, makes also a part of
the same self, which is the same both then and now.
26. "Person" a forensic term. Person, as I take it, is the name for
this self. Wherever a man finds what he calls himself, there, I think,
another may say is the same person. It is a forensic term, appropriating
actions and their merit; and so belongs only to intelligent agents, capable
of a law, and happiness, and misery. This personality extends itself beyond
present existence to what is past, only by consciousness,- whereby it becomes
concerned and accountable; owns and imputes to itself past actions, just
upon the same ground and for the same reason as it does the present. All
which is founded in a concern for happiness, the unavoidable concomitant
of consciousness; that which is conscious of pleasure and pain, desiring
that that self that is conscious should be happy. And therefore whatever
past actions it cannot reconcile or appropriate to that present self by
consciousness, it can be no more concerned in than if they had never been
done: and to receive pleasure or pain, i.e. reward or punishment, on the
account of any such action, is all one as to be made happy or miserable
in its first being, without any demerit at all. For, supposing a man punished
now for what he had done in another life, whereof he could be made to have
no consciousness at all, what difference is there between that punishment
and being created miserable? And therefore, conformable to this, the apostle
tells us, that, at the great day, when every one shall "receive according
to his doings, the secrets of all hearts shall be laid open." The sentence
shall be justified by the consciousness all persons shall have, that they
themselves, in what bodies soever they appear, or what substances soever
that consciousness adheres to, are the same that committed those actions,
and deserve that punishment for them.
27. Suppositions that look strange are pardonable in our ignorance.
I am apt enough to think I have, in treating of this subject, made some
suppositions that will look strange to some readers, and possibly they
are so in themselves. But yet, I think they are such as are pardonable,
in this ignorance we are in of the nature of that thinking thing that is
in us, and which we look on as ourselves. Did we know what it was, or how
it was tied to a certain system of fleeting animal spirits; or whether
it could or could not perform its operations of thinking and memory out
of a body organized as ours is; and whether it has pleased God that no
one such spirit shall ever be united to any but one such body, upon the
right constitution of whose organs its memory should depend; we might see
the absurdity of some of those suppositions I have made. But taking, as
we ordinarily now do (in the dark concerning these matters), the soul of
a man for an immaterial substance, independent from matter, and indifferent
alike to it all; there can, from the nature of things, be no absurdity
at all to suppose that the same soul may at different times be united to
different bodies, and with them make up for that time one man: as well
as we suppose a part of a sheep's body yesterday should be a part of a
man's body to-morrow, and in that union make a vital part of Meliboeus
himself, as well as it did of his ram.
28. The difficulty from ill use of names. To conclude: Whatever substance
begins to exist, it must, during its existence, necessarily be the same:
whatever compositions of substances begin to exist, during the union of
those substances, the concrete must be the same: whatsoever mode begins
to exist, during its existence it is the same: and so if the composition
be of distinct substances and different modes, the same rule holds. Whereby
it will appear, that the difficulty or obscurity that has been about this
matter rather rises from the names ill-used, than from any obscurity in
things themselves. For whatever makes the specific idea to which the name
is applied, if that idea be steadily kept to, the distinction of anything
into the same and divers will easily be conceived, and there can arise
no doubt about it.
29. Continuance of that which we have made to he our complex idea of
man makes the same man. For, supposing a rational spirit be the idea of
a man, it is easy to know what is the same man, viz. the same spirit- whether
separate or in a body- will be the same man. Supposing a rational spirit
vitally united to a body of a certain conformation of parts to make a man;
whilst that rational spirit, with that vital conformation of parts, though
continued in a fleeting successive body, remains, it will be the same man.
But if to any one the idea of a man be but the vital union of parts in
a certain shape; as long as that vital union and shape remain in a concrete,
no otherwise the same but by a continued succession of fleeting particles,
it will be the same man. For, whatever be the composition whereof the complex
idea is made, whenever existence makes it one particular thing under any
denomination the same existence continued preserves it the same individual
under the same denomination.
Chapter XXVIII: Of Other Relations
1. Ideas of proportional relations. Besides the before-mentioned occasions
of time, place, and causality of comparing or referring things one to another,
there are, as I have said, infinite others, some whereof I shall mention.
First, The first I shall name is some one simple idea, which, being
capable of parts or degrees, affords an occasion of comparing the subjects
wherein it is to one another, in respect of that simple idea, v.g. whiter,
sweeter, equal, more, &c. These relations depending on the equality
and excess of the same simple idea, in several subjects, may be called,
if one will, proportional; and that these are only conversant about those
simple ideas received from sensation or reflection is so evident that nothing
need be said to evince it.
2. Natural relation. Secondly, Another occasion of comparing things
together, or considering one thing, so as to include in that consideration
some other thing, is the circumstances of their origin or beginning; which
being not afterwards to be altered, make the relations depending thereon
as lasting as the subjects to which they belong, v.g. father and son, brothers,
cousin-germans, &c., which have their relations by one community of
blood, wherein they partake in several degrees: countrymen, i.e. those
who were born in the same country or tract of ground; and these I call
natural relations: wherein we may observe, that mankind have fitted their
notions and words to the use of common life, and not to the truth and extent
of things. For it is certain, that, in reality, the relation is the same
betwixt the begetter and the begotten, in the several races of other animals
as well as men; but yet it is seldom said, this bull is the grandfather
of such a calf, or that two pigeons are cousin-germans. It is very convenient
that, by distinct names, these relations should be observed and marked
out in mankind, there being occasion, both in laws and other communications
one with another, to mention and take notice of men under these relations:
from whence also arise the obligations of several duties amongst men: whereas,
in brutes, men having very little or no cause to mind these relations,
they have not thought fit to give them distinct and peculiar names. This,
by the way, may give us some light into the different state and growth
of languages; which being suited only to the convenience of communication,
are proportioned to the notions men have, and the commerce of thoughts
familiar amongst them; and not to the reality or extent of things, nor
to the various respects might be found among them; nor the different abstract
considerations might be framed about them. Where they had no philosophical
notions, there they had no terms to express them: and it is no wonder men
should have framed no names for those things they found no occasion to
discourse of. From whence it is easy to imagine why, as in some countries,
they may have not so much as the name for a horse; and in others, where
they are more careful of the pedigrees of their horses, than of their own,
that there they may have not only names for particular horses, but also
of their several relations of kindred one to another.
3. Ideas of instituted or voluntary relations. Thirdly, Sometimes the
foundation of considering things, with reference to one another, is some
act whereby any one comes by a moral right, power, or obligation to do
something. Thus, a general is one that hath power to command an army; and
an army under a general is a collection of armed men, obliged to obey one
man. A citizen, or a burgher, is one who has a right to certain privileges
in this or that place. All this sort depending upon men's wills, or agreement
in society, I call instituted, or voluntary; and may be distinguished from
the natural, in that they are most, if not all of them, some way or other
alterable, and separable from the persons to whom they have sometimes belonged,
though neither of the substances, so related, be destroyed. Now, though
these are all reciprocal, as well as the rest, and contain in them a reference
of two things one to the other; yet, because one of the two things often
wants a relative name, importing that reference, men usually take no notice
of it, and the relation is commonly overlooked: v.g. a patron and client
ire easily allowed to be relations, but a constable or dictator are not
so readily at first hearing considered as such. Because there is no peculiar
name for those who are under the command of a dictator or constable, expressing
a relation to either of them; though it be certain that either of them
hath a certain power over some others, and so is so far related to them,
as well as a patron is to his client, or general to his army.
4. Ideas of moral relations. Fourthly, There is another sort of relation,
which is the conformity or disagreement men's voluntary actions have to
a rule to which they are referred, and by which they are judged of; which,
I think, may be called moral relation, as being that which denominates
our moral actions, and deserves well to be examined; there being no part
of knowledge wherein we should be more careful to get determined ideas,
and avoid, as much as may be, obscurity and confusion. Human actions, when
with their various ends, objects, manners, and circumstances, they are
framed into distinct complex ideas, are, as has been shown so many mixed
modes, a great part whereof have names annexed to them. Thus, supposing
gratitude to be a readiness to acknowledge and return kindness received;
polygamy to be the having more wives than one at once: when we frame these
notions thus in our minds, we have there so many determined ideas of mixed
modes. But this is not all that concerns our actions: it is not enough
to have determined ideas of them, and to know what names belong to such
and such combinations of ideas. We have a further and greater concernment,
and that is, to know whether such actions, so made up, are morally good
or bad.
5. Moral good and evil. Good and evil, as hath been shown, (Bk. II.
chap. xx. SS 2, and chap. xxi. SS 43,) are nothing but pleasure or pain,
or that which occasions or procures pleasure or pain to us. Moral good
and evil, then, is only the conformity or disagreement of our voluntary
actions to some law, whereby good or evil is drawn on us, from the will
and power of the law-maker; which good and evil, pleasure or pain, attending
our observance or breach of the law by the decree of the lawmaker, is that
we call reward and punishment.
6. Moral rules. Of these moral rules or laws, to which men generally
refer, and by which they judge of the rectitude or pravity of their actions,
there seem to me to be three sorts, with their three different enforcements,
or rewards and punishments. For, since it would be utterly in vain to suppose
a rule set to the free actions of men, without annexing to it some enforcement
of good and evil to determine his will, we must, wherever we suppose a
law, suppose also some reward or punishment annexed to that law. It would
be in vain for one intelligent being to set a rule to the actions of another,
if he had it not in his power to reward the compliance with, and punish
deviation from his rule, by some good and evil, that is not the natural
product and consequence of the action itself For that, being a natural
convenience or inconvenience, would operate of itself, without a law. This,
if I mistake not, is the true nature of all law, properly so called.
7. Laws. The laws that men generally refer their actions to, to judge
of their rectitude or obliquity, seem to me to be these three:- 1. The
divine law. 2. The civil law. 3. The law of opinion or reputation, if I
may so call it. By the relation they bear to the first of these, men judge
whether their actions are sins or duties; by the second, whether they be
criminal or innocent; and by the third, whether they be virtues or vices.
8. Divine law the measure of sin and duty. First, the divine law, whereby
that law which God has set to the actions of men,- whether promulgated
to them by the light of nature, or the voice of revelation. That God has
given a rule whereby men should govern themselves, I think there is nobody
so brutish as to deny. He has a right to do it; we are his creatures: he
has goodness and wisdom to direct our actions to that which is best: and
he has power to enforce it by rewards and punishments of infinite weight
and duration in another life; for nobody can take us out of his hands.
This is the only true touchstone of moral rectitude; and, by comparing
them to this law, it is that men judge of the most considerable moral good
or evil of their actions; that is, whether, as duties or sins, they are
like to procure them happiness or misery from the hands of the ALMIGHTY.
9. Civil law the measure of crimes and innocence. Secondly, the civil
law- the rule set by the commonwealth to the actions of those who belong
to it- is another rule to which men refer their actions; to judge whether
they be criminal or no. This law nobody overlooks: the rewards and punishments
that enforce it being ready at hand, and suitable to the power that makes
it: which is the force of the Commonwealth, engaged to protect the lives,
liberties, and possessions of those who live according to its laws, and
has power to take away life, liberty, or goods, from him who disobeys;
which is the punishment of offences committed against his law.
10. Philosophical law the measure of virtue and vice. Thirdly, the law
of opinion or reputation. Virtue and vice are names pretended and supposed
everywhere to stand for actions in their own nature right and wrong: and
as far as they really are so applied, they so far are coincident with the
divine law above mentioned. But yet, whatever is pretended, this is visible,
that these names, virtue and vice, in the particular instances of their
application, through the several nations and societies of men in the world,
are constantly attributed only to such actions as in each country and society
are in reputation or discredit. Nor is it to be thought strange, that men
everywhere should give the name of virtue to those actions, which amongst
them are judged praiseworthy; and call that vice, which they account blamable:
since otherwise they would condemn themselves, if they should think anything
right, to which they allowed not commendation, anything wrong, which they
let pass without blame. Thus the measure of what is everywhere called and
esteemed virtue and vice is this approbation or dislike, praise or blame,
which, by a secret and tacit consent, establishes itself in the several
societies, tribes, and clubs of men in the world: whereby several actions
come to find credit or disgrace amongst them, according to the judgment,
maxims, or fashion of that place. For, though men uniting into politic
societies, have resigned up to the public the disposing of all their force,
so that they cannot employ it against any fellow-citizens any further than
the law of the country directs: yet they retain still the power of thinking
well or ill, approving or disapproving of the actions of those whom they
live amongst, and converse with: and by this approbation and dislike they
establish amongst themselves what they will call virtue and vice.
11. The measure that men commonly apply to determine what they call
virtue and vice. That this is the common measure of virtue and vice, will
appear to any one who considers, that, though that passes for vice in one
country which is counted a virtue, or at least not vice, in another, yet
everywhere virtue and praise, vice and blame, go together. Virtue is everywhere,
that which is thought praiseworthy; and nothing else but that which has
the allowance of public esteem is called virtue. Virtue and praise are
so united, that they are called often by the same name. Sunt sua praemia
laudi, says Virgil; and so Cicero, Nihil habet natura praestantius, quam
honestatem, quam laudem, quam dignitatem, quam decus, which he tells you
are all names for the same thing. This is the language of the heathen philosophers,
who well understood wherein their notions of virtue and vice consisted.
And though perhaps, by the different temper, education, fashion, maxims,
or interest of different sorts of men, it fell out, that what was thought
praiseworthy in one place, escaped not censure in another; and so in different
societies, virtues and vices were changed: yet, as to the main, they for
the most part kept the same everywhere. For, since nothing can be more
natural than to encourage with esteem and reputation that wherein every
one finds his advantage, and to blame and discountenance the contrary;
it is no wonder that esteem and discredit, virtue and vice, should, in
a great measure, everywhere correspond with the unchangeable rule of right
and wrong, which the law of God hath established; there being nothing that
so directly and visibly secures and advances the general good of mankind
in this world, as obedience to the laws he has set them, and nothing that
breeds such mischiefs and confusion, as the neglect of them. And therefore
men, without renouncing all sense and reason, and their own interest, which
they are so constantly true to, could not generally mistake, in placing
their commendation and blame on that side that really deserved it not.
Nay, even those men whose practice was otherwise, failed not to give their
approbation right, few being depraved to that degree as not to condemn,
at least in others, the faults they themselves were guilty of; whereby,
even in the corruption of manners, the true boundaries of the law of nature,
which ought to be the rule of virtue and vice, were pretty well preferred.
So that even the exhortations of inspired teachers, have not feared to
appeal to common repute: "Whatsoever is lovely, whatsoever is of good report,
if there be any virtue, if there be any praise," &c. (Phil. 4. 8.)
12. Its enforcement is commendation and discredit. If any one shall
imagine that I have forgot my own notion of a law, when I make the law,
whereby men judge of virtue and vice, to be nothing else but the consent
of private men, who have not authority enough to make a law: especially
wanting that which is so necessary and essential to a law, a power to enforce
it: I think I may say, that he who imagines commendation and disgrace not
to be strong motives to men to accommodate themselves to the opinions and
rules of those with whom they converse, seems little skilled in the nature
or history of mankind: the greatest part whereof we shall find to govern
themselves chiefly, if not solely, by this law of fashion; and so they
do that which keeps them in reputation with their company, little regard
the laws of God, or the magistrate. The penalties that attend the breach
of God's laws some, nay perhaps most men, seldom seriously reflect on:
and amongst those that do, many, whilst they break the law, entertain thoughts
of future reconciliation, and making their peace for such breaches. And
as to the punishments due from the laws of the commonwealth, they frequently
flatter themselves with the hopes of impunity. But no man escapes the punishment
of their censure and dislike, who offends against the fashion and opinion
of the company he keeps, and would recommend himself to. Nor is there one
of ten thousand, who is stiff and insensible enough, to bear up under the
constant dislike and condemnation of his own club. He must be of a strange
and unusual constitution, who can content himself to live in constant disgrace
and disrepute with his own particular society. Solitude many men have sought,
and been reconciled to: but nobody that has the least thought or sense
of a man about him, can live in society under the constant dislike and
ill opinion of his familiars, and those he converses with. This is a burden
too heavy for human sufferance: and he must be made up of irreconcilable
contradictions, who can take pleasure in company, and yet be insensible
of contempt and disgrace from his companions.
13. These three laws the rules of moral good and evil. These three then,
first, the law of God; secondly, the law of politic societies; thirdly,
the law of fashion, or private censure, are those to which men variously
compare their actions: and it is by their conformity to one of these laws
that they take their measures, when they would judge of their moral rectitude,
and denominate their actions good or bad.
14. Morality is the relation of voluntary actions to these rules. Whether
the rule to which, as to a touchstone, we bring our voluntary actions,
to examine them by, and try their goodness, and accordingly to name them,
which is, as it were, the mark of the value we set upon them: whether,
I say, we take that rule from the fashion of the country, or the will of
a law-maker, the mind is easily able to observe the relation any action
hath to it, and to judge whether the action agrees or disagrees with the
rule; and so hath a notion of moral goodness or evil, which is either conformity
or not conformity of any action to that rule: and therefore is often called
moral rectitude. This rule being nothing but a collection of several simple
ideas, the conformity thereto is but so ordering the action, that the simple
ideas belonging to it may correspond to those which the law requires. And
thus we see how moral beings and notions are founded on, and terminated
in, these simple ideas we have received from sensation or reflection. For
example: let us consider the complex idea we signify by the word murder:
and when we have taken it asunder, and examined all the particulars, we
shall find them to amount to a collection of simple ideas derived from
reflection or sensation, viz. First, from reflection on the operations
of our own minds, we have the ideas of willing, considering, purposing
beforehand, malice, or wishing ill to another; and also of life, or perception,
and self-motion. Secondly, from sensation we have the collection of those
simple sensible ideas which are to be found in a man, and of some action,
whereby we put an end to perception and motion in the man; all which simple
ideas are comprehended in the word murder. This collection of simple ideas,
being found by me to agree or disagree with the esteem of the country I
have been bred in, and to be held by most men there worthy praise or blame,
I call the action virtuous or vicious: if I have the will of a supreme
invisible Lawgiver for my rule, then, as I supposed the action commanded
or forbidden by God, I call it good or evil, sin or duty: and if I compare
it to the civil law, the rule made by the legislative power of the country,
I call it lawful or unlawful, a crime or no crime. So that whencesoever
we take the rule of moral actions; or by what standard soever we frame
in our minds the ideas of virtues or vices, they consist only, and are
made up of collections of simple ideas, which we originally received from
sense or reflection: and their rectitude or obliquity consists in the agreement
or disagreement with those patterns prescribed by some law.
15. Moral actions may be regarded either absolutely, or as ideas of
relation. To conceive rightly of moral actions, we must take notice of
them under this two-fold consideration. First, as they are in themselves,
each made up of such a collection of simple ideas. Thus drunkenness, or
lying, signify such or such a collection of simple ideas, which I call
mixed modes: and in this sense they are as much positive absolute ideas,
as the drinking of a horse, or speaking of a parrot. Secondly, our actions
are considered as good, bad, or indifferent; and in this respect they are
relative, it being their conformity to, or disagreement with some rule
that makes them to be regular or irregular, good or bad; and so, as far
as they are compared with a rule, and thereupon denominated, they come
under relation. Thus the challenging and fighting with a man, as it is
a certain positive mode, or particular sort of action, by particular ideas,
distinguished from all others, is called duelling: which, when considered
in relation to the law of God, will deserve the name of sin; to the law
of fashion, in some countries, valour and virtue; and to the municipal
laws of some governments, a capital crime. In this case, when the positive
mode has one name, and another name as it stands in relation to the law,
the distinction may as easily be observed as it is in substances, where
one name, v.g. man, is used to signify the thing; another, v.g. father,
to signify the relation.
16. The denominations of actions often mislead us. But because very
frequently the positive idea of the action, and its moral relation, are
comprehended together under one name, and the game word made use of to
express both the mode or action, and its moral rectitude or obliquity:
therefore the relation itself is less taken notice of; and there is often
no distinction made between the positive idea of the action, and the reference
it has to a rule. By which confusion of these two distinct considerations
under one term, those who yield too easily to the impressions of sounds,
and are forward to take names for things, are often misled in their judgment
of actions. Thus, the taking from another what is his, without his knowledge
or allowance, is properly called stealing: but that name, being commonly
understood to signify also the moral pravity of the action, and to denote
its contrariety to the law, men are apt to condemn whatever they hear called
stealing, as an ill action, disagreeing with the rule of right. And yet
the private taking away his sword from a madman, to prevent his doing mischief,
though it be properly denominated stealing, as the name of such a mixed
mode; yet when compared to the law of God, and considered in its relation
to that supreme rule, it is no sin or transgression, though the name stealing
ordinarily carries such an intimation with it.
17. Relations innumerable, and only the most considerable here mentioned.
And thus much for the relation of human actions to a law, which, therefore,
I call moral relations.
It would make a volume to go over all sorts of relations: it is not,
therefore, to be expected that I should here mention them all. It suffices
to our present purpose to show by these, what the ideas are we have of
this comprehensive consideration called relation. Which is so various,
and the occasions of it so many, (as many as there can be of comparing
things one to another,) that it is not very easy to reduce it to rules,
or under just heads. Those I have mentioned, I think, are some of the most
considerable; and such as may serve to let us see from whence we get our
ideas of relations, and wherein they are founded. But before I quit this
argument, from what has been said give me leave to observe:
18. All relations terminate in simple ideas. First, That it is evident,
that all relation terminates in, and is ultimately founded on, those simple
ideas we have got from sensation or reflection: so that all we have in
our thoughts ourselves, (if we think of anything, or have any meaning),
or would signify to others, when we use words standing for relations, is
nothing but some simple ideas, or collections of simple ideas, compared
one with another. This is so manifest in that sort called proportional,
that nothing can be more. For when a man says "honey is sweeter than wax,"
it is plain that his thoughts in this relation terminate in this simple
idea, sweetness; which is equally true of all the rest: though, where they
are compounded, or decompounded, the simple ideas they are made up of,
are, perhaps, seldom taken notice of: v.g. when the word father is mentioned:
first, there is meant that particular species, or collective idea, signified
by the word man; secondly, those sensible simple ideas, signified by the
word generation; and, thirdly, the effects of it, and all the simple ideas
signified by the word child. So the word friend, being taken for a man
who loves and is ready to do good to another, has all these following ideas
to the making of it up: first, all the simple ideas, comprehended in the
word man, or intelligent being; secondly, the idea of love; thirdly, the
idea of readiness or disposition; fourthly, the idea of action, which is
any kind of thought or motion; fifthly, the idea of good, which signifies
anything that may advance his happiness, and terminates at last, if examined,
in particular simple ideas, of which the word good in general signifies
any one: but, if removed from all simple ideas quite, it signifies nothing
at all. And thus also all moral words terminate at last, though perhaps
more remotely, in a collection of simple ideas: the immediate signification
of relative words, being very often other supposed known relations; which,
if traced one to another, still end in simple ideas.
19. We have ordinarily as clear a notion of the relation, as of the
simple ideas in things on which it is founded. Secondly, That in relations,
we have for the most part, if not always, as clear a notion of the relation
as we have of those simple ideas wherein it is founded: agreement or disagreement,
whereon relation depends, being things whereof we have commonly as clear
ideas as of any other whatsoever; it being but the distinguishing simple
ideas, or their degrees one from another, without which we could have no
distinct knowledge at all. For, if I have a clear idea of sweetness, light,
or extension, I have, too, of equal, or more, or less, of each of these:
if I know what it is for one man to be born of a woman, viz. Sempronia,
I know what it is for another man to be born of the same woman Sempronia;
and so have as clear a notion of brothers as of births, and perhaps clearer.
For if I believed that Sempronia digged Titus out of the parsley-bed, (as
they used to tell children), and thereby became his mother; and that afterwards,
in the same manner, she digged Caius out of the parsley-bed, I had as clear
a notion of the relation of brothers between them, as if I had all the
skill of a midwife: the notion that the same woman contributed, as mother,
equally to their births, (though I were ignorant or mistaken in the manner
of it), being that on which I grounded the relation; and that they agreed
in that circumstance of birth, let it be what it will. The comparing them
then in their descent from the same person, without knowing the particular
circumstances of that descent, is enough to found my notion of their having,
or not having the relation of brothers. But though the ideas of particular
relations are capable of being as clear and distinct in the minds of those
who will duly consider them as those of mixed modes, and more determinate
than those of substances: yet the names belonging to relation are often
of as doubtful and uncertain signification as those of substances or mixed
modes; and much more than those of simple ideas. Because relative words,
being the marks of this comparison, which is made only by men's thoughts,
and is an idea only in men's minds, men frequently apply them to different
comparisons of things, according to their own imaginations; which do not
always correspond with those of others using the same name.
20. The notion of relation is the same, whether the rule any action
is compared to be true or false. Thirdly, That in these I call moral relations,
I have a true notion of relation, by comparing the action with the rule,
whether the rule be true or false. For if I measure anything by a yard,
I know whether the thing I measure be longer or shorter than that supposed
yard, though perhaps the yard I measure by be not exactly the standard:
which indeed is another inquiry. For though the rule be erroneous, and
I mistaken in it; yet the agreement or disagreement observable in that
which I compare with, makes me perceive the relation. Though, measuring
by a wrong rule, I shall thereby be brought to judge amiss of its moral
rectitude; because I have tried it by that which is not the true rule:
yet I am not mistaken in the relation which that action bears to that rule
I compare it to, which is agreement or disagreement.
Chapter XXIX: Of Clear and Obscure, Distinct and
Confused Ideas
1. Ideas, some clear and distinct, others obscure and confused. Having
shown the original of our ideas, and taken a view of their several sorts;
considered the difference between the simple and the complex; and observed
how the complex ones are divided into those of modes, substances, and relations-
all which, I think, is necessary to be done by any one who would acquaint
himself thoroughly with the progress of the mind, in its apprehension and
knowledge of things- it will, perhaps, be thought I have dwelt long enough
upon the examination of ideas. I must nevertheless, crave leave to offer
some few other considerations concerning them.
The first is, that some are clear and others obscure; some distinct
and others confused.
2. Clear and obscure explained by sight. The perception of the mind
being most aptly explained by words relating to the sight, we shall best
understand what is meant by clear and obscure in our ideas, by reflecting
on what we call clear and obscure in the objects of sight. Light being
that which discovers to us visible objects, we give the name of obscure
to that which is not placed in a light sufficient to discover minutely
to us the figure and colours which are observable in it, and which, in
a better light, would be discernible. In like manner, our simple ideas
are clear, when they are such as the objects themselves from whence they
were taken did or might, in a well-ordered sensation or perception, present
them. Whilst the memory retains them thus, and can produce them to the
mind whenever it has occasion to consider them, they are clear ideas. So
far as they either want anything of the original exactness, or have lost
any of their first freshness, and are, as it were, faded or tarnished by
time, so far are they obscure. Complex ideas, as they are made up of simple
ones, so they are clear, when the ideas that go to their composition are
clear, and the number and order of those simple ideas that are the ingredients
of any complex one is determinate and certain.
3. Causes of obscurity. The causes of obscurity, in simple ideas, seem
to be either dull organs; or very slight and transient impressions made
by the objects; or else a weakness in the memory, not able to retain them
as received. For to return again to visible objects, to help us to apprehend
this matter. If the organs, or faculties of perception, like wax over-hardened
with cold, will not receive the impression of the seal, from the usual
impulse wont to imprint it; or, like wax of a temper too soft, will not
hold it well, when well imprinted; or else supposing the wax of a temper
fit, but the seal not applied with a sufficient force to make a clear impression:
in any of these cases, the print left by the seal will be obscure. This,
I suppose, needs no application to make it plainer.
4. Distinct and confused, what. As a clear idea is that whereof the
mind has such a full and evident perception, as it does receive from an
outward object operating duly on a well-disposed organ, so a distinct idea
is that wherein the mind perceives a difference from all other; and a confused
idea is such an one as is not sufficiently distinguishable from another,
from which it ought to be different.
5. Objection. If no idea be confused, but such as is not sufficiently
distinguishable from another from which it should be different, it will
be hard, may any one say, to find anywhere a confused idea. For, let any
idea be as it will, it can be no other but such as the mind perceives it
to be; and that very perception sufficiently distinguishes it from all
other ideas, which cannot be other, i.e. different, without being perceived
to be so. No idea, therefore, can be undistinguishable from another from
which it ought to be different, unless you would have it different from
itself: for from all other it is evidently different.
6. Confusion of ideas is in reference to their names. To remove this
difficulty, and to help us to conceive aright what it is that makes the
confusion ideas are at any time chargeable with, we must consider, that
things ranked under distinct names are supposed different enough to be
distinguished, that so each sort by its peculiar name may be marked, and
discoursed of apart upon any occasion: and there is nothing more evident,
than that the greatest part of different names are supposed to stand for
different things. Now every idea a man has, being visibly what it is, and
distinct from all other ideas but itself; that which makes it confused,
is, when it is such that it may as well be called by another name as that
which it is expressed by; the difference which keeps the things (to be
ranked under those two different names) distinct, and makes some of them
belong rather to the one and some of them to the other of those names,
being left out; and so the distinction, which was intended to be kept up
by those different names, is quite lost.
7. Defaults which make this confusion. The defaults which usually occasion
this confusion, I think, are chiefly these following:
Complex Ideas made up of too few simple ones. First, when any complex
idea (for it is complex ideas that are most liable to confusion) is made
up of too small a number of simple ideas, and such only as are common to
other things, whereby the differences that make it deserve a different
name, are left out. Thus, he that has an idea made up of barely the simple
ones of a beast with spots, has but a confused idea of a leopard; it not
being thereby sufficiently distinguished from a lynx, and several other
sorts of beasts that are spotted. So that such an idea, though it hath
the peculiar name leopard, is not distinguishable from those designed by
the names lynx or panther, and may as well come under the name lynx as
leopard. How much the custom of defining of words by general terms contributes
to make the ideas we would express by them confused and undetermined, I
leave others to consider. This is evident, that confused ideas are such
as render the use of words uncertain, and take away the benefit of distinct
names. When the ideas, for which we use different terms, have not a difference
answerable to their distinct names, and so cannot be distinguished by them,
there it is that they are truly confused.
8. Their simple ones jumbled disorderly together. Secondly, Another
fault which makes our ideas confused is, when, though the particulars that
make up any idea are in number enough, yet they are so jumbled together,
that it is not easily discernible whether it more belongs to the name that
is given it than to any other. There is nothing properer to make us conceive
this confusion than a sort of pictures, usually shown as surprising pieces
of art, wherein the colours, as they are laid by the pencil on the table
itself, mark out very odd and unusual figures, and have no discernible
order in their position. This draught, thus made up of parts wherein no
symmetry nor order appears, is in itself no more a confused thing, than
the picture of a cloudy sky; wherein, though there be as little order of
colours or figures to be found, yet nobody thinks it a confused picture.
What is it, then, that makes it be thought confused, since the want of
symmetry does not? As it is plain it does not: for another draught made
barely in imitation of this could not be called confused. I answer, That
which makes it be thought confused is, the applying it to some name to
which it does no more discernibly belong than to some other: v.g. when
it is said to be the picture of a man, or Caesar, then any one with reason
counts it confused; because it is not discernible in that state to belong
more to the name man, or Caesar, than to the name baboon, or Pompey: which
are supposed to stand for different ideas from those signified by man,
or Caesar. But when a cylindrical mirror, placed right, had reduced those
irregular lines on the table into their due order and proportion, then
the confusion ceases, and the eye presently sees that it is a man, or Caesar;
i.e. that it belongs to those names; and that it is sufficiently distinguishable
from a baboon, or Pompey; i.e. from the ideas signified by those names.
Just thus it is with our ideas, which are as it were the pictures of things.
No one of these mental draughts, however the parts are put together, can
be called confused (for they are plainly discernible as they are) till
it be ranked under some ordinary name to which it cannot be discerned to
belong, any more than it does to some other name of an allowed different
signification.
9. Their simple ones mutable and undetermined. Thirdly, A third defect
that frequently gives the name of confused to our ideas, is, when any one
of them is uncertain and undetermined. Thus we may observe men who, not
forbearing to use the ordinary words of their language till they have learned
their precise signification, change the idea they make this or that term
stand for, almost as often as they use it. He that does this out of uncertainty
of what he should leave out, or put into his idea of church, or idolatry,
every time he thinks of either, and holds not steady to any one precise
combination of ideas that makes it up, is said to have a confused idea
of idolatry or the church: though this be still for the same reason as
the former, viz. because a mutable idea (if we will allow it to be one
idea) cannot belong to one name rather than another, and so loses the distinction
that distinct names are designed for.
10. Confusion without reference to names, hardly conceivable. By what
has been said, we may observe how much names, as supposed steady signs
of things, and by their difference to stand for, and keep things distinct
that in themselves are different, are the occasion of denominating ideas
distinct or confused, by a secret and unobserved reference the mind makes
of its ideas to such names. This perhaps will be fuller understood, after
what I say of Words in the third Book has been read and considered. But
without taking notice of such a reference of ideas to distinct names, as
the signs of distinct things, it will be hard to say what a confused idea
is. And therefore when a man designs, by any name, a sort of things, or
any one particular thing, distinct from all others, the complex idea he
annexes to that name is the more distinct, the more particular the ideas
are, and the greater and more determinate the number and order of them
is, whereof it is made up. For, the more it has of these, the more it has
still of the perceivable differences, whereby it is kept separate and distinct
from all ideas belonging to other names, even those that approach nearest
to it, and thereby all confusion with them is avoided.
11. Confusion concerns always two ideas. Confusion making it a difficulty
to separate two things that should be separated, concerns always two ideas;
and those most which most approach one another. Whenever, therefore, we
suspect any idea to be confused, we must examine what other it is in danger
to be confounded with, or which it cannot easily be separated from; and
that will always be found an idea belonging to another name, and so should
be a different thing, from which yet it is not sufficiently distinct: being
either the same with it, or making a part of it, or at least as properly
called by that name as the other it is ranked under; and so keeps not that
difference from that other idea which the different names import.
12. Causes of confused ideas. This, I think, is the confusion proper
to ideas; which still carries with it a secret reference to names. At least,
if there be any other confusion of ideas, this is that which most of all
disorders men's thoughts and discourses: ideas, as ranked under names,
being those that for the most part men reason of within themselves, and
always those which they commune about with others. And therefore where
there are supposed two different ideas, marked by two different names,
which are not as distinguishable as the sounds that stand for them, there
never fails to be confusion; and where any ideas are distinct as the ideas
of those two sounds they are marked by, there can be between them no confusion.
The way to prevent it is to collect and unite into one complex idea, as
precisely as is possible, all those ingredients whereby it is differenced
from others; and to them, so united in a determinate number and order,
apply steadily the same name. But this neither accommodating men's ease
or vanity, nor serving any design but that of naked truth, which is not
always the thing aimed at, such exactness is rather to be wished than hoped
for. And since the loose application of names, to undetermined, variable,
and almost no ideas, serves both to cover our own ignorance, as well as
to perplex and confound others, which goes for learning and superiority
in knowledge, it is no wonder that most men should use it themselves, whilst
they complain of it in others. Though I think no small part of the confusion
to be found in the notions of men might, by care and ingenuity, be avoided,
yet I am far from concluding it everywhere wilful. Some ideas are so complex,
and made up of so many parts, that the memory does not easily retain the
very same precise combination of simple ideas under one name: much less
are we able constantly to divine for what precise complex idea such a name
stands in another man's use of it. From the first of these, follows confusion
in a man's own reasonings and opinions within himself; from the latter,
frequent confusion in discoursing and arguing with others. But having more
at large treated of Words, their defects, and abuses, in the following
Book, I shall here say no more of it.
13. Complex ideas may be distinct in one part, and confused in another.
Our complex ideas, being made up of collections, and so variety of simple
ones, may accordingly be very clear and distinct in one part, and very
obscure and confused in another. In a man who speaks of a chiliaedron,
or a body of a thousand sides, the ideas of the figure may be very confused,
though that of the number be very distinct; so that he being able to discourse
and demonstrate concerning that part of his complex idea which depends
upon the number of thousand, he is apt to think he has a distinct idea
of a chiliaedron; though it be plain he has no precise idea of its figure,
so as to distinguish it, by that, from one that has but 999 sides: the
not observing whereof causes no small error in men's thoughts, and confusion
in their discourses.
14. This, if not heeded, causes confusion in our arguings. He that thinks
he has a distinct idea of the figure of a chiliaedron, let him for trial
sake take another parcel of the same uniform matter, viz. gold or wax of
an equal bulk, and make it into a figure of 999 sides. He will, I doubt
not, be able to distinguish these two ideas one from another, by the number
of sides; and reason and argue distinctly about them, whilst he keeps his
thoughts and reasoning to that part only of these ideas which is contained
in their numbers; as that the sides of the one could be divided into two
equal numbers, and of the others not, &c. But when he goes about to
distinguish them by their figure, he will there be presently at a loss,
and not be able, I think, to frame in his mind two ideas, one of them distinct
from the other, by the bare figure of these two pieces of gold; as he could,
if the same parcels of gold were made one into a cube, the other a figure
of five sides. In which incomplete ideas, we are very apt to impose on
ourselves, and wrangle with others, especially where they have particular
and familiar names. For, being satisfied in that part of the idea which
we have clear; and the name which is familiar to us, being applied to the
whole, containing that part also which is imperfect and obscure, we are
apt to use it for that confused part, and draw deductions from it in the
obscure part of its signification, as confidently as we do from the other.
15. Instance in eternity. Having frequently in our mouths the name Eternity,
we are apt to think we have a positive comprehensive idea of it, which
is as much as to say, that there is no part of that duration which is not
clearly contained in our idea. It is true that he that thinks so may have
a clear idea of duration; he may also have a clear idea of a very great
length of duration; he may also have a clear idea of the comparison of
that great one with still a greater: but it not being possible for him
to include in his idea of any duration, let it be as great as it will,
the whole extent together of a duration, where he supposes no end, that
part of his idea, which is still beyond the bounds of that large duration
he represents to his own thoughts, is very obscure and undetermined. And
hence it is that in disputes and reasonings concerning eternity, or any
other infinite, we are very apt to blunder, and involve ourselves in manifest
absurdities.
16. Infinite divisibility of matter. In matter, we have no clear ideas
of the smallness of parts much beyond the smallest that occur to any of
our senses: and therefore, when we talk of the divisibility of matter in
infinitum, though we have clear ideas of division and divisibility, and
have also clear ideas of parts made out of a whole by division; yet we
have but very obscure and confused ideas of corpuscles, or minute bodies,
so to be divided, when, by former divisions, they are reduced to a smallness
much exceeding the perception of any of our senses; and so all that we
have clear and distinct ideas of is of what division in general or abstractedly
is, and the relation of totum and pars: but of the bulk of the body, to
be thus infinitely divided after certain progressions, I think, we have
no clear nor distinct idea at all. For I ask any one, whether, taking the
smallest atom of dust he ever saw, he has any distinct idea (bating still
the number, which concerns not extension) betwixt the 1,000,000th and the
1,000,000,000th part of it. Or if he think he can refine his ideas to that
degree, without losing sight of them, let him add ten cyphers to each of
those numbers. Such a degree of smallness is not unreasonable to be supposed;
since a division carried on so far brings it no nearer the end of infinite
division, than the first division into two halves does. I must confess,
for my part, I have no clear distinct ideas of the different bulk or extension
of those bodies, having but a very obscure one of either of them. So that,
I think, when we talk of division of bodies in infinitum, our idea of their
distinct bulks, which is the subject and foundation of division, comes,
after a little progression, to be confounded, and almost lost in obscurity.
For that idea which is to represent only bigness must be very obscure and
confused, which we cannot distinguish from one ten times as big, but only
by number: so that we have clear distinct ideas, we may say, of ten and
one, but no distinct ideas of two such extensions. It is plain from hence,
that, when we talk of infinite divisibility of body or extension, our distinct
and clear ideas are only of numbers: but the clear distinct ideas of extension
after some progress of division, are quite lost; and of such minute parts
we have no distinct ideas at all; but it returns, as all our ideas of infinite
do, at last to that of number always to be added; but thereby never amounts
to any distinct idea of actual infinite parts. We have, it is true, a clear
idea of division, as often as we think of it; but thereby we have no more
a clear idea of infinite parts in matter, than we have a clear idea of
an infinite number, by being able still to add new numbers to any assigned
numbers we have: endless divisibility giving us no more a clear and distinct
idea of actually infinite parts, than endless addibility (if I may so speak)
gives us a clear and distinct idea of an actually infinite number: they
both being only in a power still of increasing the number, be it already
as great as it will. So that of what remains to be added (wherein consists
the infinity) we have but an obscure, imperfect, and confused idea; from
or about which we can argue or reason with no certainty or clearness, no
more than we can in arithmetic, about a number of which we have no such
distinct idea as we have of 4 or 100; but only this relative obscure one,
that, compared to any other, it is still bigger: and we have no more a
clear positive idea of it, when we say or conceive it is bigger, or more
than 400,000,000, than if we should say it is bigger than 40 or 4: 400,000,000
having no nearer a proportion to the end of addition or number than 4.
For he that adds only 4 to 4, and so proceeds, shall as soon come to the
end of all addition, as he that adds 400,000,000 to 400,000,000. And so
likewise in eternity; he that has an idea of but four years, has as much
a positive complete idea of eternity, as he that has one of 400,000,000
of years: for what remains of eternity beyond either of these two numbers
of years, is as clear to the one as the other; i.e. neither of them has
any clear positive idea of it at all. For he that adds only 4 years to
4, and so on, shall as soon reach eternity as he that adds 400,000,000
of years, and so on; or, if he please, doubles the increase as often as
he will: the remaining abyss being still as far beyond the end of all these
progressions as it is from the length of a day or an hour. For nothing
finite bears any proportion to infinite; and therefore our ideas, which
are all finite, cannot bear any. Thus it is also in our idea of extension,
when we increase it by addition, as well as when we diminish it by division,
and would enlarge our thoughts to infinite space. After a few doublings
of those ideas of extension, which are the largest we are accustomed to
have, we lose the clear distinct idea of that space: it becomes a confusedly
great one, with a surplus of still greater; about which, when we would
argue or reason, we shall always find ourselves at a loss; confused ideas,
in our arguings and deductions from that part of them which is confused,
always leading us into confusion.
Chapter XXX: Of Real and Fantastical Ideas
1. Ideas considered in reference to their archetypes. Besides what we have
already mentioned concerning ideas, other considerations belong to them,
in reference to things from whence they are taken, or which they may be
supposed to represent; and thus, I think, they may come under a three-fold
distinction, and are:-
First, either real or fantastical;
Secondly, adequate or inadequate;
Thirdly, true or false.
First, by real ideas, I mean such as have a foundation in nature; such
as have a conformity with the real being and existence of things, or with
their archetypes. Fantastical or chimerical, I call such as have no foundation
in nature, nor have any conformity with that reality of being to which
they are tacitly referred, as to their archetypes. If we examine the several
sorts of ideas before mentioned, we shall find that,
2. Simple ideas are all real appearances of things. First, Our simple
ideas are all real, all agree to the reality of things: not that they are
all of them the images or representations of what does exist; the contrary
whereof, in all but the primary qualities of bodies, hath been already
shown. But, though whiteness and coldness are no more in snow than pain
is; yet those ideas of whiteness and coldness, pain, &c., being in
us the effects of powers in things without us, ordained by our Maker to
produce in us such sensations; they are real ideas in us, whereby we distinguish
the qualities that are really in things themselves. For, these several
appearances being designed to be the mark whereby we are to know and distinguish
things which we have to do with, our ideas do as well serve us to that
purpose, and are as real distinguishing characters, whether they be only
constant effects, or else exact resemblances of something in the things
themselves: the reality lying in that steady correspondence they have with
the distinct constitutions of real beings. But whether they answer to those
constitutions, as to causes or patterns, it matters not; it suffices that
they are constantly produced by them. And thus our simple ideas are all
real and true, because they answer and agree to those powers of things
which produce them in our minds; that being all that is requisite to make
them real, and not fictions at pleasure. For in simple ideas (as has been
shown) the mind is wholly confined to the operation of things upon it,
and can make to itself no simple idea, more than what it has received.
3. Complex ideas are voluntary combinations. Though the mind be wholly
passive in respect of its simple ideas; yet, I think, we may say it is
not so in respect of its complex ideas. For those being combinations of
simple ideas put together, and united under one general name, it is plain
that the mind of man uses some kind of liberty in forming those complex
ideas: how else comes it to pass that one man's idea of gold, or justice,
is different from another's, but because he has put in, or left out of
his, some simple idea which the other has not? The question then is, Which
of these are real, and which barely imaginary combinations? What collections
agree to the reality of things, and what not? And to this I say that,
4. Mixed modes and relations, made of consistent ideas, are real. Secondly,
Mixed modes and relations, having no other reality but what they have in
the minds of men, there is nothing more required to this kind of ideas
to make them real, but that they be so framed, that there be a possibility
of existing conformable to them. These ideas themselves, being archetypes,
cannot differ from their archetypes, and so cannot be chimerical, unless
any one will jumble together in them inconsistent ideas. Indeed, as any
of them have the names of a known language assigned to them, by which he
that has them in his mind would signify them to others, so bare possibility
of existing is not enough; they must have a conformity to the ordinary
signification of the name that is given them, that they may not be thought
fantastical: as if a man would give the name of justice to that idea which
common use calls liberality. But this fantasticalness relates more to propriety
of speech, than reality of ideas. For a man to be undisturbed in danger,
sedately to consider what is fittest to be done, and to execute it steadily,
is a mixed mode, or a complex idea of an action which may exist. But to
be undisturbed in danger, without using one's reason or industry, is what
is also possible to be; and so is as real an idea as the other. Though
the first of these, having the name courage given to it, may, in respect
of that name, be a right or wrong idea; but the other, whilst it has not
a common received name of any known language assigned to it, is not capable
of any deformity, being made with no reference to anything but itself.
5. Complex ideas of substances are real, when they agree with the existence
of things. Thirdly, Our complex ideas of substances, being made all of
them in reference to things existing without us, and intended to be representations
of substances as they really are, are no further real than as they are
such combinations of simple ideas as are really united, and co-exist in
things without us. On the contrary, those are fantastical which are made
up of such collections of simple ideas as were really never united, never
were found together in any substance: v.g. a rational creature, consisting
of a horse's head, joined to a body of human shape, or such as the centaurs
are described: or, a body yellow, very malleable, fusible, and fixed, but
lighter than common water: or an uniform, unorganized body, consisting,
as to sense, all of similar parts, with perception and voluntary motion
joined to it. Whether such substances as these can possibly exist or no,
it is probable we do not know: but be that as it will, these ideas of substances,
being made conformable to no pattern existing that we know; and consisting
of such collections of ideas as no substance ever showed us united together,
they ought to pass with us for barely imaginary: but much more are those
complex ideas so, which contain in them any inconsistency or contradiction
of their parts.
Chapter XXXI: Of Adequate and Inadequate Ideas
1. Adequate ideas are such as perfectly represent their archetypes. Of
our real ideas, some are adequate, and some are inadequate. Those I call
adequate, which perfectly represent those archetypes which the mind supposes
them taken from: which it intends them to stand for, and to which it refers
them. Inadequate ideas are such, which are but a partial or incomplete
representation of those archetypes to which they are referred. Upon which
account it is plain,
2. Simple ideas all adequate. First, that all our simple ideas are adequate.
Because, being nothing but the effects of certain powers in things, fitted
and ordained by God to produce such sensations in us, they cannot but be
correspondent and adequate to those powers: and we are sure they agree
to the reality of things. For, if sugar produce in us the ideas which we
call whiteness and sweetness, we are sure there is a power in sugar to
produce those ideas in our minds, or else they could not have been produced
by it. And so each sensation answering the power that operates on any of
our senses, the idea so produced is a real idea, (and not a fiction of
the mind, which has no power to produce any simple idea); and cannot but
be adequate, since it ought only to answer that power: and so all simple
ideas are adequate. It is true, the things producing in us these simple
ideas are but few of them denominated by us, as if they were only the causes
of them; but as if those ideas were real beings in them. For, though fire
be called painful to the touch, whereby is signified the power of producing
in us the idea of pain, yet it is denominated also light and hot; as if
light and heat were really something in the fire, more than a power to
excite these ideas in us; and therefore are called qualities in or of the
fire. But these being nothing, in truth, but powers to excite such ideas
in us, I must in that sense be understood, when I speak of secondary qualities
as being in things; or of their ideas as being the objects that excite
them in us. Such ways of speaking, though accommodated to the vulgar notions,
without which one cannot be well understood, yet truly signify nothing
but those powers which are in things to excite certain sensations or ideas
in us. Since were there no fit organs to receive the impressions fire makes
on the sight and touch, nor a mind joined to those organs to receive the
ideas of light and heat by those impressions from the fire or sun, there
would yet be no more light or heat in the world than there would be pain
if there were no sensible creature to feel it, though the sun should continue
just as it is now, and Mount AEtna flame higher than ever it did. Solidity
and extension, and the termination of it, figure, with motion and rest,
whereof we have the ideas, would be really in the world as they are, whether
there were any sensible being to perceive them or no: and therefore we
have reason to look on those as the real modifications of matter, and such
as are the exciting causes of all our various sensations from bodies. But
this being an inquiry not belonging to this place, I shall enter no further
into it, but proceed to show what complex ideas are adequate, and what
not.
3. Modes are all adequate. Secondly, our complex ideas of modes, being
voluntary collections of simple ideas, which the mind puts together, without
reference to any real archetypes, or standing patterns, existing anywhere,
are and cannot but be adequate ideas. Because they, not being intended
for copies of things really existing, but for archetypes made by the mind,
to rank and denominate things by, cannot want anything; they having each
of them that combination of ideas, and thereby that perfection, which the
mind intended they should: so that the mind acquiesces in them, and can
find nothing wanting. Thus, by having the idea of a figure with three sides
meeting at three angles, I have a complete idea, wherein I require nothing
else to make it perfect. That the mind is satisfied with the perfection
of this its idea is plain, in that it does not conceive that any understanding
hath, or can have, a more complete or perfect idea of that thing it signifies
by the word triangle, supposing it to exist, than itself has, in that complex
idea of three sides and three angles, in which is contained all that is
or can be essential to it, or necessary to complete it, wherever or however
it exists. But in our ideas of substances it is otherwise. For there, desiring
to copy things as they really do exist, and to represent to ourselves that
constitution on which all their properties depend, we perceive our ideas
attain not that perfection we intend: we find they still want something
we should be glad were in them; and so are all inadequate. But mixed modes
and relations, being archetypes without patterns, and so having nothing
to represent but themselves, cannot but be adequate, everything being so
to itself. He that at first put together the idea of danger perceived,
absence of disorder from fear, sedate consideration of what was justly
to be done, and executing that without disturbance, or being deterred by
the danger of it, had certainly in his mind that complex idea made up of
that combination: and intending it to be nothing else but what is, nor
to have in it any other simple ideas but what it hath, it could not also
but be an adequate idea: and laying this up in his memory, with the name
courage annexed to it, to signify to others, and denominate from thence
any action he should observe to agree with it, had thereby a standard to
measure and denominate actions by, as they agreed to it. This idea, thus
made and laid up for a pattern, must necessarily be adequate, being referred
to nothing else but itself, nor made by any other original but the good
liking and will of him that first made this combination.
4. Modes, in reference to settled names, may be inadequate. Indeed another
coming after, and in conversation learning from him the word courage, may
make an idea, to which he gives the name courage, different from what the
first author applied it to, and has in his mind when he uses it. And in
this case, if he designs that his idea in thinking should be conformable
to the other's idea, as the name he uses in speaking is conformable in
sound to his from whom he learned it, his idea may be very wrong and inadequate:
because in this case, making the other man's idea the pattern of his idea
in thinking, as the other man's word or sound is the pattern of his in
speaking, his idea is so far defective and inadequate, as it is distant
from the archetype and pattern he refers it to, and intends to express
and signify by the name he uses for it; which name he would have to be
a sign of the other man's idea, (to which, in its proper use, it is primarily
annexed), and of his own, as agreeing to it: to which if his own does not
exactly correspond, it is faulty and inadequate.
5. Because then meant, in propriety of speech, to correspond to the
ideas in some other mind. Therefore these complex ideas of modes, which
they are referred by the mind, and intended to correspond to the ideas
in the mind of some other intelligent being, expressed by the names we
apply to them, they may be very deficient, wrong, and inadequate; because
they agree not to that which the mind designs to be their archetype and
pattern: in which respect only any idea of modes can be wrong, imperfect,
or inadequate. And on this account our ideas of mixed modes are the most
liable to be faulty of any other; but this refers more to proper speaking
than knowing right.
6. Ideas of substances, as referred to real essences, not adequate.
Thirdly, what ideas we have of substances, I have above shown. Now, those
ideas have in the mind a double reference: 1. Sometimes they are referred
to a supposed real essence of each species of things. 2. Sometimes they
are only designed to be pictures and representations in the mind of things
that do exist, by ideas of those qualities that are discoverable in them.
In both which ways these copies of those originals and archetypes are imperfect
and inadequate.
First, it is usual for men to make the names of substances stand for
things as supposed to have certain real essences, whereby they are of this
or that species: and names standing for nothing but the ideas that are
in men's minds, they must constantly refer their ideas to such real essences,
as to their archetypes. That men (especially such as have been bred up
in the learning taught in this part of the world) do suppose certain specific
essences of substances, which each individual in its several kinds is made
conformable to and partakes of, is so far from needing proof that it will
be thought strange if any one should do otherwise. And thus they ordinarily
apply the specific names they rank particular substances under, to things
as distinguished by such specific real essences. Who is there almost, who
would not take it amiss if it should be doubted whether he called himself
a man, with any other meaning than as having the real essence of a man?
And yet if you demand what those real essences are, it is plain men are
ignorant, and know them not. From whence it follows, that the ideas they
have in their minds, being referred to real essences, as to archetypes
which are unknown, must be so far from being adequate that they cannot
be supposed to be any representation of them at all. The complex ideas
we have of substances are, as it has been shown, certain collections of
simple ideas that have been observed or supposed constantly to exist together.
But such a complex idea cannot be the real essence of any substance; for
then the properties we discover in that body would depend on that complex
idea, and be deducible from it, and their necessary connexion with it be
known; as all properties of a triangle depend on, and, as far as they are
discoverable, are deducible from the complex idea of three lines including
a space. But it is plain that in our complex ideas of substances are not
contained such ideas, on which all the other qualities that are to be found
in them do depend. The common idea men have of iron is, a body of a certain
colour, weight, and hardness; and a property that they look on as belonging
to it, is malleableness. But yet this property has no necessary connexion
with that complex idea, or any part of it: and there is no more reason
to think that malleableness depends on that colour, weight, and hardness,
than that colour or that weight depends on its malleableness. And yet,
though we know nothing of these real essences, there is nothing more ordinary
than that men should attribute the sorts of things to such essences. The
particular parcel of matter which makes the ring I have on my finger is
forwardly by most men supposed to have a real essence, whereby it is gold;
and from whence those qualities flow which I find in it, viz. its peculiar
colour, weight, hardness, fusibility, fixedness, and change of colour upon
a slight touch of mercury, &c. This essence, from which all these properties
flow, when I inquire into it and search after it, I plainly perceive I
cannot discover: the furthest I can go is, only to presume that, it being
nothing but body, its real essence or internal constitution, on which these
qualities depend, can be nothing but the figure, size, and connexion of
its solid parts; of neither of which having any distinct perception at
all can I have any idea of its essence: which is the cause that it has
that particular shining yellowness; a greater weight than anything I know
of the same bulk; and a fitness to have its colour changed by the touch
of quicksilver. If any one will say, that the real essence and internal
constitution, on which these properties depend, is not the figure, size,
and arrangement or connexion of its solid parts, but something else, called
its particular form, I am further from having any idea of its real essence
than I was before. For I have an idea of figure, size, and situation of
solid parts in general, though I have none of the particular figure, size,
or putting together of parts, whereby the qualities above mentioned are
produced; which qualities I find in that particular parcel of matter that
is on my finger, and not in another parcel of matter, with which I cut
the pen I write with. But, when I am told that something besides the figure,
size, and posture of the solid parts of that body in its essence, something
called substantial form, of that I confess I have no idea at all, but only
of the sound form; which is far enough from an idea of its real essence
or constitution. The like ignorance as I have of the real essence of this
particular substance, I have also of the real essence of all other natural
ones: of which essences I confess I have no distinct ideas at all; and,
I am apt to suppose, others, when they examine their own knowledge, will
find in themselves, in this one point, the same sort of ignorance.
7. Because men know not the real essences of substances. Now, then,
when men apply to this particular parcel of matter on my finger a general
name already in use, and denominate it gold, do they not ordinarily, or
are they not understood to give it that name, as belonging to a particular
species of bodies, having a real internal essence; by having of which essence
this particular substance comes to be of that species, and to be called
by that name? If it be so, as it is plain it is, the name by which things
are marked as having that essence must be referred primarily to that essence;
and consequently the idea to which that name is given must be referred
also to that essence, and be intended to represent it. Which essence, since
they who so use the names know not, their ideas of substances must be all
inadequate in that respect, as not containing in them that real essence
which the mind intends they should.
8. Ideas of substances, when regarded as collections of their qualities,
are all inadequate. Secondly, those who, neglecting that useless supposition
of unknown real essences, whereby they are distinguished, endeavour to
copy the substances that exist in the world, by putting together the ideas
of those sensible qualities which are found coexisting in them, though
they come much nearer a likeness of them than those who imagine they know
not what real specific essences: yet they arrive not at perfectly adequate
ideas of those substances they would thus copy into the their minds: nor
do those copies exactly and fully contain all that is to be found in their
archetypes. Because those qualities and powers of substances, whereof we
make their complex ideas, are so many and various, that no man's complex
idea contains them all. That our complex ideas of substances do not contain
in them all the simple ideas that are united in the things themselves is
evident, in that men do rarely put into their complex idea of any substance
all the simple ideas they do know to exist in it. Because, endeavouring
to make the signification of their names as clear and as little cumbersome
as they can, they make their specific ideas of the sorts of substance,
for the most part, of a few of those simple ideas which are to be found
in them: but these having no original precedency, or right to be put in,
and make the specific idea, more than others that are left out, it is plain
that both these ways our ideas of substances are deficient and inadequate.
The simple ideas whereof we make our complex ones of substances are all
of them (bating only the figure and bulk of some sorts) powers; which being
relations to other substances, we can never be sure that we know all the
powers that are in any one body, till we have tried what changes it is
fitted to give to or receive from other substances in their several ways
of application: which being impossible to be tried upon any one body, much
less upon all, it is impossible we should have adequate ideas of any substance
made up of a collection of all its properties.
9. Their powers usually make up our complex ideas of substances. Whosoever
first lighted on a parcel of that sort of substance we denote by the word
gold, could not rationally take the bulk and figure he observed in that
lump to depend on its real essence, or internal constitution. Therefore
those never went into his idea of that species of body; but its peculiar
colour, perhaps, and weight, were the first he abstracted from it, to make
the complex idea of that species. Which both are but powers; the one to
affect our eyes after such a manner, and to produce in us that idea we
call yellow; and the other to force upwards any other body of equal bulk,
they being put into a pair of equal scales, one against another. Another
perhaps added to these the ideas of fusibility and fixedness, two other
passive powers, in relation to the operation of fire upon it; another,
its ductility and solubility in aqua regia, two other powers, relating
to the operation of other bodies, in changing its outward figure, or separation
of it into insensible parts. These, or parts of these, put together, usually
make the complex idea in men's minds of that sort of body we call gold.
10. Substances have innumerable powers not contained in our complex
ideas of them. But no one who hath considered the properties of bodies
in general, or this sort in particular, can doubt that this, called gold,
has infinite other properties not contained in that complex idea. Some
who have examined this species more accurately could, I believe, enumerate
ten times as many properties in gold, all of them as inseparable from its
internal constitution, as its colour or weight: and it is probable, if
any one knew all the properties that are by divers men known of this metal,
there would be an hundred times as many ideas go to the complex idea of
gold as any one man yet has in his; and yet perhaps that not be the thousandth
part of what is to be discovered in it. The changes that that one body
is apt to receive, and make in other bodies, upon a due application, exceeding
far not only what we know, but what we are apt to imagine. Which will not
appear so much a paradox to any one who will but consider how far men are
yet from knowing all the properties of that one, no very compound figure,
a triangle; though it be no small number that are already by mathematicians
discovered of it.
11. Ideas of substances, being got only by collecting their qualities,
are all inadequate. So that all our complex ideas of substances are imperfect
and inadequate. Which would be so also in mathematical figures, if we were
to have our complex ideas of them, only by collecting their properties
in reference to other figures. How uncertain and imperfect would our ideas
be of an ellipsis, if we had no other idea of it, but some few of its properties?
Whereas, having in our plain idea the whole essence of that figure, we
from thence discover those properties, and demonstratively see how they
flow, and are inseparable from it.
12. Simple ideas, ektupa, and adequate. Thus the mind has three sorts
of abstract ideas or nominal essences:
First, simple ideas, which are ektupa or copies; but yet certainly adequate.
Because, being intended to express nothing but the power in things to produce
in the mind such a sensation, that sensation when it is produced, cannot
but be the effect of that power. So the paper I write on, having the power
in the light (I speak according to the common notion of light) to produce
in men the sensation which I call white, it cannot but be the effect of
such a power in something without the mind; since the mind has not the
power to produce any such idea in itself: and being meant for nothing else
but the effect of such a power, that simple idea is real and adequate;
the sensation of white, in my mind, being the effect of that power which
is in the paper to produce it, is perfectly adequate to that power; or
else that power would produce a different idea.
13. Ideas of substances are ektupa, and inadequate. Secondly, the complex
ideas of substances are ectypes, copies too; but not perfect ones, not
adequate: which is very evident to the mind, in that it plainly perceives,
that whatever collection of simple ideas it makes of any substance that
exists, it cannot be sure that it exactly answers all that are in that
substance. Since, not having tried all the operations of all other substances
upon it, and found all the alterations it would receive from, or cause
in, other substances, it cannot have an exact adequate collection of all
its active and passive capacities; and so not have an adequate complex
idea of the powers of any substance existing, and its relations; which
is that sort of complex idea of substances we have. And, after all, if
we would have, and actually had, in our complex idea, an exact collection
of all the secondary qualities or powers of any substance, we should not
yet thereby have an idea of the essence of that thing. For, since the powers
or qualities that are observable by us are not the real essence of that
substance, but depend on it, and flow from it, any collection whatsoever
of these qualities cannot be the real essence of that thing. Whereby it
is plain, that our ideas of substances are not adequate; are not what the
mind intends them to be. Besides, a man has no idea of substance in general,
nor knows what substance is in itself.
14. Ideas of modes and relations are archetypes and cannot be adequate.
Thirdly, complex ideas of modes and relations are originals, and archetypes;
are not copies, nor made after the pattern of any real existence, to which
the mind intends them to be conformable, and exactly to answer. These being
such collections of simple ideas that the mind itself puts together, and
such collections that each of them contains in it precisely all that the
mind intends that it should, they are archetypes and essences of modes
that may exist; and so are designed only for, and belong only to such modes
as, when they do exist, have an exact conformity with those complex ideas.
The ideas, therefore, of modes and relations cannot but be adequate.
Chapter XXXII: Of True and False Ideas
1. Truth and falsehood properly belong to propositions, not to ideas. Though
truth and falsehood belong, in propriety of speech, only to propositions:
yet ideas are oftentimes termed true or false (as what words are there
that are not used with great latitude, and with some deviation from their
strict and proper significations?) Though I think that when ideas themselves
are termed true or false, there is still some secret or tacit proposition,
which is the foundation of that denomination: as we shall see, if we examine
the particular occasions wherein they come to be called true or false.
In all which we shall find some kind of affirmation or negation, which
is the reason of that denomination. For our ideas, being nothing but bare
appearances, or perceptions in our minds, cannot properly and simply in
themselves be said to be true or false, no more than a single name of anything
can be said to be true or false.
2. Ideas and words may be said to be true, inasmuch as they really are
ideas and words. Indeed both ideas and words may be said to be true, in
a metaphysical sense of the word truth; as all other things that any way
exist are said to be true, i.e. really to be such as they exist. Though
in things called true, even in that sense, there is perhaps a secret reference
to our ideas, looked upon as the standards of that truth; which amounts
to a mental proposition, though it be usually not taken notice of.
3. No idea, as an appearance in the mind, either true or false. But
it is not in that metaphysical sense of truth which we inquire here, when
we examine, whether our ideas are capable of being true or false, but in
the more ordinary acceptation of those words: and so I say that the ideas
in our minds, being only so many perceptions or appearances there, none
of them are false; the idea of a centaur having no more falsehood in it
when it appears in our minds, than the name centaur has falsehood in it,
when it is pronounced by our mouths, or written on paper. For truth or
falsehood lying always in some affirmation or negation, mental or verbal,
our ideas are not capable, any of them, of being false, till the mind passes
some judgment on them; that is, affirms or denies something of them.
4. Ideas referred to anything extraneous to them may be true or false.
Whenever the mind refers any of its ideas to anything extraneous to them,
they are then capable to be called true or false. Because the mind, in
such a reference, makes a tacit supposition of their conformity to that
thing; which supposition, as it happens to be true or false, so the ideas
themselves come to be denominated. The most usual cases wherein this happens,
are these following:
5. Other men's ideas; real existence; and supposed real essences, are
what men usually refer their ideas to. First, when the mind supposes any
idea it has conformable to that in other men's minds, called by the same
common name; v.g. when the mind intends or judges its ideas of justice,
temperance, religion, to be the same with what other men give those names
to.
Secondly, when the mind supposes any idea it has in itself to be conformable
to some real existence. Thus the two ideas of a man and a centaur, supposed
to be the ideas of real substances, are the one true and the other false;
the one having a conformity to what has really existed, the other not.
Thirdly, when the mind refers any of its ideas to that real constitution
and essence of anything, whereon all its properties depend: and thus the
greatest part, if not all our ideas of substances, are false.
6. The cause of such reference. These suppositions the mind is very
apt tacitly to make concerning its own ideas. But yet, if we will examine
it, we shall find it is chiefly, if not only, concerning its abstract complex
ideas. For the natural tendency of the mind being towards knowledge; and
finding that, if it should proceed by and dwell upon only particular things,
its progress would be very slow, and its work endless; therefore, to shorten
its way to knowledge, and make each perception more comprehensive, the
first thing it does, as the foundation of the easier enlarging its knowledge,
either by contemplation of the things themselves that it would know, or
conference with others about them, is to bind them into bundles, and rank
them so into sorts, that what knowledge it gets of any of them it may thereby
with assurance extend to all of that sort; and so advance by larger steps
in that which is its great business, knowledge. This, as I have elsewhere
shown, is the reason why we collect things under comprehensive ideas, with
names annexed to them, into genera and species; i.e. into kinds and sorts.
7. Names of things supposed to carry in them knowledge of their essences.
If therefore we will warily attend to the motions of the mind, and observe
what course it usually takes in its way to knowledge, we shall I think
find, that the mind having got an idea which it thinks it may have use
of either in contemplation or discourse, the first thing it does is to
abstract it, and then get a name to it; and so lay it up in its storehouse,
the memory, as containing the essence of a sort of things, of which that
name is always to be the mark. Hence it is, that we may often observe that,
when any one sees a new thing of a kind that he knows not, he presently
asks, what it is; meaning by that inquiry nothing but the name. As if the
name carried with it the knowledge of the species, or the essence of it;
whereof it is indeed used as the mark, and is generally supposed annexed
to it.
8. How men suppose that their ideas must correspond to things, and to
the customary meanings of names. But this abstract idea, being something
in the mind, between the thing that exists, and the name that is given
to it; it is in our ideas that both the rightness of our knowledge, and
the propriety and intelligibleness of our speaking, consists. And hence
it is that men are so forward to suppose, that the abstract ideas they
have in their minds are such as agree to the things existing without them,
to which they are referred; and are the same also to which the names they
give them do by the use and propriety of that language belong. For without
this double conformity of their ideas, they find they should both think
amiss of things in themselves, and talk of them unintelligibly to others.
9. Simple ideas may be false, in reference to others of the same name,
but are least liable to be so. First, then, I say, that when the truth
of our ideas is judged of by the conformity they have to the ideas which
other men have, and commonly signify by the same name, they may be any
of them false. But yet simple ideas are least of all liable to be so mistaken.
Because a man, by his senses and every day's observation, may easily satisfy
himself what the simple ideas are which their several names that are in
common use stand for; they being but few in number, and such as, if he
doubts or mistakes in, he may easily rectify by the objects they are to
be found in. Therefore it is seldom that any one mistakes in his names
of simple ideas, or applies the name red to the idea green, or the name
sweet to the idea bitter: mush less are men apt to confound the names of
ideas belonging to different senses, and call a colour by the name of a
taste, &c. Whereby it is evident that the simple ideas they call by
any name are commonly the same that others have and mean when they use
the same names.
10. Ideas of mixed modes most liable to be false in this sense. Complex
ideas are much more liable to be false in this respect; and the complex
ideas of mixed modes, much more than those of substances; because in substances
(especially those which the common and unborrowed names of any language
are applied to) some remarkable sensible qualities, serving ordinarily
to distinguish one sort from another, easily preserve those who take any
care in the use of their words, from applying them to sorts of substances
to which they do not at all belong. But in mixed modes we are much more
uncertain; it being not so easy to determine of several actions, whether
they are to be called justice or cruelly, liberality or prodigality. And
so in referring our ideas to those of other men, called by the same names,
ours may be false; and the idea in our minds, which we express by the word
justice, may perhaps be that which ought to have another name.
11. Or at least to be thought false. But whether or no our ideas of
mixed modes are more liable than any sort to be different from those of
other men, which are marked by the same names, this at least is certain,
That this sort of falsehood is much more familiarly attributed to our ideas
of mixed modes than to any other. When a man is thought to have a false
idea of justice, or gratitude, or glory, it is for no other reason, but
that his agrees not with the ideas which each of those names are the signs
of in other men.
12. And why. The reason whereof seems to me to be this: That the abstract
ideas of mixed modes, being men's voluntary combinations of such a precise
collection of simple ideas, and so the essence of each species being made
by men alone, whereof we have no other sensible standard existing anywhere
but the name itself, or the definition of that name; we having nothing
else to refer these our ideas of mixed modes to, as a standard to which
we would conform them, but the ideas of those who are thought to use those
names in their most proper significations; and, so as our ideas conform
or differ from them, they pass for true or false. And thus much concerning
the truth and falsehood of our ideas, in reference to their names.
13. As referred to real existence, none of our ideas can be false but
those of substances. Secondly, as to the truth and falsehood of our ideas,
in reference to the real existence of things. When that is made the standard
of their truth, none of them can be termed false but only our complex ideas
of substances.
14. Simple ideas in this sense not false, and why. First, our simple
ideas, being barely such perceptions as God has fitted us to receive, and
given power to external objects to produce in us by established laws and
ways, suitable to his wisdom and goodness, though incomprehensible to us,
their truth consists in nothing else but in such appearances as are produced
in us, and must be suitable to those powers he has placed in external objects
or else they could not be produced in us: and thus answering those powers,
they are what they should be, true ideas. Nor do they become liable to
any imputation of falsehood, if the mind (as in most men I believe it does)
judges these ideas to be in the things themselves. For God in his wisdom
having set them as marks of distinction in things, whereby we may be able
to discern one thing from another, and so choose any of them for our uses
as we have occasion; it alters not the nature of our simple idea, whether
we think that the idea of blue be in the violet itself, or in our mind
only; and only the power of producing it by the texture of its parts, reflecting
the particles of light after a certain manner, to be in the violet itself.
For that texture in the object, by a regular and constant operation producing
the same idea of blue in us, it serves us to distinguish, by our eyes,
that from any other thing; whether that distinguishing mark, as it is really
in the violet, be only a peculiar texture of parts, or else that very colour,
the idea whereof (which is in us) is the exact resemblance. And it is equally
from that appearance to be denominated blue, whether it be that real colour,
or only a peculiar texture in it, that causes in us that idea: since the
name, blue, notes properly nothing but that mark of distinction that is
in a violet, discernible only by our eyes, whatever it consists in; that
being beyond our capacities distinctly to know, and perhaps would be of
less use to us, if we had faculties to discern.
15. Though one man's idea of blue should be different from another's.
Neither would it carry any imputation of falsehood to our simple ideas,
if by the different structure of our organs it were so ordered, that the
same object should produce in several men's minds different ideas at the
same time; v.g. if the idea that a violet produced in one man's mind by
his eyes were the same that a marigold produced in another man's, and vice
versa. For, since this could never be known, because one man's mind could
not pass into another man's body, to perceive what appearances were produced
by those organs; neither the ideas hereby, nor the names, would be at all
confounded, or any falsehood be in either. For all things that had the
texture of a violet, producing constantly the idea that he called blue,
and those which had the texture of a marigold, producing constantly the
idea which he as constantly called yellow, whatever those appearances were
in his mind; he would be able as regularly to distinguish things for his
use by those appearances, and understand and signify those distinctions
marked by the name blue and yellow, as if the appearances or ideas in his
mind received from those two flowers were exactly the same with the ideas
in other men's minds. I am nevertheless very apt to think that the sensible
ideas produced by any object in different men's minds, are most commonly
very near and undiscernibly alike. For which opinion, I think, there might
be many reasons offered: but that being besides my present business, I
shall not trouble my reader with them; but only mind him, that the contrary
supposition, if it could be proved, is of little use, either for the improvement
of our knowledge, or conveniency of life, and so we need not trouble ourselves
to examine it.
16. Simple ideas can none of them be false in respect of real existence.
From what has been said concerning our simple ideas, I think it evident
that our simple ideas can none of them be false in respect of things existing
without us. For the truth of these appearances or perceptions in our minds
consisting, as has been said, only in their being answerable to the powers
in external objects to produce by our senses such appearances in us, and
each of them being in the mind such as it is, suitable to the power that
produced it, and which alone it represents, it cannot upon that account,
or as referred to such a pattern, be false. Blue and yellow, bitter or
sweet, can never be false ideas: these perceptions in the mind are just
such as they are there, answering the powers appointed by God to produce
them; and so are truly what they are, and are intended to be. Indeed the
names may be misapplied, but that in this respect makes no falsehood in
the ideas; as if a man ignorant in the English tongue should call purple
scarlet.
17. Modes not false cannot be false in reference to essences of things.
Secondly, neither can our complex ideas of modes, in reference to the essence
of anything really existing, be false; because whatever complex ideas I
have of any mode, it hath no reference to any pattern existing, and made
by nature; it is not supposed to contain in it any other ideas than what
it hath; nor to represent anything but such a complication of ideas as
it does. Thus, when I have the idea of such an action of a man who forbears
to afford himself such meat, drink, and clothing, and other conveniences
of life, as his riches and estate will be sufficient to supply and his
station requires, I have no false idea; but such an one as represents an
action, either as I find or imagine it, and so is capable of neither truth
nor falsehood. But when I give the name frugality or virtue to this action,
then it may be called a false idea, if thereby it be supposed to agree
with that idea to which, in propriety of speech, the name of frugality
doth belong, or to be conformable to that law which is the standard of
virtue and vice.
18. Ideas of substances may be false in reference to existing things.
Thirdly, our complex ideas of substances, being all referred to patterns
in things themselves, may be false. That they are all false, when looked
upon as the representations of the unknown essences of things, is so evident
that there needs nothing to be said of it. I shall therefore pass over
that chimerical supposition, and consider them as collections of simple
ideas in the mind, taken from combinations of simple ideas existing together
constantly in things, of which patterns they are the supposed copies; and
in this reference of them to the existence of things, they are false ideas:-
(1) When they put together simple ideas, which in the real existence of
things have no union; as when to the shape and size that exist together
in a horse, is joined in the same complex idea the power of barking like
a dog: which three ideas, however put together into one in the mind, were
never united in nature; and this, therefore, may be called a false idea
of a horse. (2) Ideas of substances are, in this respect, also false, when,
from any collection of simple ideas that do always exist together, there
is separated, by a direct negation, any other simple idea which is constantly
joined with them. Thus, if to extension, solidity, fusibility, the peculiar
weightiness, and yellow colour of gold, any one join in his thoughts the
negation of a greater degree of fixedness than is in lead or copper, he
may be said to have a false complex idea, as well as when he joins to those
other simple ones the idea of perfect absolute fixedness. For either way,
the complex idea of gold being made up of such simple ones as have no union
in nature, may be termed false. But, if he leave out of this his complex
idea that of fixedness quite, without either actually joining to or separating
it from the rest in his mind, it is, I think, to be looked on as an inadequate
and imperfect idea, rather than a false one; since, though it contains
not all the simple ideas that are united in nature, yet it puts none together
but what do really exist together.
19. Truth or falsehood always supposes affirmation or negation. Though,
in compliance with the ordinary way of speaking, I have shown in what sense
and upon what ground our ideas may be sometimes called true or false; yet
if we will look a little nearer into the matter, in all cases where any
idea is called true or false, it is from some judgment that the mind makes,
or is supposed to make, that is true or false. For truth or falsehood,
being never without some affirmation or negation, express or tacit, it
is not to be found but where signs are joined or separated, according to
the agreement or disagreement of the things they stand for. The signs we
chiefly use are either ideas or words; wherewith we make either mental
or verbal propositions. Truth lies in so joining or separating these representatives,
as the things they stand for do in themselves agree or disagree; and falsehood
in the contrary, as shall be more fully shown hereafter.
20. Ideas in themselves neither true nor false. Any idea, then, which
we have in our minds, whether conformable or not to the existence of things,
or to any idea in the minds of other men, cannot properly for this alone
be called false. For these representations, if they have nothing in them
but what is really existing in things without, cannot be thought false,
being exact representations of something: nor yet if they have anything
in them differing from the reality of things, can they properly be said
to be false representations, or ideas of things they do not represent.
But the mistake and falsehood is:
21. But are false- when judged agreeable to another man's idea, without
being so. First, when the mind having any idea, it judges and concludes
it the same that is in other men's minds, signified by the same name; or
that it is conformable to the ordinary received signification or definition
of that word, when indeed it is not: which is the most usual mistake in
mixed modes, though other ideas also are liable to it.
22. When judged to agree to real existence, when they do not. (2) When
it having a complex idea made up of such a collection of simple ones as
nature never puts together, it judges it to agree to a species of creatures
really existing; as when it joins the weight of tin to the colour, fusibility,
and fixedness of gold.
23. When judged adequate, without being so. (3) When in its complex
idea it has united a certain number of simple ideas that do really exist
together in some sort of creatures, but has also left out others as much
inseparable, it judges this to be a perfect complete idea of a sort of
things which really it is not; v.g. having joined the ideas of substance,
yellow, malleable, most heavy, and fusible, it takes that complex idea
to be the complete idea of gold, when yet its peculiar fixedness, and solubility
in aqua regia, are as inseparable from those other ideas, or qualities,
of that body as they are one from another.
24. When judged to represent the real essence. (4) The mistake is yet
greater, when I judge that this complex idea contains in it the real essence
of any body existing; when at least it contains but some few of those properties
which flow from its real essence and constitution. I say only some few
of those properties; for those properties consisting mostly in the active
and passive powers it has in reference to other things, all that are vulgarly
known of any one body, of which the complex idea of that kind of things
is usually made, are but a very few, in comparison of what a man that has
several ways tried and examined it knows of that one sort of things; and
all that the most expert man knows are but a few, in comparison of what
are really in that body, and depend on its internal or essential constitution.
The essence of a triangle lies in a very little compass, consists in a
very few ideas: three lines including a space make up that essence: but
the properties that flow from this essence are more than can be easily
known or enumerated. So I imagine it is in substances; their real essences
lie in a little compass, though the properties flowing from that internal
constitution are endless.
25. Ideas, when called false. To conclude, a man having no notion of
anything without him, but by the idea he has of it in his mind, (which
idea he has a power to call by what name he pleases), he may indeed make
an idea neither answering the reason of things, nor agreeing to the idea
commonly signified by other people's words; but cannot make a wrong or
false idea of a thing which is no otherwise known to him but by the idea
he has of it: v.g. when I frame an idea of the legs, arms, and body of
a man, and join to this a horse's head and neck, I do not make a false
idea of anything; because it represents nothing without me. But when I
call it a man or Tartar, and imagine it to represent some real being without
me, or to be the same idea that others call by the same name; in either
of these cases I may err. And upon this account it is that it comes to
be termed a false idea; though indeed the falsehood lies not in the idea,
but in that tacit mental proposition, wherein a conformity and resemblance
is attributed to it which it has not. But yet, if, having framed such an
idea in my mind without thinking either that existence, or the name man
or Tartar, belongs to it, I will call it man or Tartar, I may be justly
thought fantastical in the naming; but not erroneous in my judgment; nor
the idea any way false.
26. More properly to be called right or wrong. Upon the whole, matter,
I think that our ideas, as they are considered by the mind,- either in
reference to the proper signification of their names; or in reference to
the reality of things,- may very fitly be called right or wrong ideas,
according as they agree or disagree to those patterns to which they are
referred. But if any one had rather call them true or false, it is fit
he use a liberty, which every one has, to call things by those names he
thinks best; though, in propriety of speech, truth or falsehood will, I
think, scarce agree to them, but as they, some way or other, virtually
contain in them some mental proposition. The ideas that are in a man's
mind, simply considered, cannot be wrong; unless complex ones, wherein
inconsistent parts are jumbled together. All other ideas are in themselves
right, and the knowledge about them right and true knowledge; but when
we come to refer them to anything, as to their patterns and archetypes,
then they are capable of being wrong, as far as they disagree with such
archetypes.
Chapter XXXIII: Of the Association of Ideas
1. Something unreasonable in most men. There is scarce any one that does
not observe something that seems odd to him, and is in itself really extravagant,
in the opinions, reasonings, and actions of other men. The least flaw of
this kind, if at all different from his own, every one is quick-sighted
enough to espy in another, and will by the authority of reason forwardly
condemn; though he be guilty of much greater unreasonableness in his own
tenets and conduct, which he never perceives, and will very hardly, if
at all, be convinced of.
2. Not wholly from self-love. This proceeds not wholly from self-love,
though that has often a great hand in it. Men of fair minds, and not given
up to the overweening of self-flattery, are frequently guilty of it; and
in many cases one with amazement hears the arguings, and is astonished
at the obstinacy of a worthy man, who yields not to the evidence of reason,
though laid before him as clear as daylight.
3. Not from education. This sort of unreasonableness is usually imputed
to education and prejudice, and for the most part truly enough, though
that reaches not the bottom of the disease, nor shows distinctly enough
whence it rises, or wherein it lies. Education is often rightly assigned
for the cause, and prejudice is a good general name for the thing itself:
but yet, I think, he ought to look a little further, who would trace this
sort of madness to the root it springs from, and so explain it, as to show
whence this flaw has its original in very sober and rational minds, and
wherein it consists.
4. A degree of madness found in most men. I shall be pardoned for calling
it by so harsh a name as madness, when it is considered that opposition
to reason deserves that name, and is really madness; and there is scarce
a man so free from it, but that if he should always, on all occasions,
argue or do as in some cases he constantly does, would not be thought fitter
for Bedlam than civil conversation. I do not here mean when he is under
the power of an unruly passion, but in the steady calm course of his life.
That which will yet more apologize for this harsh name, and ungrateful
imputation on the greatest part of mankind, is, that, inquiring a little
by the bye into the nature of madness (Bk. ii. ch. xi. SS 13), I found
it to spring from the very same root, and to depend on the very same cause
we are here speaking of. This consideration of the thing itself, at a time
when I thought not the least on the subject which I am now treating of,
suggested it to me. And if this be a weakness to which all men are so liable,
if this be a taint which so universally infects mankind, the greater care
should be taken to lay it open under its due name, thereby to excite the
greater care in its prevention and cure.
5. From a wrong connexion of ideas. Some of our ideas have a natural
correspondence and connexion one with another: it is the office and excellency
of our reason to trace these, and hold them together in that union and
correspondence which is founded in their peculiar beings. Besides this,
there is another connexion of ideas wholly owing to chance or custom. Ideas
that in themselves are not all of kin, come to be so united in some men's
minds, that it is very hard to separate them; they always keep in company,
and the one no sooner at any time comes into the understanding, but its
associate appears with it; and if they are more than two which are thus
united, the whole gang, always inseparable, show themselves together.
6. This connexion made by custom. This strong combination of ideas,
not allied by nature, the mind makes in itself either voluntarily or by
chance; and hence it comes in different men to be very different, according
to their different inclinations, education, interests, &c. Custom settles
habits of thinking in the understanding, as well as of determining in the
will, and of motions in the body: all which seems to be but trains of motions
in the animal spirits, which, once set a going, continue in the same steps
they have used to; which, by often treading, are worn into a smooth path,
and the motion in it becomes easy, and as it were natural. As far as we
can comprehend thinking, thus ideas seem to be produced in our minds; or,
if they are not, this may serve to explain their following one another
in an habitual train, when once they are put into their track, as well
as it does to explain such motions of the body. A musician used to any
tune will find that, let it but once begin in his head, the ideas of the
several notes of it will follow one another orderly in his understanding,
without any care or attention, as regularly as his fingers move orderly
over the keys of the organ to play out the tune he has begun, though his
unattentive thoughts be elsewhere a wandering. Whether the natural cause
of these ideas, as well as of that regular dancing of his fingers be the
motion of his animal spirits, I will not determine, how probable soever,
by this instance, it appears to be so: but this may help us a little to
conceive of intellectual habits, and of the tying together of ideas.
7. Some antipathies an effect of it. That there are such associations
of them made by custom, in the minds of most men, I think nobody will question,
who has well considered himself or others; and to this, perhaps, might
be justly attributed most of the sympathies and antipathies observable
in men, which work as strongly, and produce as regular effects as if they
were natural; and are therefore called so, though they at first had no
other original but the accidental connexion of two ideas, which either
the strength of the first impression, or future indulgence so united, that
they always afterwards kept company together in that man's mind, as if
they were but one idea. I say most of the antipathies, I do not say all;
for some of them are truly natural, depend upon our original constitution,
and are born with us; but a great part of those which are counted natural,
would have been known to be from unheeded, though perhaps early, impressions,
or wanton fancies at first, which would have been acknowledged the original
of them, if they had been warily observed. A grown person surfeiting with
honey no sooner hears the name of it, but his fancy immediately carries
sickness and qualms to his stomach, and he cannot bear the very idea of
it; other ideas of dislike, and sickness, and vomiting, presently accompany
it, and he is disturbed; but he knows from whence to date this weakness,
and can tell how he got this indisposition. Had this happened to him by
an over-dose of honey when a child, all the same effects would have followed;
but the cause would have been mistaken, and the antipathy counted natural.
8. Influence of association to be watched educating young children.
I mention this, not out of any great necessity there is in this present
argument to distinguish nicely between natural and acquired antipathies;
but I take notice of it for another purpose, viz. that those who have children,
or the charge of their education, would think it worth their while diligently
to watch, and carefully to prevent the undue connexion of ideas in the
minds of young people. This is the time most susceptible of lasting impressions;
and though those relating to the health of the body are by discreet people
minded and fenced against, yet I am apt to doubt, that those which relate
more peculiarly to the mind, and terminate in the understanding or passions,
have been much less heeded than the thing deserves: nay, those relating
purely to the understanding, have, as I suspect, been by most men wholly
overlooked.
9. Wrong connexion of ideas a great cause of errors. This wrong connexion
in our minds of ideas in themselves loose and independent of one another,
has such an influence, and is of so great force to set us awry in our actions,
as well moral as natural, passions, reasonings, and notions themselves,
that perhaps there is not any one thing that deserves more to be looked
after.
10. An instance. The ideas of goblins and sprites have really no more
to do with darkness than light: yet let but a foolish maid inculcate these
often on the mind of a child, and raise them there together, possibly he
shall never be able to separate them again so long as he lives, but darkness
shall ever afterwards bring with it those frightful ideas, and they shall
be so joined, that he can no more bear the one than the other.
11. Another instance. A man receives a sensible injury from another,
thinks on the man and that action over and over, and by ruminating on them
strongly, or much, in his mind, so cements those two ideas together, that
he makes them almost one; never thinks on the man, but the pain and displeasure
he suffered comes into his mind with it, so that he scarce distinguishes
them, but has as much an aversion for the one as the other. Thus hatreds
are often begotten from slight and innocent occasions, and quarrels propagated
and continued in the world.
12. A third instance. A man has suffered pain or sickness in any place;
he saw his friend die in such a room: though these have in nature nothing
to do one with another, yet when the idea of the place occurs to his mind,
it brings (the impression being once made) that of the pain and displeasure
with it: he confounds them in his mind, and can as little bear the one
as the other.
13. Why time cures some disorders in the mind, which reason cannot cure.
When this combination is settled, and while it lasts, it is not in the
power of reason to help us, and relieve us from the effects of it. Ideas
in our minds, when they are there, will operate according to their natures
and circumstances. And here we see the cause why time cures certain affections,
which reason, though in the right, and allowed to be so, has not power
over, nor is able against them to prevail with those who are apt to hearken
to it in other cases. The death of a child that was the daily delight of
its mother's eyes, and joy of her soul, rends from her heart the whole
comfort of her life, and gives her all the torment imaginable: use the
consolations of reason in this case, and you were as good preach ease to
one on the rack, and hope to allay, by rational discourses, the pain of
his joints tearing asunder. Till time has by disuse separated the sense
of that enjoyment and its loss, from the idea of the child returning to
her memory, all representations, though ever so reasonable, are in vain;
and therefore some in whom the union between these ideas is never dissolved,
spend their lives in mourning, and carry an incurable sorrow to their graves.
14. Another instance of the effect of the association of ideas. A friend
of mine knew one perfectly cured of madness by a very harsh and offensive
operation. The gentleman who was thus recovered, with great sense of gratitude
and acknowledgment owned the cure all his life after, as the greatest obligation
he could have received; but, whatever gratitude and reason suggested to
him, he could never bear the sight of the operator: that image brought
back with it the idea of that agony which he suffered from his hands, which
was too mighty and intolerable for him to endure.
15. More instances. Many children, imputing the pain they endured at
school to their books they were corrected for, so join those ideas together,
that a book becomes their aversion, and they are never reconciled to the
study and use of them all their lives after; and thus reading becomes a
torment to them, which otherwise possibly they might have made the great
pleasure of their lives. There are rooms convenient enough, that some men
cannot study in, and fashions of vessels, which, though ever so clean and
commodious, they cannot drink out of, and that by reason of some accidental
ideas which are annexed to them, and make them offensive; and who is there
that hath not observed some man to flag at the appearance, or in the company
of some certain person not otherwise superior to him, but because, having
once on some occasion got the ascendant, the idea of authority and distance
goes along with that of the person, and he that has been thus subjected,
is not able to separate them.
16. A curious instance. Instances of this kind are so plentiful everywhere,
that if I add one more, it is only for the pleasant oddness of it. It is
of a young gentleman, who, having learnt to dance, and that to great perfection,
there happened to stand an old trunk in the room where he learnt. The idea
of this remarkable piece of household stuff had so mixed itself with the
turns and steps of all his dances, that though in that chamber he could
dance excellently well, yet it was only whilst that trunk was there; nor
could he perform well in any other place, unless that or some such other
trunk had its due position in the room. If this story shall be suspected
to be dressed up with some comical circumstances, a little beyond precise
nature, I answer for myself that I had it some years since from a very
sober and worthy man, upon his own knowledge, as I report it; and I dare
say there are very few inquisitive persons who read this, who have not
met with accounts, if not examples, of this nature, that may parallel,
or at least justify this.
17. Influence of association on intellectual habits. Intellectual habits
and defects this way contracted, are not less frequent and powerful, though
less observed. Let the ideas of being and matter be strongly joined, either
by education or much thought; whilst these are still combined in the mind,
what notions, what reasonings, will there be about separate spirits? Let
custom from the very childhood have joined figure and shape to the idea
of God, and what absurdities will that mind be liable to about the Deity?
Let the idea of infallibility be inseparably joined to any person, and
these two constantly together possess the mind; and then one body in two
places at once, shall unexamined be swallowed for a certain truth, by an
implicit faith, whenever that imagined infallible person dictates and demands
assent without inquiry.
18. Observable in the opposition between different sects of philosophy
and of religion. Some such wrong and unnatural combinations of ideas will
be found to establish the irreconcilable opposition between different sects
of philosophy and religion; for we cannot imagine every one of their followers
to impose wilfully on himself, and knowingly refuse truth offered by plain
reason. Interest, though it does a great deal in the case, yet cannot be
thought to work whole societies of men to so universal a perverseness,
as that every one of them to a man should knowingly maintain falsehood:
some at least must be allowed to do what all pretend to, i.e. to pursue
truth sincerely; and therefore there must be something that blinds their
understandings, and makes them not see the falsehood of what they embrace
for real truth. That which thus captivates their reasons, and leads men
of sincerity blindfold from common sense, will, when examined, be found
to be what we are speaking of: some independent ideas, of no alliance to
one another, are, by education, custom, and the constant din of their party,
so coupled in their minds, that they always appear there together; and
they can no more separate them in their thoughts than if they were but
one idea, and they operate as if they were so. This gives sense to jargon,
demonstration to absurdities, and consistency to nonsense, and is the foundation
of the greatest, I had almost said of all the errors in the world; or,
if it does not reach so far, it is at least the most dangerous one, since,
so far as it obtains, it hinders men from seeing and examining. When two
things, in themselves disjoined, appear to the sight constantly united;
if the eye sees these things riveted which are loose, where will you begin
to rectify the mistakes that follow in two ideas that they have been accustomed
so to join in their minds as to substitute one for the other, and, as I
am apt to think, often without perceiving it themselves? This, whilst they
are under the deceit of it, makes them incapable of conviction, and they
applaud themselves as zealous champions for truth, when indeed they are
contending for error; and the confusion of two different ideas, which a
customary connexion of them in their minds hath to them made in effect
but one, fills their heads with false views, and their reasonings with
false consequences.
19. Conclusion. Having thus given an account of the original, sorts,
and extent of our IDEAS, with several other considerations about these
(I know not whether I may say) instruments, or materials of our knowledge,
the method I at first proposed to myself would now require that I should
immediately proceed to show, what use the understanding makes of them,
and what KNOWLEDGE we have by them. This was that which, in the first general
view I had of this subject, was all that I thought I should have to do:
but, upon a nearer approach, I find that there is so close a connexion
between ideas and WORDS, and our abstract ideas and general words have
so constant a relation one to another, that it is impossible to speak clearly
and distinctly of our knowledge, which all consists in propositions, without
considering, first, the nature, use, and signification of Language; which,
therefore, must be the business of the next Book.
BOOK III: Of Words
Chapter I: Of Words or Language in General
1. Man fitted to form articulate sounds. God, having designed man for a
sociable creature, made him not only with an inclination, and under a necessity
to have fellowship with those of his own kind, but furnished him also with
language, which was to be the great instrument and common tie of society.
Man, therefore, had by nature his organs so fashioned, as to be fit to
frame articulate sounds, which we call words. But this was not enough to
produce language; for parrots, and several other birds, will be taught
to make articulate sounds distinct enough, which yet by no means are capable
of language.
2. To use these sounds as signs of ideas. Besides articulate sounds,
therefore, it was further necessary that he should be able to use these
sounds as signs of internal conceptions; and to make them stand as marks
for the ideas within his own mind, whereby they might be made known to
others, and the thoughts of men's minds be conveyed from one to another.
3. To make them general signs. But neither was this sufficient to make
words so useful as they ought to be. It is not enough for the perfection
of language, that sounds can be made signs of ideas, unless those signs
can be so made use of as to comprehend several particular things: for the
multiplication of words would have perplexed their use, had every particular
thing need of a distinct name to be signified by. To remedy this inconvenience,
language had yet a further improvement in the use of general terms, whereby
one word was made to mark a multitude of particular existences: which advantageous
use of sounds was obtained only by the difference of the ideas they were
made signs of: those names becoming general, which are made to stand for
general ideas, and those remaining particular, where the ideas they are
used for are particular.
4. To make them signify the absence of positive ideas. Besides these
names which stand for ideas, there be other words which men make use of,
not to signify any idea, but the want or absence of some ideas, simple
or complex, or all ideas together; such as are nihil in Latin, and in English,
ignorance and barrenness. All which negative or privative words cannot
be said properly to belong to, or signify no ideas: for then they would
be perfectly insignificant sounds; but they relate to positive ideas, and
signify their absence.
5. Words ultimately derived from such as signify sensible ideas. It
may also lead us a little towards the original of all our notions and knowledge,
if we remark how great a dependence our words have on common sensible ideas;
and how those which are made use of to stand for actions and notions quite
removed from sense, have their rise from thence, and from obvious sensible
ideas are transferred to more abstruse significations, and made to stand
for ideas that come not under the cognizance of our senses; v.g. to imagine,
apprehend, comprehend, adhere, conceive, instil, disgust, disturbance,
tranquillity, &c., are all words taken from the operations of sensible
things, and applied to certain modes of thinking. Spirit, in its primary
signification, is breath; angel, a messenger: and I doubt not but, if we
could trace them to their sources, we should find, in all languages, the
names which stand for things that fall not under our senses to have had
their first rise from sensible ideas. By which we may give some kind of
guess what kind of notions they were, and whence derived, which filled
their minds who were the first beginners of languages, and how nature,
even in the naming of things, unawares suggested to men the originals and
principles of all their knowledge: whilst, to give names that might make
known to others any operations they felt in themselves, or any other ideas
that came not under their senses, they were fain to borrow words from ordinary
known ideas of sensation, by that means to make others the more easily
to conceive those operations they experimented in themselves, which made
no outward sensible appearances; and then, when they had got known and
agreed names to signify those internal operations of their own minds, they
were sufficiently furnished to make known by words all their other ideas;
since they could consist of nothing but either of outward sensible perceptions,
or of the inward operations of their minds about them; we having, as has
been proved, no ideas at all, but what originally come either from sensible
objects without, or what we feel within ourselves, from the inward workings
of our own spirits, of which we are conscious to ourselves within.
6. Distribution of subjects to be treated of. But to understand better
the use and force of Language, as subservient to instruction and knowledge,
it will be convenient to consider:
First, To what it is that names, in the use of language, are immediately
applied.
Secondly, Since all (except proper) names are general, and so stand
not particularly for this or that single thing, but for sorts and ranks
of things, it will be necessary to consider, in the next place, what the
sorts and kinds, or, if you rather like the Latin names, what the Species
and Genera of things are, wherein they consist, and how they come to be
made. These being (as they ought) well looked into, we shall the better
come to find the right use of words; the natural advantages and defects
of language; and the remedies that ought to be used, to avoid the inconveniences
of obscurity or uncertainty in the signification of words: without which
it is impossible to discourse with any clearness or order concerning knowledge:
which, being conversant about propositions, and those most commonly universal
ones, has greater connexion with words than perhaps is suspected.
These considerations, therefore, shall be the matter of the following
chapters.
Chapter II: Of the Signification of Words
1. Words are sensible signs, necessary for communication of ideas. Man,
though he have great variety of thoughts, and such from which others as
well as himself might receive profit and delight; yet they are all within
his own breast, invisible and hidden from others, nor can of themselves
be made to appear. The comfort and advantage of society not being to be
had without communication of thoughts, it was necessary that man should
find out some external sensible signs, whereof those invisible ideas, which
his thoughts are made up of, might be made known to others. For this purpose
nothing was so fit, either for plenty or quickness, as those articulate
sounds, which with so much ease and variety he found himself able to make.
Thus we may conceive how words, which were by nature so well adapted to
that purpose, came to be made use of by men as the signs of their ideas;
not by any natural connexion that there is between particular articulate
sounds and certain ideas, for then there would be but one language amongst
all men; but by a voluntary imposition, whereby such a word is made arbitrarily
the mark of such an idea. The use, then, of words, is to be sensible marks
of ideas; and the ideas they stand for are their proper and immediate signification.
2. Words, in their immediate signification, are the sensible signs of
his ideas who uses them. The use men have of these marks being either to
record their own thoughts, for the assistance of their own memory or, as
it were, to bring out their ideas, and lay them before the view of others:
words, in their primary or immediate signification, stand for nothing but
the ideas in the mind of him that uses them, how imperfectly soever or
carelessly those ideas are collected from the things which they are supposed
to represent. When a man speaks to another, it is that he may be understood:
and the end of speech is, that those sounds, as marks, may make known his
ideas to the hearer. That then which words are the marks of are the ideas
of the speaker: nor can any one apply them as marks, immediately, to anything
else but the ideas that he himself hath: for this would be to make them
signs of his own conceptions, and yet apply them to other ideas; which
would be to make them signs and not signs of his ideas at the same time,
and so in effect to have no signification at all. Words being voluntary
signs, they cannot be voluntary signs imposed by him on things he knows
not. That would be to make them signs of nothing, sounds without signification.
A man cannot make his words the signs either of qualities in things, or
of conceptions in the mind of another, whereof he has none in his own.
Till he has some ideas of his own, he cannot suppose them to correspond
with the conceptions of another man; nor can he use any signs for them
of another man; nor can he use any signs for them: for thus they would
be the signs of he knows not what, which is in truth to be the signs of
nothing. But when he represents to himself other men's ideas by some of
his own, if he consent to give them the same names that other men do, it
is still to his own ideas; to ideas that he has, and not to ideas that
he has not.
3. Examples of this. This is so necessary in the use of language, that
in this respect the knowing and the ignorant, the learned and the unlearned,
use the words they speak (with any meaning) all alike. They, in every man's
mouth, stand for the ideas he has, and which he would express by them.
A child having taken notice of nothing in the metal he hears called gold,
but the bright shining yellow colour, he applies the word gold only to
his own idea of that colour, and nothing else; and therefore calls the
same colour in a peacock's tail gold. Another that hath better observed,
adds to shining yellow great weight: and then the sound gold, when he uses
it, stands for a complex idea of a shining yellow and a very weighty substance.
Another adds to those qualities fusibility: and then the word gold signifies
to him a body, bright, yellow, fusible, and very heavy. Another adds malleability.
Each of these uses equally the word gold, when they have occasion to express
the idea which they have applied it to: but it is evident that each can
apply it only to his own idea; nor can he make it stand as a sign of such
a complex idea as he has not.
4. Words are often secretly referred first to the ideas supposed to
be in other men's minds. But though words, as they are used by men, can
properly and immediately signify nothing but the ideas that are in the
mind of the speaker; yet they in their thoughts give them a secret reference
to two other things.
First, They suppose their words to be marks of the ideas in the minds
also of other men, with whom they communicate: for else they should talk
in vain, and could not be understood, if the sounds they applied to one
idea were such as by the hearer were applied to another, which is to speak
two languages. But in this men stand not usually to examine, whether the
idea they, and those they discourse with have in their minds be the same:
but think it enough that they use the word, as they imagine, in the common
acceptation of that language; in which they suppose that the idea they
make it a sign of is precisely the same to which the understanding men
of that country apply that name.
5. To the reality of things. Secondly, Because men would not be thought
to talk barely of their own imagination, but of things as really they are;
therefore they often suppose the words to stand also for the reality of
things. But this relating more particularly to substances and their names,
as perhaps the former does to simple ideas and modes, we shall speak of
these two different ways of applying words more at large, when we come
to treat of the names of mixed modes and substances in particular: though
give me leave here to say, that it is a perverting the use of words, and
brings unavoidable obscurity and confusion into whenever we make them stand
for anything but those ideas we have in our own minds.
6. Words by use readily excite ideas of their objects. Concerning words,
also, it is further to be considered:
First, that they being immediately the signs of men's ideas, and by
that means the instruments whereby men communicate their conceptions, and
express to one another those thoughts and imaginations they have within
their own their own breasts; there comes, by constant use, to be such a
connexion between certain sounds and the ideas they stand for, that the
names heard, almost as readily excite certain ideas as if the objects themselves,
which are apt to produce them, did actually affect the senses. Which is
manifestly so in all obvious sensible qualities, and in all substances
that frequently and familiarly occur to us.
7. Words are often used without signification, and why. Secondly, That
though the proper and immediate signification of words are ideas in the
mind of the speaker, yet, because by familiar use from our cradles, we
come to learn certain articulate sounds very perfectly, and have them readily
on our tongues, and always at hand in our memories, but yet are not always
careful to examine or settle their significations perfectly; it often happens
that men, even when they would apply themselves to an attentive consideration,
do set their thoughts more on words than things. Nay, because words are
many of them learned before the ideas are known for which they stand: therefore
some, not only children but men, speak several words no otherwise than
parrots do, only because they have learned them, and have been accustomed
to those sounds. But so far as words are of use and signification, so far
is there a constant connexion between the sound and the idea, and a designation
that the one stands for the other; without which application of them, they
are nothing but so much insignificant noise.
8. Their signification perfectly arbitrary, not the consequence of a
natural connexion. Words, by long and familiar use, as has been said, come
to excite in men certain ideas so constantly and readily, that they are
apt to suppose a natural connexion between them. But that they signify
only men's peculiar ideas, and that by a perfect arbitrary imposition,
is evident, in that they often fail to excite in others (even that use
the same language) the same ideas we take them to be signs of: and every
man has so inviolable a liberty to make words stand for what ideas he pleases,
that no one hath the power to make others have the same ideas in their
minds that he has, when they use the same words that he does. And therefore
the great Augustus himself, in the possession of that power which ruled
the world, acknowledged he could not make a new Latin word: which was as
much as to say, that he could not arbitrarily appoint what idea any sound
should be a sign of, in the mouths and common language of his subjects.
It is true, common use, by a tacit consent, appropriates certain sounds
to certain ideas in all languages, which so far limits the signification
of that sound, that unless a man applies it to the same idea, he does not
speak properly: and let me add, that unless a man's words excite the same
ideas in the hearer which he makes them stand for in speaking, he does
not speak intelligibly. But whatever be the consequence of any man's using
of words differently, either from their general meaning, or the particular
sense of the person to whom he addresses them; this is certain, their signification,
in his use of them, is limited to his ideas, and they can be signs of nothing
else.
Chapter III: Of General Terms
1. The greatest part of words are general terms. All things that exist
being particulars, it may perhaps be thought reasonable that words, which
ought to be conformed to things, should be so too,- I mean in their signification:
but yet we find quite the contrary. The far greatest part of words that
make all languages are general terms: which has not been the effect of
neglect or chance, but of reason and necessity.
2. That every particular thing should have a name for itself is impossible.
First, It is impossible that every particular thing should have a distinct
peculiar name. For, the signification and use of words depending on that
connexion which the mind makes between its ideas and the sounds it uses
as signs of them, it is necessary, in the application of names to things,
that the mind should have distinct ideas of the things, and retain also
the particular name that belongs to every one, with its peculiar appropriation
to that idea. But it is beyond the power of human capacity to frame and
retain distinct ideas of all the particular things we meet with: every
bird and beast men saw; every tree and plant that affected the senses,
could not find a place in the most capacious understanding. If it be looked
on as an instance of a prodigious memory, that some generals have been
able to call every soldier in their army by his proper name, we may easily
find a reason why men have never attempted to give names to each sheep
in their flock, or crow that flies over their heads; much less to call
every leaf of plants, or grain of sand that came in their way, by a peculiar
name.
3. And would be useless, if it were possible. Secondly, If it were possible,
it would yet be useless; because it would not serve to the chief end of
language. Men would in vain heap up names of particular things, that would
not serve them to communicate their thoughts. Men learn names, and use
them in talk with others, only that they may be understood: which is then
only done when, by use or consent, the sound I make by the organs of speech,
excites in another man's mind who hears it, the idea I apply it to in mine,
when I speak it. This cannot be done by names applied to particular things;
whereof I alone having the ideas in my mind, the names of them could not
be significant or intelligible to another, who was not acquainted with
all those very particular things which had fallen under my notice.
4. A distinct name for every particular thing, not fitted for enlargement
of knowledge. Thirdly, But yet, granting this also feasible, (which I think
is not), yet a distinct name for every particular thing would not be of
any great use for the improvement of knowledge: which, though founded in
particular things, enlarges itself by general views; to which things reduced
into sorts, under general names, are properly subservient. These, with
the names belonging to them, come within some compass, and do not multiply
every moment, beyond what either the mind can contain, or use requires.
And therefore, in these, men have for the most part stopped: but yet not
so as to hinder themselves from distinguishing particular things by appropriated
names, where convenience demands it. And therefore in their own species,
which they have most to do with, and wherein they have often occasion to
mention particular persons, they make use of proper names; and there distinct
individuals have distinct denominations.
5. What things have proper names, and why. Besides persons, countries
also, cities, rivers, mountains, and other the like distinctions of place
have usually found peculiar names, and that for the same reason; they being
such as men have often an occasion to mark particularly, and, as it were,
set before others in their discourses with them. And I doubt not but, if
we had reason to mention particular horses as often as we have to mention
particular men, we should have proper names for the one, as familiar as
for the other, and Bucephalus would be a word as much in use as Alexander.
And therefore we see that, amongst jockeys, horses have their proper names
to be known and distinguished by, as commonly as their servants: because,
amongst them, there is often occasion to mention this or that particular
horse when he is out of sight.
6. How general words are made. The next thing to be considered is,-
How general words come to be made. For, since all things that exist are
only particulars, how come we by general terms; or where find we those
general natures they are supposed to stand for? Words become general by
being made the signs of general ideas: and ideas become general, by separating
from them the circumstances of time and place, and any other ideas that
may determine them to this or that particular existence. By this way of
abstraction they are made capable of representing more individuals than
one; each of which having in it a conformity to that abstract idea, is
(as we call it) of that sort.
7. Shown by the way we enlarge our complex ideas from infancy. But,
to deduce this a little more distinctly, it will not perhaps be amiss to
trace our notions and names from their beginning, and observe by what degrees
we proceed, and by what steps we enlarge our ideas from our first infancy.
There is nothing more evident, than that the ideas of the persons children
converse with (to instance in them alone) are, like the persons themselves,
only particular. The ideas of the nurse and the mother are well framed
in their minds; and, like pictures of them there, represent only those
individuals. The names they first gave to them are confined to these individuals;
and the names of nurse and mamma, the child uses, determine themselves
to those persons. Afterwards, when time and a larger acquaintance have
made them observe that there are a great many other things in the world,
that in some common agreements of shape, and several other qualities, resemble
their father and mother, and those persons they have been used to, they
frame an idea, which they find those many particulars do partake in; and
to that they give, with others, the name man, for example. And thus they
come to have a general name, and a general idea. Wherein they make nothing
new; but only leave out of the complex idea they had of Peter and James,
Mary and Jane, that which is peculiar to each, and retain only what is
common to them all.
8. And further enlarge our complex ideas, by still leaving out properties
contained in them. By the same way that they come by the general name and
idea of man, they easily advance to more general names and notions. For,
observing that several things that differ from their idea of man, and cannot
therefore be comprehended under that name, have yet certain qualities wherein
they agree with man, by retaining only those qualities, and uniting them
into one idea, they have again another and more general idea; to which
having given a name they make a term of a more comprehensive extension:
which new idea is made, not by any new addition, but only as before, by
leaving out the shape, and some other properties signified by the name
man, and retaining only a body, with life, sense, and spontaneous motion,
comprehended under the name animal.
9. General natures are nothing but abstract and partial ideas of more
complex ones. That this is the way whereby men first formed general ideas,
and general names to them, I think is so evident, that there needs no other
proof of it but the considering of a man's self, or others, and the ordinary
proceedings of their minds in knowledge. And he that thinks general natures
or notions are anything else but such abstract and partial ideas of more
complex ones, taken at first from particular existences, will, I fear,
be at a loss where to find them. For let any one effect, and then tell
me, wherein does his idea of man differ from that of Peter and Paul, or
his idea of horse from that of Bucephalus, but in the leaving out something
that is peculiar to each individual, and retaining so much of those particular
complex ideas of several particular existences as they are found to agree
in? Of the complex ideas signified by the names man and horse, leaving
out but those particulars wherein they differ, and retaining only those
wherein they agree, and of those making a new distinct complex idea, and
giving the name animal to it, one has a more general term, that comprehends
with man several other creatures. Leave out of the idea of animal, sense
and spontaneous motion, and the remaining complex idea, made up of the
remaining simple ones of body, life, and nourishment, becomes a more general
one, under the more comprehensive term, vivens. And, not to dwell longer
upon this particular, so evident in itself; by the same way the mind proceeds
to body, substance, and at last to being, thing, and such universal terms,
which stand for any of our ideas whatsoever. To conclude: this whole mystery
of genera and species, which make such a noise in the schools, and are
with justice so little regarded out of them, is nothing else but abstract
ideas, more or less comprehensive, with names annexed to them. In all which
this is constant and unvariable, That every more general term stands for
such an idea, and is but a part of any of those contained under it.
10. Why the genus is ordinarily made use of in definitions. This may
show us the reason why, in the defining of words, which is nothing but
declaring their signification, we make use of the genus, or next general
word that comprehends it. Which is not out of necessity, but only to save
the labour of enumerating the several simple ideas which the next general
word or genus stands for; or, perhaps, sometimes the shame of not being
able to do it. But though defining by genus and differentia (I crave leave
to use these terms of art, though originally Latin, since they most properly
suit those notions they are applied to), I say, though defining by the
genus be the shortest way, yet I think it may be doubted whether it be
the best. This I am sure, it is not the only, and so not absolutely necessary.
For, definition being nothing but making another understand by words what
idea the term defined stands for, a definition is best made by enumerating
those simple ideas that are combined in the signification of the term defined:
and if, instead of such an enumeration, men have accustomed themselves
to use the next general term, it has not been out of necessity, or for
greater clearness, but for quickness and dispatch sake. For I think that,
to one who desired to know what idea the word man stood for; if it should
be said, that man was a solid extended substance, having life, sense, spontaneous
motion, and the faculty of reasoning, I doubt not but the meaning of the
term man would be as well understood, and the idea it stands for be at
least as clearly made known, as when it is defined to be a rational animal:
which, by the several definitions of animal, vivens, and corpus, resolves
itself into those enumerated ideas. I have, in explaining the term man,
followed here the ordinary definition of the schools; which, though perhaps
not the most exact, yet serves well enough to my present purpose. And one
may, in this instance, see what gave occasion to the rule, that a definition
must consist of genus and differentia; and it suffices to show us the little
necessity there is of such a rule, or advantage in the strict observing
of it. For, definitions, as has been said, being only the explaining of
one word by several others, so that the meaning or idea it stands for may
be certainly known; languages are not always so made according to the rules
of logic, that every term can have its signification exactly and clearly
expressed by two others. Experience sufficiently satisfies us to the contrary;
or else those who have made this rule have done ill, that they have given
us so few definitions conformable to it. But of definitions more in the
next chapter.
11. General and universal are creatures of the understanding, and belong
not to the real existence of things. To return to general words: it is
plain, by what has been said, that general and universal belong not to
the real existence of things; but are the inventions and creatures of the
understanding, made by it for its own use, and concern only signs, whether
words or ideas. Words are general, as has been said, when used for signs
of general ideas, and so are applicable indifferently to many particular
things; and ideas are general when they are set up as the representatives
of many particular things: but universality belongs not to things themselves,
which are all of them particular in their existence, even those words and
ideas which in their signification are general. When therefore we quit
particulars, the generals that rest are only creatures of our own making;
their general nature being nothing but the capacity they are put into,
by the understanding, of signifying or representing many particulars. For
the signification they have is nothing but a relation that, by the mind
of man, is added to them.
12. Abstract ideas are the essences of genera and species. The next
thing therefore to be considered is, What kind of signification it is that
general words have. For, as it is evident that they do not signify barely
one particular thing; for then they would not be general terms, but proper
names, so, on the other side, it is as evident they do not signify a plurality;
for man and men would then signify the same; and the distinction of numbers
(as the grammarians call them) would be superfluous and useless. That then
which general words signify is a sort of things; and each of them does
that, by being a sign of an abstract idea in the mind; to which idea, as
things existing are found to agree, so they come to be ranked under that
name, or, which is all one, be of that sort. Whereby it is evident that
the essences of the sorts, or, if the Latin word pleases better, species
of things, are nothing else but these abstract ideas. For the having the
essence of any species, being that which makes anything to be of that species;
and the conformity to the idea to which the name is annexed being that
which gives a right to that name; the having the essence, and the having
that conformity, must needs be the same thing: since to be of any species,
and to have a right to the name of that species, is all one. As, for example,
to be a man, or of the species man, and to have right to the name man,
is the same thing. Again, to be a man, or of the species man, and have
the essence of a man, is the same thing. Now, since nothing can be a man,
or have a right to the name man, but what has a conformity to the abstract
idea the name man stands for, nor anything be a man, or have a right to
the species man, but what has the essence of that species; it follows,
that the abstract idea for which the name stands, and the essence of the
species, is one and the same. From whence it is easy to observe, that the
essences of the sorts of things, and, consequently, the sorting of things,
is the workmanship of the understanding that abstracts and makes those
general ideas.
13. They are the workmanship of the understanding, but have their foundation
in the similitude of things. I would not here be thought to forget, much
less to deny, that Nature, in the production of things, makes several of
them alike: there is nothing more obvious, especially in the race of animals,
and all things propagated by seed. But yet I think we may say, the sorting
of them under names is the workmanship of the understanding, taking occasion,
from the similitude it observes amongst them, to make abstract general
ideas, and set them up in the mind, with names annexed to them, as patterns
or forms, (for, in that sense, the word form has a very proper signification,)
to which as particular things existing are found to agree, so they come
to be of that species, have that denomination, or are put into that classis.
For when we say this is a man, that a horse; this justice, that cruelty;
this a watch, that a jack; what do we else but rank things under different
specific names, as agreeing to those abstract ideas, of which we have made
those names the signs? And what are the essences of those species set out
and marked by names, but those abstract ideas in the mind; which are, as
it were, the bonds between particular things that exist, and the names
they are to be ranked under? And when general names have any connexion
with particular beings, these abstract ideas are the medium that unites
them: so that the essences of species, as distinguished and denominated
by us, neither are nor can be anything but those precise abstract ideas
we have in our minds. And therefore the supposed real essences of substances,
if different from our abstract ideas, cannot be the essences of the species
we rank things into. For two species may be one, as rationally as two different
essences be the essence of one species: and I demand what are the alterations
[which] may, or may not be made in a horse or lead, without making either
of them to be of another species? In determining the species of things
by our abstract ideas, this is easy to resolve: but if any one will regulate
himself herein by supposed real essences, he will, I suppose, be at a loss:
and he will never be able to know when anything precisely ceases to be
of the species of a horse or lead.
14. Each distinct abstract idea is a distinct essence. Nor will any
one wonder that I say these essences, or abstract ideas (which are the
measures of name, and the boundaries of species) are the workmanship of
the understanding, who considers that at least the complex ones are often,
in several men, different collections of simple ideas; and therefore that
is covetousness to one man, which is not so to another. Nay, even in substances,
where their abstract ideas seem to be taken from the things themselves,
they are not constantly the same; no, not in that species which is most
familiar to us, and with which we have the most intimate acquaintance:
it having been more than once doubted, whether the foetus born of a woman
were a man, even so far as that it hath been debated, whether it were or
were not to be nourished and baptized: which could not be, if the abstract
idea or essence to which the name man belonged were of nature's making;
and were not the uncertain and various collection of simple ideas, which
the understanding put together, and then, abstracting it, affixed a name
to it. So that, in truth, every distinct abstract idea is a distinct essence;
and the names that stand for such distinct ideas are the names of things
essentially different. Thus a circle is as essentially different from an
oval as a sheep from a goat; and rain is as essentially different from
snow as water from earth: that abstract idea which is the essence of one
being impossible to be communicated to the other. And thus any two abstract
ideas, that in any part vary one from another, with two distinct names
annexed to them, constitute two distinct sorts, or, if you please, species,
as essentially different as any two of the most remote or opposite in the
world.
15. Several significations of the word "essence." But since the essences
of things are thought by some (and not without reason) to be wholly unknown,
it may not be amiss to consider the several significations of the word
essence.
Real essences. First, Essence may be taken for the very being of anything,
whereby it is what it is. And thus the real internal, but generally (in
substances) unknown constitution of things, whereon their discoverable
qualities depend, may be called their essence. This is the proper original
signification of the word, as is evident from the formation of it; essentia,
in its primary notation, signifying properly, being. And in this sense
it is still used, when we speak of the essence of particular things, without
giving them any name.
Nominal essences. Secondly, The learning and disputes of the schools
having been much busied about genus and species, the word essence has almost
lost its primary signification: and, instead of the real constitution of
things, has been almost wholly applied to the artificial constitution of
genus and species. It is true, there is ordinarily supposed a real constitution
of the sorts of things; and it is past doubt there must be some real constitution,
on which any collection of simple ideas co-existing must depend. But, it
being evident that things are ranked under names into sorts or species,
only as they agree to certain abstract ideas, to which we have annexed
those names, the essence of each genus, or sort, comes to be nothing but
that abstract idea which the general, or sortal (if I may have leave so
to call it from sort, as I do general from genus), name stands for. And
this we shall find to be that which the word essence imports in its most
familiar use.
These two sorts of essences, I suppose, may not unfitly be termed, the
one the real, the other nominal essence.
16. Constant connexion between the name and nominal essence. Between
the nominal essence and the name there is so near a connexion, that the
name of any sort of things cannot be attributed to any particular being
but what has this essence, whereby it answers that abstract idea whereof
that name is the sign.
17. Supposition, that species are distinguished by their real essences,
useless. Concerning the real essences of corporeal substances (to mention
these only) there are, if I mistake not, two opinions. The one is of those
who, using the word essence for they know not what, suppose a certain number
of those essences, according to which all natural things are made, and
wherein they do exactly every one of them partake, and so become of this
or that species. The other and more rational opinion is of those who look
on all natural things to have a real, but unknown, constitution of their
insensible parts; from which flow those sensible qualities which serve
us to distinguish them one from another, according as we have occasion
to rank them into sorts, under common denominations. The former of these
opinions, which supposes these essences as a certain number of forms or
moulds, wherein all natural things that exist are cast, and do equally
partake, has, I imagine, very much perplexed the knowledge of natural things.
The frequent productions of monsters, in all the species of animals, and
of changelings, and other strange issues of human birth, carry with them
difficulties, not possible to consist with this hypothesis; since it is
as impossible that two things partaking exactly of the same real essence
should have different properties, as that two figures partaking of the
same real essence of a circle should have different properties. But were
there no other reason against it, yet the supposition of essences that
cannot be known; and the making of them, nevertheless, to be that which
distinguishes the species of things, is so wholly useless and unserviceable
to any part of our knowledge, that that alone were sufficient to make us
lay it by, and content ourselves with such essences of the sorts or species
of things as come within the reach of our knowledge: which, when seriously
considered, will be found, as I have said, to be nothing else but, those
abstract complex ideas to which we have annexed distinct general names.
18. Real and nominal essence the same in simple ideas and modes, different
in substances. Essences being thus distinguished into nominal and real,
we may further observe, that, in the species of simple ideas and modes,
they are always the same; but in substances always quite different. Thus,
a figure including a space between three lines, is the real as well as
nominal essence of a triangle; it being not only the abstract idea to which
the general name is annexed, but the very essentia or being of the thing
itself; that foundation from which all its properties flow, and to which
they are all inseparably annexed. But it is far otherwise concerning that
parcel of matter which makes the ring on my finger; wherein these two essences
are apparently different. For, it is the real constitution of its insensible
parts, on which depend all those properties of colour, weight, fusibility,
fixedness, &c., which are to be found in it; which constitution we
know not, and so, having no particular idea of, having no name that is
the sign of it. But yet it is its colour, weight, fusibility, fixedness,
&c., which makes it to be gold, or gives it a right to that name, which
is therefore its nominal essence. Since nothing can be called gold but
what has a conformity of qualities to that abstract complex idea to which
that name is annexed. But this distinction of essences, belonging particularly
to substances, we shall, when we come to consider their names, have an
occasion to treat of more fully.
19. Essences ingenerable and incorruptible. That such abstract ideas,
with names to them, as we have been speaking of are essences, may further
appear by what we are told concerning essences, viz. that they are all
ingenerable and incorruptible. Which cannot be true of the real constitutions
of things, which begin and perish with them. All things that exist, besides
their Author, are all liable to change; especially those things we are
acquainted with, and have ranked into bands under distinct names or ensigns.
Thus, that which was grass to-day is to-morrow the flesh of a sheep; and,
within a few days after, becomes part of a man: in all which and the like
changes, it is evident their real essence- i.e. that constitution whereon
the properties of these several things depended- is destroyed, and perishes
with them. But essences being taken for ideas established in the mind,
with names annexed to them, they are supposed to remain steadily the same,
whatever mutations the particular substances are liable to. For, whatever
becomes of Alexander and Bucephalus, the ideas to which man and horse are
annexed, are supposed nevertheless to remain the same; and so the essences
of those species are preserved whole and undestroyed, whatever changes
happen to any or all of the individuals of those species. By this means
the essence of a species rests safe and entire, without the existence of
so much as one individual of that kind. For, were there now no circle existing
anywhere in the world, (as perhaps that figure exists not anywhere exactly
marked out), yet the idea annexed to that name would not cease to be what
it is; nor cease to be as a pattern to determine which of the particular
figures we meet with have or have not a right to the name circle, and so
to show which of them, by having that essence, was of that species. And
though there neither were nor had been in nature such a beast as an unicorn,
or such a fish as a mermaid; yet, supposing those names to stand for complex
abstract ideas that contained no inconsistency in them, the essence of
a mermaid is as intelligible as that of a man; and the idea of an unicorn
as certain, steady, and permanent as that of a horse. From what has been
said, it is evident, that the doctrine of the immutability of essences
proves them to be only abstract ideas; and is founded on the relation established
between them and certain sounds as signs of them; and will always be true,
as long as the same name can have the same signification.
20. Recapitulation. To conclude. This is that which in short I would
say, viz. that all the great business of genera and species, and their
essences, amounts to no more but this:- That men making abstract ideas,
and settling them in their minds with names annexed to them, do thereby
enable themselves to consider things, and discourse of them, as it were
in bundles, for the easier and readier improvement and communication of
their knowledge, which would advance but slowly were their words and thoughts
confined only to particulars.
Chapter IV: Of the Names of Simple Ideas
1. Names of simple ideas, modes, and substances, have each something peculiar.
Though all words, as I have shown, signify nothing immediately but the
ideas in the mind of the speaker; yet, upon a nearer survey, we shall find
the names of simple ideas, mixed modes (under which I comprise relations
too), and natural substances, have each of them something peculiar and
different from the other. For example:
2. Names of simple ideas, and of substances intimate real existence.
First, the names of simple ideas and substances, with the abstract ideas
in the mind which they immediately signify, intimate also some real existence,
from which was derived their original pattern. But the names of mixed modes
terminate in the idea that is in the mind, and lead not the thoughts any
further; as we shall see more at large in the following chapter.
3. Names of simple ideas and modes signify always both real and nominal
essences. Secondly, The names of simple ideas and modes signify always
the real as well as nominal essence of their species. But the names of
natural substances signify rarely, if ever, anything but barely the nominal
essences of those species; as we shall show in the chapter that treats
of the names of substances in particular.
4. Names of simple ideas are undefinable. Thirdly, The names of simple
ideas are not capable of any definition; the names of all complex ideas
are. It has not, that I know, been yet observed by anybody what words are,
and what are not, capable of being defined; the want whereof is (as I am
apt to think) not seldom the occasion of great wrangling and obscurity
in men's discourses, whilst some demand definitions of terms that cannot
be defined; and others think they ought not to rest satisfied in an explication
made by a more general word, and its restriction, (or to speak in terms
of art, by a genus and difference), when, even after such definition, made
according to rule, those who hear it have often no more a clear conception
of the meaning of the word than they had before. This at least I think,
that the showing what words are, and what are not, capable of definitions,
and wherein consists a good definition, is not wholly besides our present
purpose; and perhaps will afford so much light to the nature of these signs
and our ideas, as to deserve a more particular consideration.
5. If all names were definable, it would be a process in infinitum.
I will not here trouble myself to prove that all terms are not definable,
from that progress in infinitum, which it will visibly lead us into, if
we should allow that all names could be defined. For, if the terms of one
definition were still to be defined by another, where at last should we
stop? But I shall, from the nature of our ideas, and the signification
of our words, show why some names can, and others cannot be defined; and
which they are.
6. What a definition is. I think it is agreed, that a definition is
nothing else but the showing the meaning of one word by several other not
synonymous terms. The meaning of words being only the ideas they are made
to stand for by him that uses them, the meaning of any term is then showed,
or the word is defined, when, by other words, the idea it is made the sign
of, and annexed to, in the mind of the speaker, is as it were represented,
or set before the view of another; and thus its signification is ascertained.
This is the only use and end of definitions; and therefore the only measure
of what is, or is not a good definition.
7. Simple ideas, why undefinable. This being premised, I say that the
names of simple ideas, and those only, are incapable of being defined.
The reason whereof is this, That the several terms of a definition, signifying
several ideas, they can all together by no means represent an idea which
has no composition at all: and therefore a definition, which is properly
nothing but the showing the meaning of one word by several others not signifying
each the same thing, can in the names of simple ideas have no place.
8. Instances: scholastic definitions of motion. The not observing this
difference in our ideas, and their names, has produced that eminent trifling
in the schools, which is so easy to be observed in the definitions they
give us of some few of these simple ideas. For, as to the greatest part
of them, even those masters of definitions were fain to leave them untouched,
merely by the impossibility they found in it. What more exquisite jargon
could the wit of man invent, than this definition:- "The act of a being
in power, as far forth as in power"; which would puzzle any rational man,
to whom it was not already known by its famous absurdity, to guess what
word it could ever be supposed to be the explication of. If Tully, asking
a Dutchman what beweeginge was, should have received this explication in
his own language, that it was "actus entis in potentia quatenus in potentia";
I ask whether any one can imagine he could thereby have understood what
the word beweeginge signified, or have guessed what idea a Dutchman ordinarily
had in his mind, and would signify to another, when he used that sound?
9. Modern definitions of motion. Nor have the modern philosophers, who
have endeavoured to throw off the jargon of the schools, and speak intelligibly,
much better succeeded in defining simple ideas, whether by explaining their
causes, or any otherwise. The atomists, who define motion to be "a passage
from one place to another," what do they more than put one synonymous word
for another? For what is passage other than motion? And if they were asked
what passage was, how would they better define it than by motion? For is
it not at least as proper and significant to say, Passage is a motion from
one place to another, as to say, Motion is a passage, &c.? This is
to translate, and not to define, when we change two words of the same signification
one for another; which, when one is better understood than the other, may
serve to discover what idea the unknown stands for; but is very far from
a definition, unless we will say every English word in the dictionary is
the definition of the Latin word it answers, and that motion is a definition
of motus. Nor will the "successive application of the parts of the superficies
of one body to those of another," which the Cartesians give us, prove a
much better definition of motion, when well examined.
10. Definitions of light. "The act of perspicuous, as far forth as perspicuous,"
is another Peripatetic definition of a simple idea; which, though not more
absurd than the former of motion, yet betrays its uselessness and insignificancy
more plainly; because experience will easily convince any one that it cannot
make the meaning of the word light (which it pretends to define) at all
understood by a blind man, but the definition of motion appears not at
first sight so useless, because it escapes this way of trial. For this
simple idea, entering by the touch as well as sight, it is impossible to
show an example of any one who has no other way to get the idea of motion,
but barely by the definition of that name. Those who tell us that light
is a great number of little globules, striking briskly on the bottom of
the eye, speak more intelligibly than the Schools: but yet these words
never so well understood would make the idea the word light stands for
no more known to a man that understands it not before, than if one should
tell him that light was nothing but a company of little tennis-balls, which
fairies all day long struck with rackets against some men's foreheads,
whilst they passed by others. For granting this explication of the thing
to be true, yet the idea of the cause of light, if we had it never so exact,
would no more give us the idea of light itself, as it is such a particular
perception in us, than the idea of the figure and motion of a sharp piece
of steel would give us the idea of that pain which it is able to cause
in us. For the cause of any sensation, and the sensation itself, in all
the simple ideas of one sense, are two ideas; and two ideas so different
and distant one from another, that no two can be more so. And therefore,
should Descartes's globules strike never so long on the retina of a man
who was blind by a gutta serena, he would thereby never have any idea of
light, or anything approaching it, though he understood never so well what
little globules were, and what striking on another body was. And therefore
the Cartesians very well distinguish between that light which is the cause
of that sensation in us, and the idea which is produced in us by it, and
is that which is properly light.
11. Simple ideas, why undefinable, further explained. Simple ideas,
as has been shown, are only to be got by those impressions objects themselves
make on our minds, by the proper inlets appointed to each sort. If they
are not received this way, all the words in the world, made use of to explain
or define any of their names, will never be able to produce in us the idea
it stands for. For, words being sounds, can produce in us no other simple
ideas than of those very sounds; nor excite any in us, but by that voluntary
connexion which is known to be between them and those simple ideas which
common use has made them the signs of. He that thinks otherwise, let him
try if any words can give him the taste of a pine-apple, and make him have
the true idea of the relish of that celebrated delicious fruit. So far
as he is told it has a resemblance with any tastes whereof he has the ideas
already in his memory, imprinted there by sensible objects, not strangers
to his palate, so far may he approach that resemblance in his mind. But
this is not giving us that idea by a definition, but exciting in us other
simple ideas by their known names; which will be still very different from
the true taste of that fruit itself. In light and colours, and all other
simple ideas, it is the same thing: for the signification of sounds is
not natural, but only imposed and arbitrary. And no definition of light
or redness is more fitted or able to produce either of those ideas in us,
than the sound light or red, by itself. For, to hope to produce an idea
of light or colour by a sound, however formed, is to expect that sounds
should be visible, or colours audible; and to make the ears do the office
of all the other senses. Which is all one as to say, that we might taste,
smell, and see by the ears: a sort of philosophy worthy only of Sancho
Panza, who had the faculty to see Dulcinea by hearsay. And therefore he
that has not before received into his mind, by the proper inlet, the simple
idea which any word stands for, can never come to know the signification
of that word by any other words or sounds whatsoever, put together according
to any rules of definition. The only way is, by applying to his senses
the proper object; and so producing that idea in him, for which he has
learned the name already. A studious blind man, who had mightily beat his
head about visible objects, and made use of the explication of his books
and friends, to understand those names of light and colours which often
came in his way, bragged one day, That he now understood what scarlet signified.
Upon which, his friend demanding what scarlet was? The blind man answered,
It was like the sound of a trumpet. Just such an understanding of the name
of any other simple idea will he have, who hopes to get it only from a
definition, or other words made use of to explain it.
12. The contrary shown in complex ideas, by instances of a statue and
rainbow. The case is quite otherwise in complex ideas; which, consisting
of several simple ones, it is in the power of words, standing for the several
ideas that make that composition, to imprint complex ideas in the mind
which were never there before, and so make their names be understood. In
such collections of ideas, passing under one name, definition, or the teaching
the signification of one word by several others, has place, and may make
us understand the names of things which never came within the reach of
our senses; and frame ideas suitable to those in other men's minds, when
they use those names: provided that none of the terms of the definition
stand for any such simple ideas, which he to whom the explication is made
has never yet had in his thought. Thus the word statue may be explained
to a blind man by other words, when picture cannot; his senses having given
him the idea of figure, but not of colours, which therefore words cannot
excite in him. This gained the prize to the painter against the statuary:
each of which contending for the excellency of his art, and the statuary
bragging that his was to be preferred, because it reached further, and
even those who had lost their eyes could yet perceive the excellency of
it. The painter agreed to refer himself to the judgment of a blind man;
who being brought where there was a statue made by the one, and a picture
drawn by the other; he was first led to the statue, in which he traced
with his hands all the lineaments of the face and body, and with great
admiration applauded the skill of the workman. But being led to the picture,
and having his hands laid upon it, was told, that now he touched the head,
and then the forehead, eyes, nose, &c., as his hand moved over the
parts of the picture on the cloth, without finding any the least distinction:
whereupon he cried out, that certainly that must needs be a very admirable
and divine piece of workmanship, which could represent to them all those
parts, where he could neither feel nor perceive anything.
13. Colours indefinable to the born-blind. He that should use the word
rainbow to one who knew all those colours, but yet had never seen that
phenomenon, would, by enumerating the figure, largeness, position, and
order of the colours, so well define that word that it might be perfectly
understood. But yet that definition, how exact and perfect soever, would
never make a blind man understand it; because several of the simple ideas
that make that complex one, being such as he never received by sensation
and experience, no words are able to excite them in his mind.
14. Complex ideas definable only when the simple ideas of which they
consist have been got from experience. Simple ideas, as has been shown,
can only be got by experience from those objects which are proper to produce
in us those perceptions. When, by this means, we have our minds stored
with them, and know the names for them, then we are in a condition to define,
and by definition to understand, the names of complex ideas that are made
up of them. But when any term stands for a simple idea that a man has never
yet had in his mind, it is impossible by any words to make known its meaning
to him. When any term stands for an idea a man is acquainted with, but
is ignorant that that term is the sign of it, then another name of the
same idea, which he has been accustomed to, may make him understand its
meaning. But in no case whatsoever is any name of any simple idea capable
of a definition.
15. Names of simple ideas of less doubtful meaning than those of mixed
modes and substances. Fourthly, But though the names of simple ideas have
not the help of definition to determine their signification, yet that hinders
not but that they are generally less doubtful and uncertain than those
of mixed modes and substances; because they, standing only for one simple
perception, men for the most part easily and perfectly agree in their signification;
and there is little room for mistake and wrangling about their meaning.
He that knows once that whiteness is the name of that colour he has observed
in snow or milk, will not be apt to misapply that word, as long as he retains
that idea; which when he has quite lost, he is not apt to mistake the meaning
of it, but perceives he understands it not. There is neither a multiplicity
of simple ideas to be put together, which makes the doubtfulness in the
names of mixed modes; nor a supposed, but an unknown, real essence, with
properties depending thereon, the precise number whereof is also unknown,
which makes the difficulty in the names of substances. But, on the contrary,
in simple ideas the whole signification of the name is known at once, and
consists not of parts, whereof more or less being put in, the idea may
be varied, and so the signification of name be obscure, or uncertain.
16. Simple ideas have few ascents in linea praedicamentali. Fifthly,
This further may be observed concerning simple ideas and their names, that
they have but few ascents in linea praedicamentali, (as they call it,)
from the lowest species to the summum genus. The reason whereof is, that
the lowest species being but one simple idea, nothing can be left out of
it, that so the difference being taken away, it may agree with some other
thing in one idea common to them both; which, having one name, is the genus
of the other two: v.g. there is nothing that can be left out of the idea
of white and red to make them agree in one common appearance, and so have
one general name; as rationality being left out of the complex idea of
man, makes it agree with brute in the more general idea and name of animal.
And therefore when, to avoid unpleasant enumerations, men would comprehend
both white and red, and several other such simple ideas, under one general
name, they have been fain to do it by a word which denotes only the way
they get into the mind. For when white, red, and yellow are all comprehended
under the genus or name colour, it signifies no more but such ideas as
are produced in the mind only by the sight, and have entrance only through
the eyes. And when they would frame yet a more general term to comprehend
both colours and sounds, and the like simple ideas, they do it by a word
that signifies all such as come into the mind only by one sense. And so
the general term quality, in its ordinary acceptation, comprehends colours,
sounds, tastes, smells, and tangible qualities, with distinction from extension,
number, motion, pleasure, and pain, which make impressions on the mind
and introduce their ideas by more senses than one.
17. Names of simple ideas not arbitrary, but perfectly taken from the
existence of things. Sixthly, The names of simple ideas, substances, and
mixed modes have also this difference: that those of mixed modes stand
for ideas perfectly arbitrary; those of substances are not perfectly so,
but refer to a pattern, though with some latitude; and those of simple
ideas are perfectly taken from the existence of things, and are not arbitrary
at an. Which, what difference it makes in the significations of their names,
we shall see in the following chapters.
Simple modes. The names of simple modes differ little from those of
simple ideas.
Chapter V: Of the Names of Mixed Modes and Relations
1. Mixed modes stand for abstract ideas, as other general names. The names
of mixed modes, being general, they stand, as has been shewed, for sorts
or species of things, each of which has its peculiar essence. The essences
of these species also, as has been shewed, are nothing but the abstract
ideas in the mind, to which the name is annexed. Thus far the names and
essences of mixed modes have nothing but what is common to them with other
ideas: but if we take a little nearer survey of them, we shall find that
they have something peculiar, which perhaps may deserve our attention.
2. First, The abstract ideas they stand for are made by the understanding.
The first particularity I shall observe in them, is, that the abstract
ideas, or, if you please, the essences, of the several species of mixed
modes, are made by the understanding, wherein they differ from those of
simple ideas: in which sort the mind has no power to make any one, but
only receives such as are presented to it by the real existence of things
operating upon it.
3. Secondly, made arbitrarily, and without patterns. In the next place,
these essences of the species of mixed modes are not only made by the mind,
but made very arbitrarily, made without patterns, or reference to any real
existence. Wherein they differ from those of substances, which carry with
them the supposition of some real being, from which they are taken, and
to which they are comformable. But, in its complex ideas of mixed modes,
the mind takes a liberty not to follow the existence of things exactly.
It unites and retains certain collections, as so many distinct specific
ideas; whilst others, that as often occur in nature, and are as plainly
suggested by outward things, pass neglected, without particular names or
specifications. Nor does the mind, in these of mixed modes, as in the complex
idea of substances, examine them by the real existence of things; or verify
them by patterns containing such peculiar compositions in nature. To know
whether his idea of adultery or incest be right, will a man seek it anywhere
amongst things existing? Or is it true because any one has been witness
to such an action? No: but it suffices here, that men have put together
such a collection into one complex idea, that makes the archetype and specific
idea, whether ever any such action were committed in rerum natura or no.
4. How this is done. To understand this right, we must consider wherein
this making of these complex ideas consists; and that is not in the making
any new idea, but putting together those which the mind had before. Wherein
the mind does these three things: First, It chooses a certain number; Secondly,
It gives them connexion, and makes them into one idea; Thirdly, It ties
them together by a name. If we examine how the mind proceeds in these,
and what liberty it takes in them, we shall easily observe how these essences
of the species of mixed modes are the workmanship of the mind; and, consequently,
that the species themselves are of men's making. Evidently arbitrary, in
that the idea is often before the existence. Nobody can doubt but that
these ideas of mixed modes are made by a voluntary collection of ideas,
put together in the mind, independent from any original patterns in nature,
who will but reflect that this sort of complex ideas may be made, abstracted,
and have names given them, and so a species be constituted, before any
one individual of that species ever existed. Who can doubt but the ideas
of sacrilege or adultery might be framed in the minds of men, and have
names given them, and so these species of mixed modes be constituted, before
either of them was ever committed; and might be as well discoursed of and
reasoned about, and as certain truths discovered of them, whilst yet they
had no being but in the understanding, as well as now, that they have but
too frequently a real existence? Whereby it is plain how much the sorts
of mixed modes are the creatures of the understanding, where they have
a being as subservient to all the ends of real truth and knowledge, as
when they really exist. And we cannot doubt but law-makers have often made
laws about species of actions which were only the creatures of their own
understandings; beings that had no other existence but in their own minds.
And I think nobody can deny but that the resurrection was a species of
mixed modes in the mind, before it really existed.
6. Instances: murder, incest, stabbing. To see how arbitrarily these
essences of mixed modes are made by the mind, we need but take a view of
almost any of them. A little looking into them will satisfy us, that it
is the mind that combines several scattered independent ideas into one
complex one; and, by the common name it gives them, makes them the essence
of a certain species, without regulating itself by any connexion they have
in nature. For what greater connexion in nature has the idea of a man than
the idea of a sheep with killing, that this is made a particular species
of action, signified by the word murder, and the other not? Or what union
is there in nature between the idea of the relation of a father with killing
than that of a son or neighbour, that those are combined into one complex
idea, and thereby made the essence of the distinct species parricide, whilst
the other makes no distinct species at all? But, though they have made
killing a man's father or mother a distinct species from killing his son
or daughter, yet, in some other cases, son and daughter are taken in too,
as well as father and mother: and they are all equally comprehended in
the same species, as in that of incest. Thus the mind in mixed modes arbitrarily
unites into complex ideas such as it finds convenient; whilst others that
have altogether as much union in nature are left loose, and never combined
into one idea, because they have no need of one name. It is evident then
that the mind, by its free choice, gives a connexion to a certain number
of ideas, which in nature have no more union with one another than others
that it leaves out: why else is the part of the weapon the beginning of
the wound is made with taken notice of, to make the distinct species called
stabbing, and the figure and matter of the weapon left out? I do not say
this is done without reason, as we shall see more by and by; but this I
say, that it is done by the free choice of the mind, pursuing its own ends;
and that, therefore, these species of mixed modes are the workmanship of
the understanding. And there is nothing more evident than that, for the
most part, in the framing of these ideas, the mind searches not its patterns
in nature, nor refers the ideas it makes to the real existence of things,
but puts such together as may best serve its own purposes, without tying
itself to a precise imitation of anything that really exists.
7. But still subservient to the end of language, and not made at random.
But, though these complex ideas or essences of mixed modes depend on the
mind, and are made by it with great liberty, yet they are not made at random,
and jumbled together without any reason at all. Though these complex ideas
be not always copied from nature, yet they are always suited to the end
for which abstract ideas are made: and though they be combinations made
of ideas that are loose enough, and have as little union in themselves
as several others to which the mind never gives a connexion that combines
them into one idea; yet they are always made for the convenience of communication,
which is the chief end of language. The use of language is, by short sounds,
to signify with ease and dispatch general conceptions; wherein not only
abundance of particulars may be contained, but also a great variety of
independent ideas collected into one complex one. In the making therefore
of the species of mixed modes, men have had regard only to such combinations
as they had occasion to mention one to another. Those they have combined
into distinct complex ideas, and given names to; whilst others, that in
nature have as near a union, are left loose and unregarded. For, to go
no further than human actions themselves, if they would make distinct abstract
ideas of all the varieties which might be observed in them, the number
must be infinite, and the memory confounded with the plenty, as well as
overcharged to little purpose. It suffices that men make and name so many
complex ideas of these mixed modes as they find they have occasion to have
names for, in the ordinary occurrence of their affairs. If they join to
the idea of killing the idea of father or mother, and so make a distinct
species from killing a man's son or neighbour, it is because of the different
heinousness of the crime, and the distinct punishment is, due to the murdering
a man's father and mother, different to what ought to be inflicted on the
murderer of a son or neighbour; and therefore they find it necessary to
mention it by a distinct name, which is the end of making that distinct
combination. But though the ideas of mother and daughter are so differently
treated, in reference to the idea of killing, that the one is joined with
it to make a distinct abstract idea with a name, and so a distinct species,
and the other not; yet, in respect of carnal knowledge, they are both taken
in under incest: and that still for the same convenience of expressing
under one name, and reckoning of one species, such unclean mixtures as
have a peculiar turpitude beyond others; and this to avoid circumlocutions
and tedious descriptions.
8. Whereof the intranslatable words of divers languages are a proof.
A moderate skill in different languages will easily satisfy one of the
truth of this, it being so obvious to observe great store of words in one
language which have not any that answer them in another. Which plainly
shows that those of one country, by their customs and manner of life, have
found occasion to make several complex ideas, and given names to them,
which others never collected into specific ideas. This could not have happened
if these species were the steady workmanship of nature, and not collections
made and abstracted by the mind, in order to naming, and for the convenience
of communication. The terms of our law, which are not empty sounds, will
hardly find words that answer them in the Spanish or Italian, no scanty
languages; much less, I think, could any one translate them into the Caribbee
or Westoe tongues: and the versura of the Romans, or corban of the Jews,
have no words in other languages to answer them; the reason whereof is
plain, from what has been said. Nay, if we look a little more nearly into
this matter, and exactly compare different languages, we shall find that,
though they have words which in translations and dictionaries are supposed
to answer one another, yet there is scarce one of ten amongst the names
of complex ideas, especially of mixed modes, that stands for the same precise
idea which the word does that in dictionaries it is rendered by. There
are no ideas more common and less compounded than the measures of time,
extension and weight; and the Latin names, hora, pes, libra, are without
difficulty rendered by the English names, hour, foot, and pound: but yet
there is nothing more evident than that the ideas a Roman annexed to these
Latin names, were very far different from those which an Englishman expresses
by those English ones. And if either of these should make use of the measures
that those of the other language designed by their names, he would be quite
out in his account. These are too sensible proofs to be doubted; and we
shall find this much more so in the names of more abstract and compounded
ideas, such as are the greatest part of those which make up moral discourses:
whose names, when men come curiously to compare with those they are translated
into, in other languages, they will find very few of them exactly to correspond
in the whole extent of their significations.
9. This shows species to be made for communication. The reason why I
take so particular notice of this is, that we may not be mistaken about
genera and species, and their essences, as if they were things regularly
and constantly made by nature, and had a real existence in things; when
they appear, upon a more wary survey, to be nothing else but an artifice
of the understanding, for the easier signifying such collections of ideas
as it should often have occasion to communicate by one general term; under
which divers particulars, as far forth as they agreed to that abstract
idea, might be comprehended. And if the doubtful signification of the word
species may make it sound harsh to some, that I say the species of mixed
modes are "made by the understanding"; yet, I think, it can by nobody be
denied that it is the mind makes those abstract complex ideas to which
specific names are given. And if it be true, as it is, that the mind makes
the patterns for sorting and naming of things, I leave it to be considered
who makes the boundaries of the sort or species; since with me species
and sort have no other difference than that of a Latin and English idiom.
10. In mixed modes it is the name that ties the combination of simple
ideas together, and makes it a species. The near relation that there is
between species, essences, and their general name, at least in mixed modes,
will further appear when we consider, that it is the name that seems to
preserve those essences, and give them their lasting duration. For, the
connexion between the loose parts of those complex ideas being made by
the mind, this union, which has no particular foundation in nature, would
cease again, were there not something that did, as it were, hold it together,
and keep the parts from scattering. Though therefore it be the mind that
makes the collection, it is the name which is as it were the knot that
ties them fast together. What a vast variety of different ideas does the
word triumphus hold together, and deliver to us as one species! Had this
name been never made, or quite lost, we might, no doubt, have had descriptions
of what passed in that solemnity: but yet, I think, that which holds those
different parts together, in the unity of one complex idea, is that very
word annexed to it; without which the several parts of that would no more
be thought to make one thing, than any other show, which having never been
made but once, had never been united into one complex idea, under one denomination.
How much, therefore, in mixed modes, the unity necessary to any essence
depends on the mind; and how much the continuation and fixing of that unity
depends on the name in common use annexed to it, I leave to be considered
by those who look upon essences and species as real established things
in nature.
11. Suitable to this, we find that men speaking of mixed modes, seldom
imagine or take any other for species of them, but such as are set out
by name: because they, being of man's making only, in order to naming,
no such species are taken notice of, or supposed to be, unless a name be
joined to it, as the sign of man's having combined into one idea several
loose ones; and by that name giving a lasting union to the parts which
would otherwise cease to have any, as soon as the mind laid by that abstract
idea, and ceased actually to think on it. But when a name is once annexed
to it, wherein the parts of that complex idea have a settled and permanent
union, then is the essence, as it were, established, and the species looked
on as complete. For to what purpose should the memory charge itself with
such compositions, unless it were by abstraction to make them general?
And to what purpose make them general, unless it were that they might have
general names for the convenience of discourse and communication? Thus
we see, that killing a man with a sword or a hatchet are looked on as no
distinct species of action; but if the point of the sword first enter the
body, it passes for a distinct species, where it has a distinct name, as
in England, in whose language it is called stabbing: but in another country,
where it has not happened to be specified under a peculiar name, it passes
not for a distinct species. But in the species of corporeal substances,
though it be the mind that makes the nominal essence, yet, since those
ideas which are combined in it are supposed to have an union in nature
whether the mind joins them or not, therefore those are looked on as distinct
species, without any operation of the mind, either abstracting, or giving
a name to that complex idea.
12. For the originals of our mixed modes, we look no further than the
mind; which also shows them to he the workmanship of the understanding.
Conformable also to what has been said concerning the essences of the species
of mixed modes, that they are the creatures of the understanding rather
than the works of nature; conformable, I say, to this, we find that their
names lead our thoughts to the mind, and no further. When we speak of justice,
or gratitude, we frame to ourselves no imagination of anything existing,
which we would conceive; but our thoughts terminate in the abstract ideas
of those virtues, and look not further; as they do when we speak of a horse,
or iron, whose specific ideas we consider not as barely in the mind, but
as in things themselves, which afford the original patterns of those ideas.
But in mixed modes, at least the most considerable parts of them, which
are moral beings, we consider the original patterns as being in the mind,
and to those we refer for the distinguishing of particular beings under
names. And hence I think it is that these essences of the species of mixed
modes are by a more particular name called notions; as, by a peculiar right,
appertaining to the understanding.
13. Their being made by the understanding without patterns, shows the
reason why they are so compounded. Hence, likewise, we may learn why the
complex ideas of mixed modes are commonly more compounded and decompounded
than those of natural substances. Because they being the workmanship of
the understanding, pursuing only its own ends, and the conveniency of expressing
in short those ideas it would make known to another, it does with great
liberty unite often into one abstract idea things that, in their nature,
have no coherence; and so under one term bundle together a great variety
of compounded and decompounded ideas. Thus the name of procession: what
a great mixture of independent ideas of persons, habits, tapers, orders,
motions, sounds, does it contain in that complex one, which the mind of
man has arbitrarily put together, to express by that one name? Whereas
the complex ideas of the sorts of substances are usually made up of only
a small number of simple ones; and in the species of animals, these two,
viz. shape and voice, commonly make the whole nominal essence.
14. Names of mixed modes stand always for their real essences, which
are the workmanship of our minds. Another thing we may observe from what
has been said is, That the names of mixed modes always signify (when they
have any determined signification) the real essences of their species.
For, these abstract ideas being the workmanship of the mind, and not referred
to the real existence of things, there is no supposition of anything more
signified by that name, but barely that complex idea the mind itself has
formed; which is all it would have expressed by it; and is that on which
all the properties of the species depend, and from which alone they all
flow: and so in these the real and nominal essence is the same; which,
of what concernment it is to the certain knowledge of general truth, we
shall see hereafter.
15. Why their names are usually got before their ideas. This also may
show us the reason why for the most part the names of fixed modes are got
before the ideas they stand for are perfectly known. Because there being
no species of these ordinarily taken notice of but what have names, and
those species, or rather their essences, being abstract complex ideas,
made arbitrarily by the mind, it is convenient, if not necessary, to know
the names, before one endeavour to frame these complex ideas: unless a
man will fill his head with a company of abstract complex ideas, which,
others having no names for, he has nothing to do with, but to lay by and
forget again. I confess that, in the beginning of languages, it was necessary
to have the idea before one gave it the name: and so it is still, where,
making a new complex idea, one also, by giving it a new name, makes a new
word. But this concerns not languages made, which have generally pretty
well provided for ideas which men have frequent occasion to have and communicate;
and in such, I ask whether it be not the ordinary method, that children
learn the names of mixed modes before they have their ideas? What one of
a thousand ever frames the abstract ideas of glory and ambition, before
he has heard the names of them? In simple ideas and substances I grant
it is otherwise, which, being such ideas as have a real existence and union
in nature, the ideas and names are got one before the other, as it happens.
16. Reason of my being so large on this subject. What has been said
here of mixed modes is, with very little difference, applicable also to
relations; which, since every man himself may observe, I may spare myself
the pains to enlarge on: especially, since what I have here said concerning
Words in this third Book, will possibly be thought by some to be much more
than what so slight a subject required. I allow it might be brought into
a narrower compass; but I was willing to stay my reader on an argument
that appears to me new and a little out of the way, (I am sure it is one
I thought not of when I began to write,) that, by searching it to the bottom,
and turning it on every side, some part or other might meet with every
one's thoughts, and give occasion to the most averse or negligent to reflect
on a general miscarriage, which, though of great consequence, is little
taken notice of. When it is considered what a pudder is made about essences,
and how much all sorts of knowledge, discourse, and conversation are pestered
and disordered by the careless and confused use and application of words,
it will perhaps be thought worth while thoroughly to lay it open. And I
shall be pardoned if I have dwelt long on an argument which I think, therefore,
needs to be inculcated, because the faults men are usually guilty of in
this kind, are not only the greatest hindrances of true knowledge, but
are so well thought of as to pass for it. Men would often see what a small
pittance of reason and truth, or possibly none at all, is mixed with those
huffing opinions they are swelled with; if they would but look beyond fashionable
sounds, and observe what ideas are or are not comprehended under those
words with which they are so armed at all points, and with which they so
confidently lay about them. I shall imagine I have done some service to
truth, peace, and learning, if, by any enlargement on this subject, I can
make men reflect on their own use of language; and give them reason to
suspect, that, since it is frequent for others, it may also be possible
for them, to have sometimes very good and approved words in their mouths
and writings, with very uncertain, little, or no signification. And therefore
it is not unreasonable for them to be wary herein themselves, and not to
be unwilling to have them examined by others. With this design, therefore,
I shall go on with what I have further to say concerning this matter.
Chapter VI: Of the Names of Substances
1. The common names of substances stand for sorts. The common names of
substances, as well as other general terms, stand for sorts: which is nothing
else but the being made signs of such complex ideas wherein several particular
substances do or might agree, by virtue of which they are capable of being
comprehended in one common conception, and signified by one name. I say
do or might agree: for though there be but one sun existing in the world,
yet the idea of it being abstracted, so that more substances (if there
were several) might each agree in it, it is as much a sort as if there
were as many suns as there are stars. They want not their reasons who think
there are, and that each fixed star would answer the idea the name sun
stands for, to one who was placed in a due distance: which, by the way,
may show us how much the sorts, or, if you please, genera and species of
things (for those Latin terms signify to me no more than the English word
sort) depend on such collections of ideas as men have made, and not on
the real nature of things; since it is not impossible but that, in propriety
of speech, that might be a sun to one which is a star to another.
2. The essence of each sort of substance is our abstract idea to which
the name is annexed. The measure and boundary of each sort or species,
whereby it is constituted that particular sort, and distinguished from
others, is that we call its essence, which is nothing but that abstract
idea to which the name is annexed; so that everything contained in that
idea is essential to that sort. This, though it be all the essence of natural
substances that we know, or by which we distinguish them into sorts, yet
I call it by a peculiar name, the nominal essence, to distinguish it from
the real constitution of substances, upon which depends this nominal essence,
and all the properties of that sort; which, therefore, as has been said,
may be called the real essence: v.g. the nominal essence of gold is that
complex idea the word gold stands for, let it be, for instance, a body
yellow, of a certain weight, malleable, fusible, and fixed. But the real
essence is the constitution of the insensible parts of that body, on which
those qualities and all the other properties of gold depend. How far these
two are different, though they are both called essence, is obvious at first
sight to discover.
3. The nominal and real essence different. For, though perhaps voluntary
motion, with sense and reason, joined to a body of a certain shape, be
the complex idea to which I and others annex the name man, and so be the
nominal essence of the species so called: yet nobody will say that complex
idea is the real essence and source of all those operations which are to
be found in any individual of that sort. The foundation of all those qualities
which are the ingredients of our complex idea, is something quite different:
and had we such a knowledge of that constitution of man, from which his
faculties of moving, sensation, and reasoning, and other powers flow, and
on which his so regular shape depends, as it is possible angels have, and
it is certain his Maker has, we should have a quite other idea of his essence
than what now is contained in our definition of that species, be it what
it will: and our idea of any individual man would be as far different from
what it is now, as is his who knows all the springs and wheels and other
contrivances within of the famous clock at Strasburg, from that which a
gazing countryman has of it, who barely sees the motion of the hand, and
hears the clock strike, and observes only some of the outward appearances.
4. Nothing essential to individuals. That essence, in the ordinary use
of the word, relates to sorts, and that it is considered in particular
beings no further than as they are ranked into sorts, appears from hence:
that, take but away the abstract ideas by which we sort individuals, and
rank them under common names, and then the thought of anything essential
to any of them instantly vanishes: we have no notion of the one without
the other, which plainly shows their relation. It is necessary for me to
be as I am; God and nature has made me so: but there is nothing I have
is essential to me. An accident or disease may very much alter my colour
or shape; a fever or fall may take away my reason or memory, or both; and
an apoplexy leave neither sense, nor understanding, no, nor life. Other
creatures of my shape may be made with more and better, or fewer and worse
faculties than I have; and others may have reason and sense in a shape
and body very different from mine. None of these are essential to the one
or the other, or to any individual whatever, till the mind refers it to
some sort or species of things; and then presently, according to the abstract
idea of that sort, something is found essential. Let any one examine his
own thoughts, and he will find that as soon as he supposes or speaks of
essential, the consideration of some species, or the complex idea signified
by some general name, comes into his mind; and it is in reference to that
that this or that quality is said to be essential. So that if it be asked,
whether it be essential to me or any other particular corporeal being,
to have reason? I say, no; no more than it is essential to this white thing
I write on to have words in it. But if that particular being be to be counted
of the sort man, and to have the name man given it, then reason is essential
to it; supposing reason to be a part of the complex idea the name man stands
for: as it is essential to this thing I write on to contain words, if I
will give it the name treatise, and rank it under that species. So that
essential and not essential relate only to our abstract ideas, and the
names annexed to them; which amounts to no more than this, That whatever
particular thing has not in it those qualities which are contained in the
abstract idea which any general term stands for, cannot be ranked under
that species, nor be called by that name; since that abstract idea is the
very essence of that species.
5. The only essences perceived by us in individual substances are those
qualities which entitle them to receive their names. Thus, if the idea
of body with some people be bare extension or space, then solidity is not
essential to body: if others make the idea to which they give the name
body to be solidity and extension, then solidity is essential to body.
That therefore, and that alone, is considered as essential, which makes
a part of the complex idea the name of a sort stands for: without which
no particular thing can be reckoned of that sort, nor be entitled to that
name. Should there be found a parcel of matter that had all the other qualities
that are in iron, but wanted obedience to the loadstone, and would neither
be drawn by it nor receive direction from it, would any one question whether
it wanted anything essential? It would be absurd to ask, Whether a thing
really existing wanted anything essential to it. Or could it be demanded,
Whether this made an essential or specific difference or no, since we have
no other measure of essential or specific but our abstract ideas? And to
talk of specific differences in nature, without reference to general ideas
in names, is to talk unintelligibly. For I would ask any one, What is sufficient
to make an essential difference in nature between any two particular beings,
without any regard had to some abstract idea, which is looked upon as the
essence and standard of a species? All such patterns and standards being
quite laid aside, particular beings, considered barely in themselves, will
be found to have all their qualities equally essential; and everything
in each individual will be essential to it; or, which is more, nothing
at all. For, though it may be reasonable to ask, Whether obeying the magnet
be essential to iron? yet I think it is very improper and insignificant
to ask, whether it be essential to the particular parcel of matter I cut
my pen with; without considering it under the name, iron, or as being of
a certain species. And if, as has been said, our abstract ideas, which
have names annexed to them, are the boundaries of species, nothing can
be essential but what is contained in those ideas.
6. Even the real essences of individual substances imply potential sorts.
It is true, I have often mentioned a real essence, distinct in substances
from those abstract ideas of them, which I call their nominal essence.
By this real essence I mean, that real constitution of anything, which
is the foundation of all those properties that are combined in, and are
constantly found to co-exist with the nominal essence; that particular
constitution which everything has within itself, without any relation to
anything without it. But essence, even in this sense, relates to a sort,
and supposes a species. For, being that real constitution on which the
properties depend, it necessarily supposes a sort of things, properties
belonging only to species, and not to individuals: v.g. supposing the nominal
essence of gold to be a body of such a peculiar colour and weight, with
malleability and fusibility, the real essence is that constitution of the
parts of matter on which these qualities and their union depend; and is
also the foundation of its solubility in aqua regia and other properties,
accompanying that complex idea. Here are essences and properties, but all
upon supposition of a sort or general abstract idea, which is considered
as immutable; but there is no individual parcel of matter to which any
of these qualities are so annexed as to be essential to it or inseparable
from it. That which is essential belongs to it as a condition whereby it
is of this or that sort: but take away the consideration of its being ranked
under the name of some abstract idea, and then there is nothing necessary
to it, nothing inseparable from it. Indeed, as to the real essences of
substances, we only suppose their being, without precisely knowing what
they are; but that which annexes them still to the species is the nominal
essence, of which they are the supposed foundation and cause.
7. The nominal essence bounds the species for us. The next thing to
be considered is, by which of those essences it is that substances are
determined into sorts or species; and that, it is evident, is by the nominal
essence. For it is that alone that the name, which is the mark of the sort,
signifies. It is impossible, therefore, that anything should determine
the sorts of things, which we rank under general names, but that idea which
that name is designed as a mark for; which is that, as has been shown,
which we call nominal essence. Why do we say this is a horse, and that
a mule; this is an animal, that an herb? How comes any particular thing
to be of this or that sort, but because it has that nominal essence; or,
which is all one, agrees to that abstract idea, that name is annexed to?
And I desire any one but to reflect on his own thoughts, when he hears
or speaks any of those or other names of substances, to know what sort
of essences they stand for.
8. The nature of species, as formed by us. And that the species of things
to us are nothing but the ranking them under distinct names, according
to the complex ideas in us, and not according to precise, distinct, real
essences in them, is plain from hence:- That we find many of the individuals
that are ranked into one sort, called by one common name, and so received
as being of one species, have yet qualities, depending on their real constitutions,
as far different one from another as from others from which they are accounted
to differ specifically. This, as it is easy to be observed by all who have
to do with natural bodies, so chemists especially are often, by sad experience,
convinced of it, when they, sometimes in vain, seek for the same qualities
in one parcel of sulphur, antimony, or vitriol, which they have found in
others. For, though they are bodies of the same species, having the same
nominal essence, under the same name, yet do they often, upon severe ways
of examination, betray qualities so different one from another, as to frustrate
the expectation and labour of very wary chemists. But if things were distinguished
into species, according to their real essences, it would be as impossible
to find different properties in any two individual substances of the same
species, as it is to find different properties in two circles, or two equilateral
triangles. That is properly the essence to us, which determines every particular
to this or that classis; or, which is the same thing, to this or that general
name: and what can that be else, but that abstract idea to which that name
is annexed; and so has, in truth, a reference, not so much to the being
of particular things, as to their general denominations?
9. Not the real essence, or texture of parts, which we know not. Nor
indeed can we rank and sort things, and consequently (which is the end
of sorting) denominate them, by their real essences; because we know them
not. Our faculties carry us no further towards the knowledge and distinction
of substances, than a collection of those sensible ideas which we observe
in them; which, however made with the greatest diligence and exactness
we are capable of, yet is more remote from the true internal constitution
from which those qualities flow, than, as I said, a countryman's idea is
from the inward contrivance of that famous clock at Strasburg, whereof
he only sees the outward figure and motions. There is not so contemptible
a plant or animal, that does not confound the most enlarged understanding.
Though the familiar use of things about us take off our wonder, yet it
cures not our ignorance. When we come to examine the stones we tread on,
or the iron we daily handle, we presently find we know not their make;
and can give no reason of the different qualities we find in them. It is
evident the internal constitution, whereon their properties depend, is
unknown to us: for to go no further than the grossest and most obvious
we can imagine amongst them, What is that texture of parts, that real essence,
that makes lead and antimony fusible, wood and stones not? What makes lead
and iron malleable, antimony and stones not? And yet how infinitely these
come short of the fine contrivances and inconceivable real essences of
plants or animals, every one knows. The workmanship of the all-wise and
powerful God in the great fabric of the universe, and every part thereof,
further exceeds the capacity and comprehension of the most inquisitive
and intelligent man, than the best contrivance of the most ingenious man
doth the conceptions of the most ignorant of rational creatures. Therefore
we in vain pretend to range things into sorts, and dispose them into certain
classes under names, by their real essences, that are so far from our discovery
or comprehension. A blind man may as soon sort things by their colours,
and he that has lost his smell as well distinguish a lily and a rose by
their odours, as by those internal constitutions which he knows not. He
that thinks he can distinguish sheep and goats by their real essences,
that are unknown to him, may be pleased to try his skill in those species
called cassiowary and querechinchio; and by their internal real essences
determine the boundaries of those species, without knowing the complex
idea of sensible qualities that each of those names stand for, in the countries
where those animals are to be found.
10. Not the substantial form, which we know less. Those, therefore,
who have been taught that the several species of substances had their distinct
internal substantial forms, and that it was those forms which made the
distinction of substances into their true species and genera, were led
yet further out of the way by having their minds set upon fruitless inquiries
after "substantial forms"; wholly unintelligible, and whereof we have scarce
so much as any obscure or confused conception in general.
11. That the nominal essence is that only whereby we distinguish species
of substances, further evident, from our ideas of finite spirits and of
God. That our ranking and distinguishing natural substances into species
consists in the nominal essences the mind makes, and not in the real essences
to be found in the things themselves, is further evident from our ideas
of spirits. For the mind getting, only by reflecting on its own operations,
those simple ideas which it attributes to spirits, it hath or can have
no other notion of spirit but by attributing all those operations it finds
in itself to a sort of beings; without consideration of matter. And even
the most advanced notion we have of GOD is but attributing the same simple
ideas which we have got from reflection on what we find in ourselves, and
which we conceive to have more perfection in them than would be in their
absence; attributing, I say, those simple ideas to Him in an unlimited
degree. Thus, having got from reflecting on ourselves the idea of existence,
knowledge, power and pleasure- each of which we find it better to have
than to want; and the more we have of each the better- joining all these
together, with infinity to each of them, we have the complex idea of an
eternal, omniscient, omnipotent, infinitely wise and happy being. And though
we are told that there are different species of angels; yet we know not
how to frame distinct specific ideas of them: not out of any conceit that
the existence of more species than one of spirits is impossible; but because
having no more simple ideas (nor being able to frame more) applicable to
such beings, but only those few taken from ourselves, and from the actions
of our own minds in thinking, and being delighted, and moving several parts
of our bodies; we can no otherwise distinguish in our conceptions the several
species of spirits, one from another, but by attributing those operations
and powers we find in ourselves to them in a higher or lower degree; and
so have no very distinct specific ideas of spirits, except only of GOD,
to whom we attribute both duration and all those other ideas with infinity;
to the other spirits, with limitation: nor, as I humbly conceive, do we,
between GOD and them in our ideas, put any difference, by any number of
simple ideas which we have of one and not of the other, but only that of
infinity. All the particular ideas of existence, knowledge, will, power,
and motion, &c., being ideas derived from the operations of our minds,
we attribute all of them to all sorts of spirits, with the difference only
of degrees; to the utmost we can imagine, even infinity, when we would
frame as well as we can an idea of the First Being; who yet, it is certain,
is infinitely more remote, in the real excellency of his nature, from the
highest and perfectest of all created beings, than the greatest man, nay,
purest seraph, is from the most contemptible part of matter; and consequently
must infinitely exceed what our narrow understandings can conceive of Him.
12. Of finite spirits there are probably numberless species, in a continuous
series or gradation. It is not impossible to conceive, nor repugnant to
reason, that there may be many species of spirits, as much separated and
diversified one from another by distinct properties whereof we have no
ideas, as the species of sensible things are distinguished one from another
by qualities which we know and observe in them. That there should be more
species of intelligent creatures above us, than there are of sensible and
material below us, is probable to me from hence: that in all the visible
corporeal world, we see no chasms or gaps. All quite down from us the descent
is by easy steps, and a continued series of things, that in each remove
differ very little one from the other. There are fishes that have wings,
and are not strangers to the airy region: and there are some birds that
are inhabitants of the water, whose blood is cold as fishes, and their
flesh so like in taste that the scrupulous are allowed them on fish-days.
There are animals so near of kin both to birds and beasts that they are
in the middle between both: amphibious animals link the terrestrial and
aquatic together; seals live at land and sea, and porpoises have the warm
blood and entrails of a hog; not to mention what is confidently reported
of mermaids, or sea-men. There are some brutes that seem to have as much
knowledge and reason as some that are called men: and the animal and vegetable
kingdoms are so nearly joined, that, if you will take the lowest of one
and the highest of the other, there will scarce be perceived any great
difference between them: and so on, till we come to the lowest and the
most inorganical parts of matter, we shall find everywhere that the several
species are linked together, and differ but in almost insensible degrees.
And when we consider the infinite power and wisdom of the Maker, we have
reason to think that it is suitable to the magnificent harmony of the universe,
and the great design and infinite goodness of the Architect, that the species
of creatures should also, by gentle degrees, ascend upward from us toward
his infinite perfection, as we see they gradually descend from us downwards:
which if it be probable, we have reason then to be persuaded that there
are far more species of creatures above us than there are beneath; we being,
in degrees of perfection, much more remote from the infinite being of GOD
than we are from the lowest state of being, and that which approaches nearest
to nothing. And yet of all those distinct species, for the reasons above
said, we have no clear distinct ideas.
13. The nominal essence that of the species, as conceived by us, proved
from water and ice. But to return to the species of corporeal substances.
If I should ask any one whether ice and water were two distinct species
of things, I doubt not but I should be answered in the affirmative: and
it cannot be denied but he that says they are two distinct species is in
the right. But if an Englishman bred in Jamaica, who perhaps had never
seen nor heard of ice, coming into England in the winter, find the water
he put in his basin at night in a great part frozen in the morning, and,
not knowing any peculiar name it had, should call it hardened water; I
ask whether this would be a new species to him, different from water? And
I think it would be answered here, It would not be to him a new species,
no more than congealed jelly, when it is cold, is a distinct species from
the same jelly fluid and warm; or than liquid gold in the furnace is a
distinct species from hard gold in the hands of a workman. And if this
be so, it is plain that our distinct species are nothing but distinct complex
ideas, with distinct names annexed to them. It is true every substance
that exists has its peculiar constitution, whereon depend those sensible
qualities and powers we observe in it; but the ranking of things into species
(which is nothing but sorting them under several titles) is done by us
according to the ideas that we have of them: which, though sufficient to
distinguish them by names, so that we may be able to discourse of them
when we have them not present before us; yet if we suppose it to be done
by their real internal constitutions, and that things existing are distinguished
by nature into species, by real essences, according as we distinguish them
into species by names, we shall be liable to great mistakes.
14. Difficulties in the supposition of a certain number of real essences.
To distinguish substantial beings into species, according to the usual
supposition, that there are certain precise essences or forms of things,
whereby all the individuals existing are, by nature distinguished into
species, these things are necessary:-
15. A crude supposition. First, To be assured that nature, in the production
of things, always designs them to partake of certain regulated established
essences, which are to be the models of all things to be produced. This,
in that crude sense it is usually proposed, would need some better explication,
before it can fully be assented to.
16. Monstrous births. Secondly, It would be necessary to know whether
nature always attains that essence it designs in the production of things.
The irregular and monstrous births, that in divers sorts of animals have
been observed, will always give us reason to doubt of one or both of these.
17. Are monsters really a distinct species? Thirdly, It ought to be
determined whether those we call monsters be really a distinct species,
according to the scholastic notion of the word species; since it is certain
that everything that exists has its particular constitution. And yet we
find that some of these monstrous productions have few or none of those
qualities which are supposed to result from, and accompany, the essence
of that species from whence, they derive their originals, and to which,
by their descent, they seem to belong.
18. Men can have no ideas of real essences. Fourthly, The real essences
of those things which we distinguish into species, and as so distinguished
we name, ought to be known; i.e. we ought to have ideas of them. But since
we are ignorant in these four points, the supposed real essences of things
stand us not in stead for the distinguishing substances into species.
19. Our nominal essences of substances not perfect collections of the
properties that flow from their real essences. Fifthly, The only imaginable
help in this case would be, that, having framed perfect complex ideas of
the properties of things flowing from their different real essences, we
should thereby distinguish them into species. But neither can this be done.
For, being ignorant of the real essence itself, it is impossible to know
all those properties that flow from it, and are so annexed to it, that
any one of them being away, we may certainly conclude that that essence
is not there, and so the thing is not of that species. We can never know
what is the precise number of properties depending on the real essence
of gold, any one of which failing, the real essence of gold, and consequently
gold, would not be there, unless we knew the real essence of gold itself,
and by that determined that species. By the word gold here, I must be understood
to design a particular piece of matter; v.g. the last guinea that was coined.
For, if it should stand here, in its ordinary signification, for that complex
idea which I or any one else calls gold, i.e. for the nominal essence of
gold, it would be jargon. So hard is it to show the various meaning and
imperfection of words, when we have nothing else but words to do it by.
20. Hence names independent of real essences. By all which it is clear,
that our distinguishing substances into species by names, is not at all
founded on their real essences; nor can we pretend to range and determine
them exactly into species, according to internal essential differences.
21. But stand for such a collection of simple substances, as we have
made the name stand for. But since, as has been remarked, we have need
of general words, though we know not the real essences of things; all we
can do is, to collect such a number of simple ideas as, by examination,
we find to be united together in things existing, and thereof to make one
complex idea. Which, though it be not the real essence of any substance
that exists, is yet the specific essence to which our name belongs, and
is convertible with it; by which we may at least try the truth of these
nominal essences. For example: there be that say that the essence of body
is extension; if it be so, we can never mistake in putting the essence
of anything for the thing itself. Let us then in discourse put extension
for body, and when we would say that body moves, let us say that extension
moves, and see how ill it will look. He that should say that one extension
by impulse moves another extension, would, by the bare expression, sufficiently
show the absurdity of such a notion. The essence of anything in respect
of us, is the whole complex idea comprehended and marked by that name;
and in substances, besides the several distinct simple ideas that make
them up, the confused one of substance, or of an unknown support and cause
of their union, is always a part: and therefore the essence of body is
not bare extension, but an extended solid thing; and so to say, an extended
solid thing moves, or impels another, is all one, and as intelligible,
as to say, body moves or impels. Likewise, to say that a rational animal
is capable of conversation, is all one as to say a man; but no one will
say that rationality is capable of conversation, because it makes not the
whole essence to which we give the name man.
22. Our abstract ideas are to us the measures of the species we make:
instance in that of man. There are creatures in the world that have shapes
like ours, but are hairy, and want language and reason. There are naturals
amongst us that have perfectly our shape, but want reason, and some of
them language too. There are creatures, as it is said, (sit fides penes
authorem, but there appears no contradiction that there should be such),
that, with language and reason and a shape in other things agreeing with
ours, have hairy tails; others where the males have no beards, and others
where the females have. If it be asked whether these be all men or no,
all of human species? it is plain, the question refers only to the nominal
essence: for those of them to whom the definition of the word man, or the
complex idea signified by the name, agrees, are men, and the other not.
But if the inquiry be made concerning the supposed real essence; and whether
the internal constitution and frame of these several creatures be specifically
different, it is wholly impossible for us to answer, no part of that going
into our specific idea: only we have reason to think, that where the faculties
or outward frame so much differs, the internal constitution is not exactly
the same. But what difference in the real internal constitution makes a
specific difference it is in vain to inquire; whilst our measures of species
be, as they are, only our abstract ideas, which we know; and not that internal
constitution, which makes no part of them. Shall the difference of hair
only on the skin be a mark of a different internal specific constitution
between a changeling and a drill, when they agree in shape, and want of
reason and speech? And shall not the want of reason and speech be a sign
to us of different real constitutions and species between a changeling
and a reasonable man? And so of the rest, if we pretend that distinction
of species or sorts is fixedly established by the real frame and secret
constitutions of things.
23. Species in animals not distinguished by generation. Nor let any
one say, that the power of propagation in animals by the mixture of male
and female, and in plants by seeds, keeps the supposed real species distinct
and entire. For, granting this to be true, it would help us in the distinction
of the species of things no further than the tribes of animals and vegetables.
What must we do for the rest? But in those too it is not sufficient: for
if history lie not, women have conceived by drills; and what real species,
by that measure, such a production will be in nature will be a new question:
and we have reason to think this is not impossible, since mules and jumarts,
the one from the mixture of an ass and a mare, the other from the mixture
of a bull and a mare, are so frequent in the world. I once saw a creature
that was the issue of a cat and a rat, and had the plain marks of both
about it; wherein nature appeared to have followed the pattern of neither
sort alone, but to have jumbled them both together. To which he that shall
add the monstrous productions that are so frequently to be met with in
nature, will find it hard, even in the race of animals, to determine by
the pedigree of what species every animal's issue is; and be at a loss
about the real essence, which he thinks certainly conveyed by generation,
and has alone a right to the specific name. But further, if the species
of animals and plants are to be distinguished only by propagation, must
I go to the Indies to see the sire and dam of the one, and the plant from
which the seed was gathered that produced the other, to know whether this
be a tiger or that tea?
24. Not by substantial forms. Upon the whole matter, it is evident that
it is their own collections of sensible qualities that men make the essences
of their several sorts of substances; and that their real internal structures
are not considered by the greatest part of men in the sorting them. Much
less were any substantial forms ever thought on by any but those who have
in this one part of the world learned the language of the schools: and
yet those ignorant men, who pretend not any insight into the real essences,
nor trouble themselves about substantial forms, but are content with knowing
things one from another by their sensible qualities, are often better acquainted
with their differences; can more nicely distinguish them from their uses;
and better know what they expect from each, than those learned quick-sighted
men, who look so deep into them, and talk so confidently of something more
hidden and essential.
25. The specific essences that are commonly made by men. But supposing
that the real essences of substances were discoverable by those that would
severely apply themselves to that inquiry, yet we could not reasonably
think that the ranking of things under general names was regulated by those
internal real constitutions, or anything else but their obvious appearances;
since languages, in all countries, have been established long before sciences.
So that they have not been philosophers or logicians, or such who have
troubled themselves about forms and essences, that have made the general
names that are in use amongst the several nations of men: but those more
or less comprehensive terms have, for the most part, in all languages,
received their birth and signification from ignorant and illiterate people,
who sorted and denominated things by those sensible qualities they found
in them; thereby to signify them, when absent, to others, whether they
had an occasion to mention a sort or a particular thing.
26. Therefore very various and uncertain in the ideas of different men.
Since then it is evident that we sort and name substances by their nominal
and not by their real essences, the next thing to be considered is how,
and by whom these essences come to be made. As to the latter, it is evident
they are made by the mind, and not by nature: for were they Nature's workmanship,
they could not be so various and different in several men as experience
tells us they are. For if we will examine it, we shall not find the nominal
essence of any one species of substances in all men the same: no, not of
that which of all others we are the most intimately acquainted with. It
could not possibly be that the abstract idea to which the name man is given
should be different in several men, if it were of Nature's making; and
that to one it should be animal rationale, and to another, animal implume
bipes latis unguibus. He that annexes the name to a complex idea, made
up of sense and spontaneous motion, joined to a body of such a shape, has
thereby one essence of the species man; and he that, upon further examination,
adds rationality, has another essence of the species he calls man: by which
means the same individual will be a true man to the one which is not so
to the other. I think there is scarce any one will allow this upright figure,
so well known, to be the essential difference of the species man; and yet
how far men determine of the sorts of animals rather by their shape than
descent, is very visible; since it has been more than once debated, whether
several human foetuses should be preserved or received to baptism or no,
only because of the difference of their outward configuration from the
ordinary make of children, without knowing whether they were not as capable
of reason as infants cast in another mould: some whereof, though of an
approved shape, are never capable of as much appearance of reason all their
lives as is to be found in an ape, or an elephant, and never give any signs
of being acted by a rational soul. Whereby it is evident, that the outward
figure, which only was found wanting, and not the faculty of reason, which
nobody could know would be wanting in its due season, was made essential
to the human species. The learned divine and lawyer must, on such occasions,
renounce his sacred definition of animal rationale, and substitute some
other essence of the human species. Monsieur Menage furnishes us with an
example worth the taking notice of on this occasion: "When the abbot of
Saint Martin," says he, "was born, he had so little of the figure of a
man, that it bespake him rather a monster. It was for some time under deliberation,
whether he should be baptized or no. However, he was baptized, and declared
a man provisionally till time should show what he would prove. Nature had
moulded him so untowardly, that he was called all his life the Abbot Malotru;
i.e. ill-shaped. He was of Caen." (Menagiana, 278, 430.) This child, we
see, was very near being excluded out of the species of man, barely by
his shape. He escaped very narrowly as he was; and it is certain, a figure
a little more oddly turned had cast him, and he had been executed, as a
thing not to be allowed to pass for a man. And yet there can be no reason
given why, if the lineaments of his face had been a little altered, a rational
soul could not have been lodged in him; why a visage somewhat longer, or
a nose flatter, or a wider mouth, could not have consisted, as well as
the rest of his ill figure, with such a soul, such parts, as made him,
disfigured as he was, capable to be a dignitary in the church.
27. Nominal essences of particular substances are undetermined by nature,
and therefore various as men vary. Wherein, then, would I gladly know,
consist the precise and unmovable boundaries of that species? It is plain,
if we examine, there is no such thing made by Nature, and established by
her amongst men. The real essence of that or any other sort of substances,
it is evident, we know not; and therefore are so undetermined in our nominal
essences, which we make ourselves, that, if several men were to be asked
concerning some oddly shaped foetus, as soon as born, whether it were a
man or no, it is past doubt one should meet with different answers. Which
could not happen, if the nominal essences, whereby we limit and distinguish
the species of substances, were not made by man with some liberty; but
were exactly copied from precise boundaries set by nature, whereby it distinguished
all substances into certain species. Who would undertake to resolve what
species that monster was of which is mentioned by Licetus (Bk. i. c. 3),
with a man's head and hog's body? Or those other which to the bodies of
men had the heads of beasts, as dogs, horses, &c. If any of these creatures
had lived, and could have spoke, it would have increased the difficulty.
Had the upper part to the middle been of human shape, and all below swine,
had it been murder to destroy it? Or must the bishop have been consulted,
whether it were man enough to be admitted to the font or no? As I have
been told it happened in France some years since, in somewhat a like case.
So uncertain are the boundaries of species of animals to us, who have no
other measures than the complex ideas of our own collecting: and so far
are we from certainly knowing what a man is; though perhaps it will be
judged great ignorance to make any doubt about it. And yet I think I may
say, that the certain boundaries of that species are so far from being
determined, and the precise number of simple ideas which make the nominal
essence so far from being settled and perfectly known, that very material
doubts may still arise about it. And I imagine none of the definitions
of the word man which we yet have, nor descriptions of that sort of animal,
are so perfect and exact as to satisfy a considerate inquisitive person;
much less to obtain a general consent, and to be that which men would everywhere
stick by, in the decision of cases, and determining of life and death,
baptism or no baptism, in productions that might happen.
28. But not so arbitrary as mixed modes. But though these nominal essences
of substances are made by the mind, they are not yet made so arbitrarily
as those of mixed modes. To the making of any nominal essence, it is necessary,
First, that the ideas whereof it consists have such a union as to make
but one idea, how compounded soever. Secondly, that the particular ideas
so united be exactly the same, neither more nor less. For if two abstract
complex ideas differ either in number or sorts of their component parts,
they make two different, and not one and the same essence. In the first
of these, the mind, in making its complex ideas of substances, only follows
nature; and puts none together which are not supposed to have a union in
nature. Nobody joins the voice of a sheep with the shape of a horse; nor
the colour of lead with the weight and fixedness of gold, to be the complex
ideas of any real substances; unless he has a mind to fill his head with
chimeras, and his discourse with unintelligible words. Men observing certain
qualities always joined and existing together, therein copied nature; and
of ideas so united made their complex ones of substances. For, though men
may make what complex ideas they please, and give what names to them they
will; yet, if they will be understood when they speak of things really
existing, they must in some degree conform their ideas to the things they
would speak of; or else men's language will be like that of Babel; and
every man's words, being intelligible only to himself, would no longer
serve to conversation and the ordinary affairs of life, if the ideas they
stand for be not some way answering the common appearances and agreement
of substances as they really exist.
29. Our nominal essences of substances usually consist of a few obvious
qualities observed in things. Secondly, Though the mind of man, in making
its complex ideas of substances, never puts any together that do not really,
or are not supposed to, co-exist; and so it truly borrows that union from
nature: yet the number it combines depends upon the various care, industry,
or fancy of him that makes it. Men generally content themselves with some
few sensible obvious qualities; and often, if not always, leave out others
as material and as firmly united as those that they take. Of sensible substances
there are two sorts: one of organized bodies, which are propagated by seed;
and in these the shape is that which to us is the leading quality, and
most characteristical part, that determines the species. And therefore
in vegetables and animals, an extended solid substance of such a certain
figure usually serves the turn. For however some men seem to prize their
definition of animal rationale, yet should there a creature be found that
had language and reason, but partaked not of the usual shape of a man,
I believe it would hardly pass for a man, how much soever it were animal
rationale. And if Balaam's ass had all his life discoursed as rationally
as he did once with his master, I doubt yet whether any one would have
thought him worthy the name man, or allowed him to be of the same species
with himself. As in vegetables and animals it is the shape, so in most
other bodies, not propagated by seed, it is the colour we must fix on,
and are most led by. Thus where we find the colour of gold, we are apt
to imagine all the other qualities comprehended in our complex idea to
be there also: and we commonly take these two obvious qualities, viz. shape
and colour, for so presumptive ideas of several species, that in a good
picture, we readily say, this is a lion, and that a rose; this is a gold,
and that a silver goblet, only by the different figures and colours represented
to the eye by the pencil.
30. Yet, imperfect as they thus are, they serve for common converse.
But though this serves well enough for gross and confused conceptions,
and inaccurate ways of talking and thinking; yet men are far enough from
having agreed on the precise number of simple ideas or qualities belonging
to any sort of things, signified by its name. Nor is it a wonder; since
it requires much time, pains, and skill, strict inquiry, and long examination
to find out what, and how many, those simple ideas are, which are constantly
and inseparably united in nature, and are always to be found together in
the same subject. Most men, wanting either time, inclination, or industry
enough for this, even to some tolerable degree, content themselves with
some few obvious and outward appearances of things, thereby readily to
distinguish and sort them for the common affairs of life: and so, without
further examination, give them names, or take up the names already in use.
Which, though in common conversation they pass well enough for the signs
of some few obvious qualities co-existing, are yet far enough from comprehending,
in a settled signification, a precise number of simple ideas, much less
all those which are united in nature. He that shall consider, after so
much stir about genus and species, and such a deal of talk of specific
differences, how few words we have yet settled definitions of, may with
reason imagine, that those forms which there hath been so much noise made
about are only chimeras, which give us no light into the specific natures
of things. And he that shall consider how far the names of substances are
from having significations wherein all who use them do agree, will have
reason to conclude that, though the nominal essences of substances are
all supposed to be copied from nature, yet they are all, or most of them,
very imperfect. Since the composition of those complex ideas are, in several
men, very different: and therefore that these boundaries of species are
as men, and not as Nature, makes them, if at least there are in nature
any such prefixed bounds. It is true that many particular substances are
so made by Nature, that they have agreement and likeness one with another,
and so afford a foundation of being ranked into sorts. But the sorting
of things by us, or the making of determinate species, being in order to
naming and comprehending them under general terms, I cannot see how it
can be properly said, that Nature sets the boundaries of the species of
things: or, if it be so, our boundaries of species are not exactly conformable
to those in nature. For we, having need of general names for present use,
stay not for a perfect discovery of all those qualities which would best
show us their most material differences and agreements; but we ourselves
divide them, by certain obvious appearances, into species, that we may
the easier under general names communicate our thoughts about them. For,
having no other knowledge of any substance but of the simple ideas that
are united in it; and observing several particular things to agree with
others in several of those simple ideas; we make that collection our specific
idea, and give it a general name; that in recording our thoughts, and in
our discourse with others, we may in one short word designate all the individuals
that agree in that complex idea, without enumerating the simple ideas that
make it up; and so not waste our time and breath in tedious descriptions:
which we see they are fain to do who would discourse of any new sort of
things they have not yet a name for.
31. Essences of species under the same name very different in different
minds. But however these species of substances pass well enough in ordinary
conversation, it is plain that this complex idea, wherein they observe
several individuals to agree, is by different men made very differently;
by some more, and others less accurately. In some, this complex idea contains
a greater, and in others a smaller number of qualities; and so is apparently
such as the mind makes it. The yellow shining colour makes gold to children;
others add weight, malleableness, and fusibility; and others yet other
qualities, which they find joined with that yellow colour, as constantly
as its weight and fusibility. For in all these and the like qualities,
one has as good a right to be put into the complex idea of that substance
wherein they are all joined as another. And therefore different men, leaving
out or putting in several simple ideas which others do not, according to
their various examination, skill, or observation of that subject, have
different essences of gold, which must therefore be of their own and not
of nature's making.
32. The more general our ideas of substances are, the more incomplete
and partial they are. If the number of simple ideas that make the nominal
essence of the lowest species, or first sorting, of individuals, depends
on the mind of man, variously collecting them, it is much more evident
that they do so in the more comprehensive classes, which, by the masters
of logic, are called genera. These are complex ideas designedly imperfect:
and it is visible at first sight, that several of those qualities that
are to be found in the things themselves are purposely left out of generical
ideas. For, as the mind, to make general ideas comprehending several particulars,
leaves out those of time and place, and such other, that make them incommunicable
to more than one individual; so to make other yet more general ideas, that
may comprehend different sorts, it leaves out those qualities that distinguish
them, and puts into its new collection only such ideas as are common to
several sorts. The same convenience that made men express several parcels
of yellow matter coming from Guinea and Peru under one name, sets them
also upon making of one name that may comprehend both gold and silver,
and some other bodies of different sorts. This is done by leaving out those
qualities, which are peculiar to each sort, and retaining a complex idea
made up of those that are common to them all. To which the name metal being
annexed, there is a genus constituted; the essence whereof being that abstract
idea, containing only malleableness and fusibility, with certain degrees
of weight and fixedness, wherein some bodies of several kinds agree, leaves
out the colour and other qualities peculiar to gold and silver, and the
other sorts comprehended under the name metal. Whereby it is plain that
men follow not exactly the patterns set them by nature, when they make
their general ideas of substances; since there is no body to be found which
has barely malleableness and fusibility in it, without other qualities
as inseparable as those. But men, in making their general ideas, seeking
more the convenience of language, and quick dispatch by short and comprehensive
signs, than the true and precise nature of things as they exist, have,
in the framing their abstract ideas, chiefly pursued that end; which was
to be furnished with store of general and variously comprehensive names.
So that in this whole business of genera and species, the genus, or more
comprehensive, is but a partial conception of what is in the species; and
the species but a partial idea of what is to be found in each individual.
If therefore any one will think that a man, and a horse, and an animal,
and a plant, &c., are distinguished by real essences made by nature,
he must think nature to be very liberal of these real essences, making
one for body, another for an animal, and another for a horse; and all these
essences liberally bestowed upon Bucephalus. But if we would rightly consider
what is done in all these genera and species, or sorts, we should find
that there is no new thing made; but only more or less comprehensive signs,
whereby we may be enabled to express in a few syllables great numbers of
particular things, as they agree in more or less general conceptions, which
we have framed to that purpose. In all which we may observe, that the more
general term is always the name of a less complex idea; and that each genus
is but a partial conception of the species comprehended under it. So that
if these abstract general ideas be thought to be complete, it can only
be in respect of a certain established relation between them and certain
names which are made use of to signify them; and not in respect of anything
existing, as made by nature.
33. This all accommodated to the end of speech. This is adjusted to
the true end of speech, which is to be the easiest and shortest way of
communicating our notions. For thus he that would discourse of things,
as they agreed in the complex idea of extension and solidity, needed but
use the word body to denote all such. He that to these would join others,
signified by the words life, sense, and spontaneous motion, needed but
use the word animal to signify all which partaked of those ideas, and he
that had made a complex idea of a body, with life, sense, and motion, with
the faculty of reasoning, and a certain shape joined to it, needed but
use the short monosyllable man, to express all particulars that correspond
to that complex idea. This is the proper business of genus and species:
and this men do without any consideration of real essences, or substantial
forms; which come not within the reach of our knowledge when we think of
those things, nor within the signification of our words when we discourse
with others.
34. Instance in Cassowaries. Were I to talk with any one of a sort of
birds I lately saw in St. James's Park, about three or four feet high,
with a covering of something between feathers and hair, of a dark brown
colour, without wings, but in the place thereof two or three little branches
coming down like sprigs of Spanish broom, long great legs, with feet only
of three claws, and without a tail; I must make this description of it,
and so may make others understand me. But when I am told that the name
of it is cassuaris, I may then use that word to stand in discourse for
all my complex idea mentioned in that description; though by that word,
which is now become a specific name, I know no more of the real essence
or constitution of that sort of animals than I did before; and knew probably
as much of the nature of that species of birds before I learned the name,
as many Englishmen do of swans or herons, which are specific names, very
well known, of sorts of birds common in England.
35. Men determine the sorts of substances, which may be sorted variously.
From what has been said, it is evident that men make sorts of things. For,
it being different essences alone that make different species, it is plain
that they who make those abstract ideas which are the nominal essences
do thereby make the species, or sort. Should there be a body found, having
all the other qualities of gold except malleableness, it would no doubt
be made a question whether it were gold or not, i.e. whether it were of
that species. This could be determined only by that abstract idea to which
every one annexed the name gold: so that it would be true gold to him,
and belong to that species, who included not malleableness in his nominal
essence, signified by the sound gold; and on the other side it would not
be true gold, or of that species, to him who included malleableness in
his specific idea. And who, I pray, is it that makes these diverse species,
even under one and the same name, but men that make two different abstract
ideas, consisting not exactly of the same collection of qualities? Nor
is it a mere supposition to imagine that a body may exist wherein the other
obvious qualities of gold may be without malleableness; since it is certain
that gold itself will be sometimes so eager, (as artists call it), that
it will as little endure the hammer as glass itself. What we have said
of the putting in, or leaving out of malleableness, in the complex idea
the name gold is by any one annexed to, may be said of its peculiar weight,
fixedness, and several other the like qualities: for whatever is left out,
or put in, it is still the complex idea to which that name is annexed that
makes the species: and as any particular parcel of matter answers that
idea, so the name of the sort belongs truly to it; and it is of that species.
And thus anything is true gold, perfect metal. All which determination
of the species, it is plain, depends on the understanding of man, making
this or that complex idea.
36. Nature makes the similitudes of substances. This, then, in short,
is the case: Nature makes many particular things, which do agree one with
another in many sensible qualities, and probably too in their internal
frame and constitution: but it is not this real essence that distinguishes
them into species; it is men who, taking occasion from the qualities they
find united in them, and wherein they observe often several individuals
to agree, range them into sorts, in order to their naming, for the convenience
of comprehensive signs; under which individuals, according to their conformity
to this or that abstract idea, come to be ranked as under ensigns: so that
this is of the blue, that the red regiment; this is a man, that a drill:
and in this, I think, consists the whole business of genus and species.
37. The manner of sorting particular beings the work of fallible men,
though nature makes things alike. I do not deny but nature, in the constant
production of particular beings, makes them not always new and various,
but very much alike and of kin one to another: but I think it nevertheless
true, that the boundaries of the species, whereby men sort them, are made
by men; since the essences of the species, distinguished by different names,
are, as has been proved, of man's making, and seldom adequate to the internal
nature of the things they are taken from. So that we may truly say, such
a manner of sorting of things is the workmanship of men.
38. Each abstract idea, with a name to it, makes a nominal essence.
One thing I doubt not but will seem very strange in this doctrine, which
is, that from what has been said it will follow, that each abstract idea,
with a name to it, makes a distinct species. But who can help it, if truth
will have it so? For so it must remain till somebody can show us the species
of things limited and distinguished by something else; and let us see that
general terms signify not our abstract ideas, but something different from
them. I would fain know why a shock and a hound are not as distinct species
as a spaniel and an elephant. We have no other idea of the different essence
of an elephant and a spaniel, than we have of the different essence of
a shock and a hound; all the essential difference, whereby we know and
distinguish them one from another, consisting only in the different collection
of simple ideas, to which we have given those different names.
39. How genera and species are related to naming. How much the making
of species and genera is in order to general names; and how much general
names are necessary, if not to the being, yet at least to the completing
of a species, and making it pass for such, will appear, besides what has
been said above concerning ice and water, in a very familiar example. A
silent and a striking watch are but one species to those who have but one
name for them: but he that has the name watch for one, and clock for the
other, and distinct complex ideas to which those names belong, to him they
are different species. It will be said perhaps, that the inward contrivance
and constitution is different between these two, which the watchmaker has
a clear idea of. And yet it is plain they are but one species to him, when
he has but one name for them. For what is sufficient in the inward contrivance
to make a new species? There are some watches that are made with four wheels,
others with five; is this a specific difference to the workman? Some have
strings and physies, and others none; some have the balance loose, and
others regulated by a spiral spring, and others by hogs' bristles. Are
any or all of these enough to make a specific difference to the workman,
that knows each of these and several other different contrivances in the
internal constitutions of watches? It is certain each of these hath a real
difference from the rest; but whether it be an essential, a specific difference
or no, relates only to the complex idea to which the name watch is given:
as long as they all agree in the idea which that name stands for, and that
name does not as a generical name comprehend different species under it,
they are not essentially nor specifically different. But if any one will
make minuter divisions, from differences that he knows in the internal
frame of watches, and to such precise complex ideas give names that shall
prevail; they will then be new species, to them who have those ideas with
names to them, and can by those differences distinguish watches into these
several sorts; and then watch will be a generical name. But yet they would
be no distinct species to men ignorant of clock-work, and the inward contrivances
of watches, who had no other idea but the outward shape and bulk, with
the marking of the hours by the hand. For to them all those other names
would be but synonymous terms for the same idea, and signify no more, nor
no other thing but a watch. Just thus I think it is in natural things.
Nobody will doubt that the wheels or springs (if I may so say) within,
are different in a rational man and a changeling; no more than that there
is a difference in the frame between a drill and a changeling. But whether
one or both these differences be essential or specifical, is only to be
known to us by their agreement or disagreement with the complex idea that
the name man stands for: for by that alone can it be determined whether
one, or both, or neither of those be a man.
40. Species of artificial things less confused than natural. From what
has been before said, we may see the reason why, in the species of artificial
things, there is generally less confusion and uncertainty than in natural.
Because an artificial thing being a production of man, which the artificer
designed, and therefore well knows the idea of, the name of it is supposed
to stand for no other idea, nor to import any other essence, than what
is certainly to be known, and easy enough to be apprehended. For the idea
or essence of the several sorts of artificial things, consisting for the
most part in nothing but the determinate figure of sensible parts, and
sometimes motion depending thereon, which the artificer fashions in matter,
such as he finds for his turn; it is not beyond the reach of our faculties
to attain a certain idea thereof; and so settle the signification of the
names whereby the species of artificial things are distinguished, with
less doubt, obscurity, and equivocation than we can in things natural,
whose differences and operations depend upon contrivances beyond the reach
of our discoveries.
41. Artificial things of distinct species. I must be excused here if
I think artificial things are of distinct species as well as natural: since
I find they are as plainly and orderly ranked into sorts, by different
abstract ideas, with general names annexed to them, as distinct one from
another as those of natural substances. For why should we not think a watch
and pistol as distinct species one from another, as a horse and a dog;
they being expressed in our minds by distinct ideas, and to others by distinct
appellations?
42. Substances alone, of all our several sorts of ideas, have proper
names. This is further to be observed concerning substances, that they
alone of all our several sorts of ideas have particular or proper names,
whereby one only particular thing is signified. Because in simple ideas,
modes, and relations, it seldom happens that men have occasion to mention
often this or that particular when it is absent. Besides, the greatest
part of mixed modes, being actions which perish in their birth, are not
capable of a lasting duration, as substances which are the actors; and
wherein the simple ideas that make up the complex ideas designed by the
name have a lasting union.
43. Difficult to lead another by words into the thoughts of things stripped
of those abstract ideas we give them. I must beg pardon of my reader for
having dwelt so long upon this subject, and perhaps with some obscurity.
But I desire it may be considered, how difficult it is to lead another
by words into the thoughts of things, stripped of those specifical differences
we give them: which things, if I name not, I say nothing; and if I do name
them, I thereby rank them into some sort or other, and suggest to the mind
the usual abstract idea of that species; and so cross my purpose. For,
to talk of a man, and to lay by, at the same time, the ordinary signification
of the name man, which is our complex idea usually annexed to it; and bid
the reader consider man, as he is in himself, and as he is really distinguished
from others in his internal constitution, or real essence, that is, by
something he knows not what, looks like trifling: and yet thus one must
do who would speak of the supposed real essences and species of things,
as thought to be made by nature, if it be but only to make it understood,
that there is no such thing signified by the general names which substances
are called by. But because it is difficult by known familiar names to do
this, give me leave to endeavour by an example to make the different consideration
the mind has of specific names and ideas a little more clear; and to show
how the complex ideas of modes are referred sometimes to archetypes in
the minds of other intelligent beings, or, which is the same, to the signification
annexed by others to their received names; and sometimes to no archetypes
at all. Give me leave also to show how the mind always refers its ideas
of substances, either to the substances themselves, or to the signification
of their names, as to the archetypes; and also to make plain the nature
of species or sorting of things, as apprehended and made use of by us;
and of the essences belonging to those species: which is perhaps of more
moment to discover the extent and certainty of our knowledge than we at
first imagine.
44. Instances of mixed modes named kinneah and niouph. Let us suppose
Adam, in the state of a grown man, with a good understanding, but in a
strange country, with all things new and unknown about him; and no other
faculties to attain the knowledge of them but what one of this age has
now. He observes Lamech more melancholy than usual, and imagines it to
be from a suspicion he has of his wife Adah, (whom he most ardently loved)
that she had too much kindness for another man. Adam discourses these his
thoughts to Eve, and desires her to take care that Adah commit not folly:
and in these discourses with Eve he makes use of these two new words kinneah
and niouph. In time, Adam's mistake appears, for he finds Lamech's trouble
proceeded from having killed a man: but yet the two names kinneah and niouph,
(the one standing for suspicion in a husband of his wife's disloyalty to
him; and the other for the act of committing disloyalty), lost not their
distinct significations. It is plain then, that here were two distinct
complex ideas of mixed modes, with names to them, two distinct species
of actions essentially different; I ask wherein consisted the essences
of these two distinct species of actions? And it is plain it consisted
in a precise combination of simple ideas, different in one from the other.
I ask, whether the complex idea in Adam's mind, which he called kinneah,
were adequate or not? And it is plain it was; for it being a combination
of simple ideas, which he, without any regard to any archetype, without
respect to anything as a pattern, voluntarily put together, abstracted,
and gave the name kinneah to, to express in short to others, by that one
sound, all the simple ideas contained and united in that complex one; it
must necessarily follow that it was an adequate idea. His own choice having
made that combination, it had all in it he intended it should, and so could
not but be perfect, could not but be adequate; it being referred to no
other archetype which it was supposed to represent.
45. These words, kinneah and niouph, by degrees grew into common use,
and then the case was somewhat altered. Adam's children had the same faculties,
and thereby the same power that he had, to make what complex ideas of mixed
modes they pleased in their own minds; to abstract them, and make what
sounds they pleased the signs of them: but the use of names being to make
our ideas within us known to others, that cannot be done, but when the
same sign stands for the same idea in two who would communicate their thoughts
and discourse together. Those, therefore, of Adam's children, that found
these two words, kinneah and niouph, in familiar use, could not take them
for insignificant sounds, but must needs conclude they stood for something;
for certain ideas, abstract ideas. they being general names; which abstract
ideas were the essences of the species distinguished by those names. If,
therefore, they would use these words as names of species already established
and agreed on, they were obliged to conform the ideas in their minds, signified
by these names, to the ideas that they stood for in other men's minds,
as to their patterns and archetypes; and then indeed their ideas of these
complex modes were liable to be inadequate, as being very apt (especially
those that consisted of combinations of many simple ideas) not to be exactly
conformable to the ideas in other men's minds, using the same names; though
for this there be usually a remedy at hand, which is to ask the meaning
of any word we understand not of him that uses it: it being as impossible
to know certainly what the words jealousy and adultery stand for in another
man's mind, with whom I would discourse about them; as it was impossible,
in the beginning of language, to know what kinneah and niouph stood for
in another man's mind, without explication; they being voluntary signs
in every one.
46. Instances of a species of substance named Zahab. Let us now also
consider, after the same manner, the names of substances in their first
application. One of Adam's children, roving in the mountains, lights on
a glittering substance which pleases his eye. Home he carries it to Adam,
who, upon consideration of it, finds it to be hard, to have a bright yellow
colour, and an exceeding great weight. These perhaps, at first, are all
the qualities he takes notice of in it; and abstracting this complex idea,
consisting of a substance having that peculiar bright yellowness, and a
weight very great in proportion to its bulk, he gives the name zahab, to
denominate and mark all substances that have these sensible qualities in
them. It is evident now, that, in this case, Adam acts quite differently
from what he did before, in forming those ideas of mixed modes to which
he gave the names kinneah and niouph. For there he put ideas together only
by his own imagination, not taken from the existence of anything; and to
them he gave names to denominate all things that should happen to agree
to those his abstract ideas, without considering whether any such thing
did exist or not; the standard there was of his own making. But in the
forming his idea of this new substance, he takes the quite contrary course;
here he has a standard made by nature; and therefore, being to represent
that to himself, by the idea he has of it, even when it is absent, he puts
in no simple idea into his complex one, but what he has the perception
of from the thing itself. He takes care that his idea be conformable to
this archetype, and intends the name should stand for an idea so conformable.
47. This piece of matter, thus denominated zahab by Adam, being quite
different from any he had seen before, nobody, I think, will deny to be
a distinct species, and to have its peculiar essence: and that the name
zahab is the mark of the species, and a name belonging to all things partaking
in that essence. But here it is plain the essence Adam made the name zahab
stand for was nothing but a body hard, shining, yellow, and very heavy.
But the inquisitive mind of man, not content with the knowledge of these,
as I may say, superficial qualities, puts Adam upon further examination
of this matter. He therefore knocks, and beats it with flints, to see what
was discoverable in the inside: he finds it yield to blows, but not easily
separate into pieces: he finds it will bend without breaking. Is not now
ductility to be added to his former idea, and made part of the essence
of the species that name Zahab stands for? Further trials discover fusibility
and fixedness. Are not they also, by the same reason that any of the others
were, to be put into the complex idea signified by the name zahab? If not,
what reason will there be shown more for the one than the other? If these
must, then all the other properties, which any further trials shall discover
in this matter, ought by the same reason to make a part of the ingredients
of the complex idea which the name zahab stands for, and so be the essence
of the species marked by that name. Which properties, because they are
endless, it is plain that the idea made after this fashion, by this archetype,
will be always inadequate.
48. The abstract ideas of substances always imperfect, and therefore
various. But this is not all. It would also follow that the names of substances
would not only have, as in truth they have, but would also be supposed
to have different significations, as used by different men, which would
very much cumber the use of language. For if every distinct quality that
were discovered in any matter by any one were supposed to make a necessary
part of the complex idea signified by the common name given to it, it must
follow, that men must suppose the same word to signify different things
in different men: since they cannot doubt but different men may have discovered
several qualities, in substances of the same denomination, which others
know nothing of.
49. Therefore to fix their nominal species, a real essense is supposed.
To avoid this therefore, they have supposed a real essence belonging to
every species, from which these properties all flow, and would have their
name of the species stand for that. But they, not having any idea of that
real essence in substances, and their words signifying nothing but the
ideas they have, that which is done by this attempt is only to put the
name or sound in the place and stead of the thing having that real essence,
without knowing what the real essence is, and this is that which men do
when they speak of species of things, as supposing them made by nature,
and distinguished by real essences.
50. Which supposition is of no use. For, let us consider, when we affirm
that "all gold is fixed," either it means that fixedness is a part of the
definition, i.e., part of the nominal essence the word gold stands for;
and so this affirmation, "all gold is fixed," contains nothing but the
signification of the term gold. Or else it means, that fixedness, not being
a part of the definition of the gold, is a property of that substance itself:
in which case it is plain that the word gold stands in the place of a substance,
having the real essence of a species of things made by nature. In which
way of substitution it has so confused and uncertain a signification, that,
though this proposition- "gold is fixed"- be in that sense an affirmation
of something real; yet it is a truth will always fail us in its particular
application, and so is of no real use or certainty. For let it be ever
so true, that all gold, i.e. all that has the real essence of gold, is
fixed, what serves this for, whilst we know not, in this sense, what is
or is not gold? For if we know not the real essence of gold, it is impossible
we should know what parcel of matter has that essence, and so whether it
be true gold or no.
51. Conclusion. To conclude: what liberty Adam had at first to make
any complex ideas of mixed modes by no other pattern but by his own thoughts,
the same have all men ever since had. And the same necessity of conforming
his ideas of substances to things without him, as to archetypes made by
nature, that Adam was under, if he would not wilfully impose upon himself,
the same are all men ever since under too. The same liberty also that Adam
had of affixing any new name to any idea, the same has any one still, (especially
the beginners of languages, if we can imagine any such); but only with
this difference, that, in places where men in society have already established
a language amongst them, the significations of words are very warily and
sparingly to be altered. Because men being furnished already with names
for their ideas, and common use having appropriated known names to certain
ideas, an affected misapplication of them cannot but be very ridiculous.
He that hath new notions will perhaps venture sometimes on the coining
of new terms to express them: but men think it a boldness, and it is uncertain
whether common use will ever make them pass for current. But in communication
with others, it is necessary that we conform the ideas we make the vulgar
words of any language stand for to their known proper significations, (which
I have explained at large already), or else to make known that new signification
we apply them to.
Chapter VII: Of Particles
1. Particles connect parts, or whole sentences together. Besides words
which are names of ideas in the mind, there are a great many others that
are made use of to signify the connexion that the mind gives to ideas,
or to propositions, one with another. The mind, in communicating its thoughts
to others, does not only need signs of the ideas it has then before it,
but others also, to show or intimate some particular action of its own,
at that time, relating to those ideas. This it does several ways; as Is,
and Is not, are the general marks, of the mind, affirming or denying. But
besides affirmation or negation, without which there is in words no truth
or falsehood, the mind does, in declaring its sentiments to others, connect
not only the parts of propositions, but whole sentences one to another,
with their several relations and dependencies, to make a coherent discourse.
2. In right use of particles consists the art of well-speaking. The
words whereby it signifies what connexion it gives to the several affirmations
and negations, that it unites in one continued reasoning or narration,
are generally called particles: and it is in the right use of these that
more particularly consists the clearness and beauty of a good style. To
think well, it is not enough that a man has ideas clear and distinct in
his thoughts, nor that he observes the agreement or disagreement of some
of them; but he must think in train, and observe the dependence of his
thoughts and reasonings upon one another. And to express well such methodical
and rational thoughts, he must have words to show what connexion, restriction,
distinction, opposition, emphasis &c., he gives to each respective
part of his discourse. To mistake in any of these, is to puzzle instead
of informing his hearer: and therefore it is, that those words which are
not truly by themselves the names of any ideas are of such constant and
indispensable use in language, and do much contribute to men's well expressing
themselves.
3. They show what relation the mind gives to its own thoughts. This
part of grammar has been perhaps as much neglected as some others over-diligently
cultivated. It is easy for men to write, one after another, of cases and
genders, moods and tenses, gerunds and supines: in these and the like there
has been great diligence used; and particles themselves, in some languages,
have been, with great show of exactness, ranked into their several orders.
But though prepositions and conjunctions, &c., are names well known
in grammar, and the particles contained under them carefully ranked into
their distinct subdivisions; yet he who would show the right use of particles,
and what significancy and force they have, must take a little more pains,
enter into his own thoughts, and observe nicely the several postures of
his mind in discoursing.
4. They are all marks of some action or intimation of the mind. Neither
is it enough, for the explaining of these words, to render them, as is
usual in dictionaries, by words of another tongue which come nearest to
their signification: for what is meant by them is commonly as hard to be
understood in one as another language. They are all marks of some action
or intimation of the mind; and therefore to understand them rightly, the
several views, postures, stands, turns, limitations, and exceptions, and
several other thoughts of the mind, for which we have either none or very
deficient names, are diligently to be studied. Of these there is a great
variety, much exceeding the number of particles that most languages have
to express them by: and therefore it is not to be wondered that most of
these particles have divers and sometimes almost opposite significations.
In the Hebrew tongue there is a particle consisting of but one single letter,
of which there are reckoned up, as I remember, seventy, I am sure above
fifty, several significations.
5. Instance in "but." "But" is a particle, none more familiar in our
language: and he that says it is a discretive conjunction, and that it
answers to sed Latin, or mais in French, thinks he has sufficiently explained
it. But yet it seems to me to intimate several relations the mind gives
to the several propositions or parts of them which it joins by this monosyllable.
First, "But to say no more": here it intimates a stop of the mind in
the course it was going, before it came quite to the end of it.
Secondly, "I saw but two plants"; here it shows that the mind limits
the sense to what is expressed, with a negation of all other.
Thirdly, "You pray; but it is not that God would bring you to the true
religion."
Fourthly, "But that he would confirm you in your own." The first of
these buts intimates a supposition in the mind of something otherwise than
it should be: the latter shows that the mind makes a direct opposition
between that and what goes before it.
Fifthly, "All animals have sense, but a dog is an animal": here it signifies
little more but that the latter proposition is joined to the former, as
the minor of a syllogism.
6. This matter of the use of particles but lightly touched here. To
these, I doubt not, might be added a great many other significations of
this particle, if it were my business to examine it in its full latitude,
and consider it in all the places it is to be found: which if one should
do, I doubt whether in all those manners it is made use of, it would deserve
the title of discretive, which grammarians give to it. But I intend not
here a full explication of this sort of signs. The instances I have given
in this one may give occasion to reflect on their use and force in language,
and lead us into the contemplation of several actions of our minds in discoursing,
which it has found a way to intimate to others by these particles, some
whereof constantly, and others in certain constructions, have the sense
of a whole sentence contained in them.
Chapter VIII: Of Abstract and Concrete Terms
1. Abstract terms not predictable one of another, and why. The ordinary
words of language, and our common use of them, would have given us light
into the nature of our ideas, if they had been but considered with attention.
The mind, as has been shown, has a power to abstract its ideas, and so
they become essences, general essences, whereby the sorts of things are
distinguished. Now each abstract idea being distinct, so that of any two
the one can never be the other, the mind will, by its intuitive knowledge,
perceive their difference, and therefore in propositions no two whole ideas
can ever be affirmed one of another. This we see in the common use of language,
which permits not any two abstract words, or names of abstract ideas, to
be affirmed one of another. For how near of kin soever they may seem to
be, and how certain soever it is that man is an animal, or rational, or
white, yet every one at first hearing perceives the falsehood of these
propositions: humanity is animality, or rationality, or whiteness: and
this is as evident as any of the most allowed maxims. All our affirmations
then are only in concrete, which is the affirming, not one abstract idea
to be another, but one abstract idea to be joined to another; which abstract
ideas, in substances, may be of any sort; in all the rest are little else
but of relations; and in substances the most frequent are of powers: v.g.
"a man is white," signifies that the thing that has the essence of a man
has also in it the essence of whiteness, which is nothing but a power to
produce the idea of whiteness in one whose eyes can discover ordinary objects:
or, "a man is rational," signifies that the same thing that hath the essence
of a man hath also in it the essence of rationality, i.e. a power of reasoning.
2. They show the difference of our ideas. This distinction of names
shows us also the difference of our ideas: for if we observe them, we shall
find that our simple ideas have all abstract as well as concrete names:
the one whereof is (to speak the language of grammarians) a substantive,
the other an adjective; as whiteness, white; sweetness, sweet. The like
also holds in our ideas of modes and relations; as justice, just; equality,
equal: only with this difference, that some of the concrete names of relations
amongst men chiefly are substantives; as, paternitas, pater; whereof it
were easy to render a reason. But as to our ideas of substances, we have
very few or no abstract names at all. For though the Schools have introduced
animalitas, humanitas, corporietas, and some others; yet they hold no proportion
with that infinite number of names of substances, to which they never were
ridiculous enough to attempt the coining of abstract ones: and those few
that the schools forged, and put into the mouths of their scholars, could
never yet get admittance into common use, or obtain the license of public
approbation. Which seems to me at least to intimate the confession of all
mankind, that they have no ideas of the real essences of substances, since
they have not names for such ideas: which no doubt they would have had,
had not their consciousness to themselves of their ignorance of them kept
them from so idle an attempt. And therefore, though they had ideas enough
to distinguish gold from a stone, and metal from wood; yet they but timorously
ventured on such terms, as aurietas and saxietas, metallietas and lignietas,
or the like names, which should pretend to signify the real essences of
those substances whereof they knew they had no ideas. And indeed it was
only the doctrine of substantial forms, and the confidence of mistaken
pretenders to a knowledge that they had not, which first coined and then
introduced animalitas and humanitas, and the like; which yet went very
little further than their own Schools, and could never get to be current
amongst understanding men. Indeed, humanitas was a word in familiar use
amongst the Romans; but in a far different sense, and stood not for the
abstract essence of any substance; but was the abstracted name of a mode,
and its concrete humanus, not homo.
Chapter IX: Of the Imperfection of Words
1. Words are used for recording and communicating our thoughts. From what
has been said in the foregoing chapters, it is easy to perceive what imperfection
there is in language, and how the very nature of words makes it almost
unavoidable for many of them to be doubtful and uncertain in their significations.
To examine the perfection or imperfection of words, it is necessary first
to consider their use and end: for as they are more or less fitted to attain
that, so they are more or less perfect. We have, in the former part of
this discourse often, upon occasion, mentioned a double use of words.
First, One for the recording of our own thoughts.
Secondly, The other for the communicating of our thoughts to others.
2. Any words will serve for recording. As to the first of these, for
the recording our own thoughts for the help of our own memories, whereby,
as it were, we talk to ourselves, any words will serve the turn. For since
sounds are voluntary and indifferent signs of any ideas, a man may use
what words he pleases to signify his own ideas to himself: and there will
be no imperfection in them, if he constantly use the same sign for the
same idea: for then he cannot fail of having his meaning understood, wherein
consists the right use and perfection of language.
3. Communication by words either for civil or philosophical purposes.
Secondly, As to communication by words, that too has a double use.
I. Civil.
II. Philosophical.
First, by their civil use, I mean such a communication of thoughts and
ideas by words, as may serve for the upholding common conversation and
commerce, about the ordinary affairs and conveniences of civil life, in
the societies of men, one amongst another.
Secondly, By the philosophical use of words, I mean such a use of them
as may serve to convey the precise notions of things, and to express in
general propositions certain and undoubted truths, which the mind may rest
upon and be satisfied with in its search after true knowledge. These two
uses are very distinct; and a great deal less exactness will serve in the
one than in the other, as we shall see in what follows.
4. The imperfection of words is the doubtfulness or ambiguity of their
signification, which is caused by the sort of ideas they stand for. The
chief end of language in communication being to be understood, words serve
not well for that end, neither in civil nor philosophical discourse, when
any word does not excite in the hearer the same idea which it stands for
in the mind of the speaker. Now, since sounds have no natural connexion
with our ideas, but have all their signification from the arbitrary imposition
of men, the doubtfulness and uncertainty of their signification, which
is the imperfection we here are speaking of, has its cause more in the
ideas they stand for than in any incapacity there is in one sound more
than in another to signify any idea: for in that regard they are all equally
perfect.
That then which makes doubtfulness and uncertainty in the signification
of some more than other words, is the difference of ideas they stand for.
5. Natural causes of their imperfection, especially in those that stand
for mixed modes, and for our ideas of substances. Words having naturally
no signification, the idea which each stands for must be learned and retained,
by those who would exchange thoughts, and hold intelligible discourse with
others, in any language. But this is the hardest to be done where,
First, The ideas they stand for are very complex, and made up of a great
number of ideas put together.
Secondly, Where the ideas they stand for have no certain connexion in
nature; and so no settled standard anywhere in nature existing, to rectify
and adjust them by.
Thirdly, When the signification of the word is referred to a standard,
which standard is not easy to be known.
Fourthly, Where the signification of the word and the real essence of
the thing are not exactly the same.
These are difficulties that attend the signification of several words
that are intelligible. Those which are not intelligible at all, such as
names standing for any simple ideas which another has not organs or faculties
to attain; as the names of colours to a blind man, or sounds to a deaf
man, need not here be mentioned.
In all these cases we shall find an imperfection in words; which I shall
more at large explain, in their particular application to our several sorts
of ideas: for if we examine them, we shall find that the names of Mixed
Modes are most liable to doubtfulness and imperfection, for the two first
of these reasons; and the names of Substances chiefly for the two latter.
6. The names of mixed modes doubtful. First, because the ideas they
stand for are so complex. First, The names of mixed modes are, many of
them, liable to great uncertainty and obscurity in their signification
I. Because of that great composition these complex ideas are often made
up of. To make words serviceable to the end of communication, it is necessary,
as has been said, that they excite in the hearer exactly the same idea
they stand for in the mind of the speaker. Without this, men fill one another's
heads with noise and sounds; but convey not thereby their thoughts, and
lay not before one another their ideas, which is the end of discourse and
language. But when a word stands for a very complex idea that is compounded
and decompounded, it is not easy for men to form and retain that idea so
exactly, as to make the name in common use stand for the same precise idea,
without any the least variation. Hence it comes to pass that men's names
of very compound ideas, such as for the most part are moral words, have
seldom in two different men the same precise signification; since one man's
complex idea seldom agrees with another's, and often differs from his own-
from that which he had yesterday, or will have to-morrow.
7. Secondly, because they have no standards in nature. Because the names
of mixed modes for the most part want standards in nature, whereby men
may rectify and adjust their significations, therefore they are very various
and doubtful. They are assemblages of ideas put together at the pleasure
of the mind, pursuing its own ends of discourse, and suited to its own
notions, whereby it designs not to copy anything really existing, but to
denominate and rank things as they come to agree with those archetypes
or forms it has made. He that first brought the word sham, or wheedle,
or banter, in use, put together as he thought fit those ideas he made it
stand for; and as it is with any new names of modes that are now brought
into any language, so it was with the old ones when they were first made
use of. Names, therefore, that stand for collections of ideas which the
mind makes at pleasure must needs be of doubtful signification, when such
collections are nowhere to be found constantly united in nature, nor any
patterns to be shown whereby men may adjust them. What the word murder,
or sacrilege, &c., signifies can never be known from things themselves:
there be many of the parts of those complex ideas which are not visible
in the action itself; the intention of the mind, or the relation of holy
things, which make a part of murder or sacrilege, have no necessary connexion
with the outward and visible action of him that commits either: and the
pulling the trigger of the gun with which the murder is committed, and
is all the action that perhaps is visible, has no natural connexion with
those other ideas that make up the complex one named murder. They have
their union and combination only from the understanding which unites them
under one name: but, uniting them without any rule or pattern, it cannot
be but that the signification of the name that stands for such voluntary
collections should be often various in the minds of different men, who
have scarce any standing rule to regulate themselves and their notions
by, in such arbitrary ideas.
8. Common use, or propriety not a sufficient remedy. It is true, common
use, that is, the rule of propriety may be supposed here to afford some
aid, to settle the signification of language; and it cannot be denied but
that in some measure it does. Common use regulates the meaning of words
pretty well for common conversation; but nobody having an authority to
establish the precise signification of words, nor determine to what ideas
any one shall annex them, common use is not sufficient to adjust them to
Philosophical Discourses; there being scarce any name of any very complex
idea (to say nothing of others) which, in common use, has not a great latitude,
and which, keeping within the bounds of propriety, may not be made the
sign of far different ideas. Besides, the rule and measure of propriety
itself being nowhere established, it is often matter of dispute, whether
this or that way of using a word be propriety of speech or no. From all
which it is evident, that the names of such kind of very complex ideas
are naturally liable to this imperfection, to be of doubtful and uncertain
signification; and even in men that have a mind to understand one another,
do not always stand for the same idea in speaker and hearer. Though the
names glory and gratitude be the same in every man's mouth through a whole
country, yet the complex collective idea which every one thinks on or intends
by that name, is apparently very different in men using the same language.
9. The way of learning these names contributes also to their doubtfulness.
The way also wherein the names of mixed modes are ordinarily learned, does
not a little contribute to the doubtfulness of their signification. For
if we will observe how children learn languages, we shall find that, to
make them understand what the names of simple ideas or substances stand
for, people ordinarily show them the thing whereof they would have them
have the idea; and then repeat to them the name that stands for it; as
white, sweet, milk, sugar, cat, dog. But as for mixed modes, especially
the most material of them, moral words, the sounds are usually learned
first; and then, to know what complex ideas they stand for, they are either
beholden to the explication of others, or (which happens for the most part)
are left to their own observation and industry; which being little laid
out in the search of the true and precise meaning of names, these moral
words are in most men's mouths little more than bare sounds; or when they
have any, it is for the most part but a very loose and undetermined, and,
consequently, obscure and confused signification. And even those themselves
who have with more attention settled their notions, do yet hardly avoid
the inconvenience to have them stand for complex ideas different from those
which other, even intelligent and studious men, make them the signs of.
Where shall one find any, either controversial debate, or familiar discourse,
concerning honour, faith, grace, religion, church, &c., wherein it
is not easy to observe the different notions men have of them? Which is
nothing but this, that they are not agreed in the signification of those
words, nor have in their minds the same complex ideas which they make them
stand for, and so all the contests that follow thereupon are only about
the meaning of a sound. And hence we see that, in the interpretation of
laws, whether divine or human, there is no end; comments beget comments,
and explications make new matter for explications; and of limiting, distinguishing,
varying the signification of these moral words there is no end. These ideas
of men's making are, by men still having the same power, multiplied in
infinitum. Many a man who was pretty well satisfied of the meaning of a
text of Scripture, or clause in the code, at first reading, has, by consulting
commentators, quite lost the sense of it, and by these elucidations given
rise or increase to his doubts, and drawn obscurity upon the place. I say
not this that I think commentaries needless; but to show how uncertain
the names of mixed modes naturally are, even in the mouths of those who
had both the intention and the faculty of speaking as clearly as language
was capable to express their thoughts.
10. Hence unavoidable obscurity in ancient authors. What obscurity this
has unavoidably brought upon the writings of men who have lived in remote
ages, and different countries, it will be needless to take notice. Since
the numerous volumes of learned men, employing their thoughts that way,
are proofs more than enough, to show what attention, study, sagacity, and
reasoning are required to find out the true meaning of ancient authors.
But, there being no writings we have any great concernment to be very solicitous
about the meaning of, but those that contain either truths we are required
to believe, or laws we are to obey, and draw inconveniences on us when
we mistake or transgress, we may be less anxious about the sense of other
authors; who, writing but their own opinions, we are under no greater necessity
to know them, than they to know ours. Our good or evil depending not on
their decrees, we may safely be ignorant of their notions: and therefore
in the reading of them, if they do not use their words with a due clearness
and perspicuity, we may lay them aside, and without any injury done them,
resolve thus with ourselves,
Si non vis intelligi, debes negligi.
11. Names of substances of doubtful signification, because the ideas
they stand for relate to the reality of things. If the signification of
the names of mixed modes be uncertain, because there be no real standards
existing in nature to which those ideas are referred, and by which they
may be adjusted, the names of substances are of a doubtful signification,
for a contrary reason, viz. because the ideas they stand for are supposed
conformable to the reality of things, and are referred to as standards
made by Nature. In our ideas of substances we have not the liberty, as
in mixed modes, to frame what combinations we think fit, to be the characteristical
notes to rank and denominate things by. In these we must follow Nature,
suit our complex ideas to real existences, and regulate the signification
of their names by the things themselves, if we will have our names to be
signs of them, and stand for them. Here, it is true, we have patterns to
follow; but patterns that will make the signification of their names very
uncertain: for names must be of a very unsteady and various meaning, if
the ideas they stand for be referred to standards without us, that either
cannot be known at all, or can be known but imperfectly and uncertainly.
12. Names of substances referred, to real essences that cannot be known.
The names of substances have, as has been shown, a double reference in
their ordinary use.
First, Sometimes they are made to stand for, and so their signification
is supposed to agree to, the real constitution of things, from which all
their properties flow, and in which they all centre. But this real constitution,
or (as it is apt to be called) essence, being utterly unknown to us, any
sound that is put to stand for it must be very uncertain in its application;
and it will be impossible to know what things are or ought to be called
a horse, or antimony, when those words are put for real essences that we
have no ideas of at all. And therefore in this supposition, the names of
substances being referred to standards that cannot be known, their significations
can never be adjusted and established by those standards.
13. To co-existing qualities, which are known but imperfectly. Secondly,
The simple ideas that are found to co-exist in substances being that which
their names immediately signify, these, as united in the several sorts
of things, are the proper standards to which their names are referred,
and by which their significations may be best rectified. But neither will
these archetypes so well serve to this purpose as to leave these names
without very various and uncertain significations. Because these simple
ideas that co-exist, and are united in the same subject, being very numerous,
and having all an equal right to go into the complex specific idea which
the specific name is to stand for, men, though they propose to themselves
the very same subject to consider, yet frame very different ideas about
it; and so the name they use for it unavoidably comes to have, in several
men, very different significations. The simple qualities which make up
the complex ideas, being most of them powers, in relation to changes which
they are apt to make in, or receive from other bodies, are almost infinite.
He that shall but observe what a great variety of alterations any one of
the baser metals is apt to receive, from the different application only
of fire; and how much a greater number of changes any of them will receive
in the hands of a chymist, by the application of other bodies, will not
think it strange that I count the properties of any sort of bodies not
easy to be collected, and completely known, by the ways of inquiry which
our faculties are capable of. They being therefore at least so many, that
no man can know the precise and definite number, they are differently discovered
by different men, according to their various skill, attention, and ways
of handling; who therefore cannot choose but have different ideas of the
same substance, and therefore make the signification of its common name
very various and uncertain. For the complex ideas of substances, being
made up of such simple ones as are supposed to co-exist in nature, every
one has a right to put into his complex idea those qualities he has found
to be united together. For, though in the substance of gold one satisfies
himself with colour and weight, yet another thinks solubility in aqua regia
as necessary to be joined with that colour in his idea of gold, as any
one does its fusibility; solubility in aqua regia being a quality as constantly
joined with its colour and weight as fusibility or any other; others put
into it ductility or fixedness, &c., as they have been taught by tradition
or experience. Who of all these has established the right signification
of the word, gold? Or who shall be the judge to determine? Each has his
standard in nature, which he appeals to, and with reason thinks he has
the same right to put into his complex idea signified by the word gold,
those qualities, which, upon trial, he has found united; as another who
has not so well examined has to leave them out; or a third, who has made
other trials, has to put in others. For the union in nature of these qualities
being the true ground of their union in one complex idea, who can say one
of them has more reason to be put in or left out than another? From hence
it will unavoidably follow, that the complex ideas of substances in men
using the same names for them, will be very various, and so the significations
of those names very uncertain.
14. Thirdly, to co-existing qualities which are known but imperfectly.
Besides, there is scarce any particular thing existing, which, in some
of its simple ideas, does not communicate with a greater, and in others
a less number of particular beings: who shall determine in this case which
are those that are to make up the precise collection that is to be signified
by the specific name? or can with any just authority prescribe, which obvious
or common qualities are to be left out; or which more secret, or more particular,
are to be put into the signification of the name of any substance? All
which together, seldom or never fall to produce that various and doubtful
signification in the names of substances, which causes such uncertainty,
disputes, or mistakes, when we come to a philosophical use of them.
15. With this imperfection, they may serve for civil, but not well for
philosophical use. It is true, as to civil and common conversation, the
general names of substances, regulated in their ordinary signification
by some obvious qualities, (as by the shape and figure in things of known
seminal propagation, and in other substances, for the most part by colour,
joined with some other sensible qualities), do well enough to design the
things men would be understood to speak of: and so they usually conceive
well enough the substances meant by the word gold or apple, to distinguish
the one from the other. But in philosophical inquiries and debates, where
general truths are to be established, and consequences drawn from positions
laid down, there the precise signification of the names of substances will
be found not only not to be well established, but also very hard to be
so. For example: he that shall make malleability, or a certain degree of
fixedness, a part of his complex idea of gold, may make propositions concerning
gold, and draw consequences from them, that will truly and clearly follow
from gold, taken in such a signification: but yet such as another man can
never be forced to admit, nor be convinced of their truth, who makes not
malleableness, or the same degree of fixedness, part of that complex idea
that the name gold, in his use of it, stands for.
16. Instance, liquor. This is a natural and almost unavoidable imperfection
in almost all the names of substances, in all languages whatsoever, which
men will easily find when, once passing from confused or loose notions,
they come to more strict and close inquiries. For then they will be convinced
how doubtful and obscure those words are in their signification, which
in ordinary use appeared very clear and determined. I was once in a meeting
of very learned and ingenious physicians, where by chance there arose a
question, whether any liquor passed through the filaments of the nerves.
The debate having been managed a good while, by variety of arguments on
both sides, I (who had been used to suspect, that the greatest part of
disputes were more about the signification of words than a real difference
in the conception of things) desired, that, before they went any further
on in this dispute, they would first examine and establish amongst them,
what the word liquor signified. They at first were a little surprised at
the proposal; and had they been persons less ingenious, they might perhaps
have taken it for a very frivolous or extravagant one: since there was
no one there that thought not himself to understand very perfectly what
the word liquor stood for; which I think, too, none of the most perplexed
names of substances. However, they were pleased to comply with my motion;
and upon examination found that the signification of that word was not
so settled or certain as they had all imagined; but that each of them made
it a sign of a different complex idea. This made them perceive that the
main of their dispute was about the signification of that term; and that
they differed very little in their opinions concerning some fluid and subtle
matter, passing through the conduits of the nerves; though it was not so
easy to agree whether it was to be called liquor or no, a thing, which,
when considered, they thought it not worth the contending about.
17. Instance, gold. How much this is the case in the greatest part of
disputes that men are engaged so hotly in, I shall perhaps have an occasion
in another place to take notice. Let us only here consider a little more
exactly the forementioned instance of the word gold, and we shall see how
hard it is precisely to determine its signification. I think all agree
to make it stand for a body of a certain yellow shining colour; which being
the idea to which children have annexed that name, the shining yellow part
of a peacock's tail is properly to them gold. Others finding fusibility
joined with that yellow colour in certain parcels of matter, make of that
combination a complex idea to which they give the name gold, to denote
a sort of substances; and so exclude from being gold all such yellow shining
bodies as by fire will be reduced to ashes; and admit to be of that species,
or to be comprehended under that name gold, only such substances as, having
that shining yellow colour, will by fire be reduced to fusion, and not
to ashes. Another, by the same reason, adds the weight, which, being a
quality as straightly joined with that colour as its fusibility, he thinks
has the same reason to be joined in its idea, and to be signified by its
name: and therefore the other made up of body, of such a colour and fusibility,
to be imperfect; and so on of all the rest: wherein no one can show a reason
why some of the inseparable qualities, that are always united in nature,
should be put into the nominal essence, and others left out: or why the
word gold, signifying that sort of body the ring on his finger is made
of, should determine that sort rather by its colour, weight, and fusibility,
than by its colour, weight, and solubility in aqua regia: since the dissolving
it by that liquor is as inseparable from it as the fusion by fire; and
they are both of them nothing but the relation which that substance has
to two other bodies, which have a power to operate differently upon it.
For by what right is it that fusibility comes to be a part of the essence
signified by the word gold, and solubility but a property of it? Or why
is its colour part of the essence, and its malleableness but a property?
That which I mean is this, That these being all but properties, depending
on its real constitution, and nothing but powers, either active or passive,
in reference to other bodies, no one has authority to determine the signification
of the word gold (as referred to such a body existing in nature) more to
one collection of ideas to be found in that body than to another: whereby
the signification of that name must unavoidably be very uncertain. Since,
as has been said, several people observe several properties in the same
substance; and I think I may say nobody all. And therefore we have but
very imperfect descriptions of things, and words have very uncertain significations.
18. The names of simple ideas the least doubtful. From what has been
said, it is easy to observe what has been before remarked, viz. that the
names of simple ideas are, of all others, the least liable to mistakes,
and that for these reasons. First, Because the ideas they stand for, being
each but one single perception, are much easier got, and more clearly retained,
than the more complex ones, and theref