which answers the Chinese 't is evident I could not be assur'd as I am that the Chinese see the same Truths as I see Therefore the Reason we consult when we retire into our selves is an universal Reason I say when we retire into our selves for I speak not here of the Reason which is follow'd by a Man in a Passion When a Man prefers the Life of his Coach-Horse before that of his Coach-Man he has his Reasons for it but they are particular Reasons which every rational Man abhors They are reasons which at Bottom are not reasonable because not conformable to Soveraign or universal Reason which all Mankind consults I am certain that the Ideas of things are immutable and that Eternal Truths and Laws are necessary 'T is impossible they should not be what they are But in my self I find nothing either immutable or necessary 'T is possible for me not to exist or exist otherwise than I do There may be Minds that are not like me and yet I am certain there can be no mind that sees other Truths and Laws than what I see For every mind necessarily sees that two times two are four and that a Friend is to be prefer'd before a Dog We must then conclude That the Reason which is consulted by all minds is an immutable and necessary Reason Moreover it is evident that this same reason is Infinite The mind of Man clearly conceives that there either are or may be an infinite number of intelligible Triangles Tetragones Pentagones and other such like Figures Nor does it only conceive that the Ideas of figures are inexhaustible and that it might still discover new ones though it should study only these Figures to all Eternity but it perceives an Infinity in Extension The mind clearly perceives that the number which multiplied by it self produces 5 or any of the numbers between 4 and 9 between 9 and 16 between 16 and 25 c. is a Quantity a Relation a Fraction whose terms contain more figures than will reach from one Pole of the World to the other It clearly sees it is such a Relation as none but God can comprehend and that 't is impossible to express it exactly because to express it we need a Fraction whose two terms are Infinite I might bring a great many such Examples from which we might conclude not only that the Mind of Man is finite but that the Reason he consults is infinite For in brief his Mind clearly sees infinite in this Reason though he does not comprehend it since he can compare incommensurable numbers together and know their Relations though he cannot compare them with the unite Or that we may stick only to what is sensible The Reason which Man consults is infinite since it cannot be exhausted and it has always something to answer to whatever we demand But if it be true that the Reason whereof all Men participate be universal and infinite if it be true that it is immutable and necessary it is certain that it differs not from that of God himself For none but the universal and infinite Being contains in himself universal and infinite Reason All Creatures are particular Beings wherefore Vniversal Reason is not created No Creatures are infinite Universal Reason therefore is no Creature But the Reason we consult is not only Universal and Infinite but also necessary and independant and we conceive it in one sence more independant than God himself For God cannot but act by this Reason on which he in one sence depends and which he must needs consult and follow But God consults only himself He depends on nothing This Reason therefore is not distinct from him but is coeternal and consubstantial with him We see clearly that God cannot punish an innocent Creature that he cannot subject minds to Bodies and that he 's oblig'd to follow Order We see therefore the Rule Order and Reason of God for what other Wisdom than that of God can we see when we fear not to affirm that God is oblig'd to follow it But after all can we conceive any Wisdom which is not the Wisdom of God Does Solomon who speaks so well of Wisdom distinguish it into two sorts Does not he teach us that which is Coeternal with God that by which he has establish'd the Order we see in his Works is the same which presides over all Minds and which Legislators consult to make Just and Reasonable Laws We need only read the Eighth Chapter of Proverbs to be perswaded of this Truth I know that the Holy Scripture speaks of a certain Wisdom which it names the Wisdom of the Age the Wisdom of Men but then it speaks only according to appearance or ordinary Opinion For we learn in other places that that Wisdom is Folly and Abomination not only before God but before all Men that consult Reason Certainly if Eternal Laws and Truths depended on God and were establish'd by a free will of the Creator in a word if the Reason we consult were not necessary and independant it seems evident to me that we must bid farewel to all true Science and that we might err in affirming that the Arithmetick and Geometrie of the Chinese is the same as ours For indeed if it were not absolutely necessary that 2 times 4 should be 8 or the three Angles of a Triangle equal to two right ones what proof could we have that these sorts of Truth were not like those which are receiv'd but in some Universities and which continue but a certain Season Do we clearly conceive that God cannot desist to will what he will'd with a will absolutely free and indifferent or rather do we clearly conceive it impossible for God to have will'd certain things for a determinate time or place for some particular Persons or certain kinds of Beings supposing him as some will have him intirely free and indifferent in that Will For my own part I cannot conceive any Necessity in Indifferency nor reconcile two so opposite things together But let it be suppos'd that it can be clearly perceiv'd that God by a Will intirely indifferent has establish'd for all times and for all places Laws and Truths Eternal and that at present they are immutable because of that Decree But where do they see this Decree Has God created any Being representative of it Will they say it is a Modification of their Soul They see clearly that Decree for they have learn'd that Immutability is ascertain'd to Eternal Truths and Laws But where is it that they see it Certainly if they see it not in God they see it not at all For that Decree can be no where but in God nor can it be seen but where he is The Philosophers cannot then be certain of any thing unless they consult God and are answer'd by him 'T is in vain for them to exclaim and they must either yield or hold their Peace But after all that Decree is an ungrounded Imagination When we think
in her that which represents them Why may not the Idea of extension be one of her Modifications 't is true there is none but God who acts in her and modifies her But why must she see Bodies in God if she can see them in her own Substance she is not material it 's confess'd But God though a pure Spirit sees Bodies in himself why then may not the Soul though Spiritual see Bodies by considering herself ANSWER Do not we see that there is this difference between God and the Humane Soul that God is Being without restriction Universal Infinite Being and the Soul is a sort of particular Being 'T is a property of infinite to be at the same time one and yet all things compos'd as we may say of infinite perfections and yet so simple that every perfection he possesses includes all the other without any real distinction for as every Divine perfection is infinite it constitutes the whole Divine Essence But the Soul since a limited Being cannot have extension in her without becoming material God includes in himself Bodies in an intelligible manner He sees their Essences or Ideas in his Wisdom and their Existence in his Love or in his Wills This must necessarily be said since God has made Bodies and he knew what he made before any thing was created But the Soul cannot see in her self what she does not contain Nor can she see clearly what she does contain but only has a confus'd Sensation of it I explain my self The Soul does not include Intelligible extension as one of her modes of Being Because this extension is not any mode of Being but a true Being We can conceive that Extension separately from any thing else but we cannot conceive any modes of Being without perceiving the Subject or Being whereof they are the modes We perceive this extension without thinking on our mind and we cannot conceive it to be any modification of our mind This extension when circumscrib'd makes some figure but the Limits of the mind cannot be figured This extension having parts may be divided at least in one sence but we see nothing in the Soul that is divisible This extension therefore that we see is no mode of the minds Existence and therefore the mind cannot see it within it self How can we see it in one species of Being all sorts of Beings In one particular and finite Being a Triangle in general and infinite Triangles For in fine the Soul perceives a Triangle or a Circle in general though it be a Contradiction for the Soul to have a modification in general The Sensations of Colour which the Soul ascribes to figures make them particular because no modification of a particular Being can be general Surely we may affirm what we clearly conceive But we clearly conceive that the Extension which we see is something distinct from our selves therefore we may affirm that this extension is not a modification of our Being and that 't is something actually distinct from us For we must observe that the Sun for instance that we see is not that we look upon The Sun and all we see in the material World is not visible of it self as I have formerly prov'd The Soul can only see the Sun to which she is immediately united But we have a clear Perception and a distinct Sensation that the Sun is something different from us Therefore we speak against our Light and against our Conscience when we say the Soul sees all surrounding Bodies in her own modifications Pleasure Pain Savour Heat Colour all our Sensations and Passions are the modifications of our Soul But though they be so do we clearly know them Can we compare Heat with Savour Odor with Colour Can we discover what Relation there is between Red and Green Or even between Green and Green 'T is not so with figures we compare them with one another we find out exactly their Proportions We know precisely that the diagonal of a Square multiplied into it self makes a Square that 's double to the former what Analogy is there between these intelligible Figures which are most clear Ideas with the modifications of our Soul which are only confus'd Sensations And why must it be pretended that intelligible Figures cannot be perceived by the Soul unless they be her modifications since the Soul knows not any of her modifications by a clear Idea but only by Conscience or internal Sense As I have elsewhere prov'd and shall prove again in the next Illustration If we could not see the figures of Bodies except in our selves they would be on the contrary unintelligible to us For we do not know our selves but are darkness to our selves and we must cast our Eye outward if we would behold our selves And we shall never know what we are till we shall contemplate our selves in him who is our Light and in whom all things become Light For no where but in God material Beings are perfectly intelligible but out of him the most Spiritual Substances are utterly invisible The Idea of Extension which we see in God is most clear But though we see not in God the Idea of our Soul we are very conscious that we exist and are sensible of what we actually have But 't is impossible to discover what we are or any of the modifications we are capable of OBJECTION III. In God there is nothing moveable In him there is nothing Figured If there be a Sun in the Intelligible World that Sun is always equal to it self whereas the visible Sun appears bigger when near the Horizon than when remote from it therefore it is not the Intelligible Sun we see The case is the same in respect of other Creatures Therefore we see not in God the Works of God ANSWER To give an Answer to all this we need only consider that God includes within himself an infinite intelligible Extension For God knows Extension in as much as he has made it and he can know it no otherwise than in himself Therefore as the mind may perceive part of that intelligible Extension which God includes it is certain it may perceive in God all Figures for all finite Intelligible Extension is necessarily an intelligible Figure since Figure is nothing but the termination of Extension Moreover that Figure of intelligible and general Extension becomes sensible and particular by Colour or some other sensible Quality which the Soul ascribes to it for the Soul almost always bestows her own Sensation upon a lively and affecting Idea Thus there is no necessity that there should be in God sensible Bodies or Figures in Intelligible Extension in order to our seeing them in God or that God may see them himself though he considers nothing but himself So likewise if it be conceived that a Figure of intelligible Extension made sensible by Colour should be taken successively from the different Parts of that same infinite Extension or if it be conceiv'd that a Figure of Intelligible Extension may turn
this which breeds and cherishes in our Soul all the Evils that afflict us and we must never hope to establish a solid and real Happiness but by seriously labouring to avoid it We are taught by the Holy Scriptures that Men are only miserable because they are Sinners and Criminals and they would neither be Sinners nor Criminals did they not make themselves Slaves to Sin by taking part with Error If it be true then That Error is the Source of all the Miseries of Men 't is very reasonable that Men should endeavour to free themselves from it and certainly their Endeavour would not be altogether unprofitable and unrewarded though it met not with all the Success that they could wish If Men should not hereby become Infallible yet they would be much less subject to be Deceiv'd and though they obtain'd not an absolute Deliverance from their Evils they would however avoid a great part of them An intire Felicity ought not to be expected in this Life since in this Mortal State there can be no Pretensions to Infallibility but the Endeavour against Error should be earnest and continual because the Desire to being freed from Misery is incessant In a word as we fervently desire perfect Happiness without the hopes of it so we should ever industriously tend towards Infallibility without pretending to it It should not be imagin'd there is much Difficulty to be undergone in the Search of Truth 'T is but opening the Eyes becoming Attentive and exactly observing some Rules we shall give in the following Discourse An exactness of Thought has scarce any thing painful in it 't is not a slavery as the Imagination represents it and though we meet with some Difficulty at first yet we find Satisfaction enough to recompense our Pains for at last 't is this only which enlightens us and guides us into Truth But not to spend time in preparing the Mind of the Reader whom 't is much more just to believe sufficiently of himself dispos'd to the Search of Truth let us examine the Causes and Nature of our Errors and since the Method of examining things by considering them in their Birth and Origine is the most regular and perspicuous and serves better than others to give us a thorough Knowledge of them let us try to put it here in Practice The Mind of Man being neither Material nor Extended is undoubtedly a simple Substance indivisible and without any Composition of Parts Notwithstanding it has been the Custom to distinguish in it two Faculties namely the Vnderstanding and the Will which it is necessary in the first place to explain For it seems that the Notions or Idea's Men have of these two Faculties are not so clear or distinct as they ought to be But because these Idea's are very Abstract and fall not under the Imagination it seems not amiss to express them by the Resemblance they bear to the Properties belonging to Matter which being easie to be Imagin'd will render the Notions which may conveniently be apply'd to these two Words Vnderstanding and Will more distinct and also more familiar to Vs only this Caution must be observ'd that these Resemblances betwixt the Mind and Matter are not perfectly just And that these two kinds of Beings are only compar'd in order to make the Mind more Attentive and to make others as it were sensible of our meaning Matter or Extension contains in it two Properties or Faculties the first Faculty is that of receiving different Figures and the second is its capacity of being mov'd In like manner the Mind of Man includes two Faculties the first which is the Vnderstanding is that of receiving many Idea's that is of perceiving many things the second which is the Will is the Faculty of receiving many Inclinations or of Willing different things We will begin with an explication of the Resemblances the first of the Faculties belonging to Matter has to the first of the two Faculties appertaining to the Mind Extension is capable of admitting two kinds of Figures The one is only External as the Roundness of a piece of Wax the other is Internal and is peculiar to all the little parts the Wax is compos'd of for it is most certain that all the little parts which go to the Composition of a piece of Wax are of a Figure very different from those which constitute a piece of Iron Therefore I call that which is external barely Figure and I term the internal Figure Configuration which is peculiarly necessary to the Wax to make it what it is So likewise it may be said that the Idea's of the Soul are of two sorts taking the name of Idea in general for whatever the Mind immediately perceives The first give Us a Representation of something without Us as of a Square or an House c. The second represent to Us only what we find within Us as our Sensations Pain Pleasure or the the like For we shall make it plain hereafter that these last Idea's are only a manner of the Mind 's existing and for that reason I call them the Modifications of the Mind Thus also the Inclinations of the Soul might be call'd Modifications of the same Soul For it being manifest that the Inclination of the Will is a manner of existing of the Soul it might be term'd a Modification of the Soul just as Motion in Bodies being a manner of existing of those Bodies might be said to be a Modification of Matter Notwithstanding I do not term the Inclinations of the Will or the Motions of Matter Modifications for as much as both those Inclinations and those Motions have commonly a reference to something that 's external for the Inclinations stand related unto Good and the Motions have a reference to some separate Body But the Figures and Configurations of Bodies and the Sensations of the Soul have no necessary relation to any thing without For as a Figure is round when all the external parts of a Body are equally distant from one of its parts which we call the Centre without relation to any thing external so all the Sensasations we are capable of might have their subsistence though there were no outward object in the World Their being includes not any necessary relation to the Bodies which seem to cause them as we shall elsewhere prove and they are nothing but the very Soul modify'd in such or such a manner so that they are properly Modifications of the Soul Let me then take leave to name them so in order to explain my self The first and principal Agreement or Resemblance that is found betwixt the Faculty which Matter has of receiving different Figures and different Configurations and that which the Soul has of receiving different Idea's and different Modifications is this That as the Faculty of receiving different Figures and different Configurations in Bodies is intirely passive and contains nothing at all of Action so the Faculty of receiving different Idea's and different Modifications
which in our ordinary way of Conception is a Decree posteriour to this Order of Nature Mysteries then of Faith must be distinguish'd from things of Nature We ought equally to submit to Faith and to Evidence but in the concernments of Faith we must not look for Evidence as in those of Nature we ought not to take up with Faith That is with the Authority of Philosophers In a word to be a Believer 't is requir'd to Assent blindly but to be a Philosopher it is necessary to See plainly 'T is not however to be deny'd but there are some Truths besides those of Faith for which it would be unreasonable to demand indisputable Demonstrations as are those which relate to Matter of Fact in History and other things which have their dependence on the Will of Men. For there are two kinds of Truth the one Necessary the other Contingent I call Necessary Truths those which are immutable by their Nature and those which have been fix'd and determin'd by the Will of God which is not subject to Change All other sorts of Truth are Contingent Mathematicks Physicks Metaphysicks as also a great part of Morality contain Necessary Truths History Grammar Private Right or Customs and such other things as depend on the changeable Will of Man contain only Contingent Truths We demand therefore an exact Observation of the Rule we have been establishing in the Search of Necessary Truths the Knowledge of which may be call'd Science and we must be content with the greatest Probability in History which includes the Knowledge of things Contingent For under the general Name of History may be concluded the Knowledge of Languages Customs as also of the different Opinions of Philosophers when Men have only learnt them by Memory without having either Evidence or Certainty concerning them The Second thing to be Observ'd is that in Morality Politicks and Medicine and in all Practical Sciences we are obliged to be content with Probability Not Universally but upon occasion not because it satisfies the Mind but because the Instance is pressing And if a Man should always delay Acting till he had perfect Assurance of Success the Opportunity would be often lost But though it falls out that a Man must inevitably act yet he should in acting doubt of the Success of what he does And he should indeavour to make such Advances in Sciences as to be able on Emergencies to act with greater Certainty For this should be the constant end of all Mens Study and Employment who make any use of Thought The Third and last thing is this That we should not absolutely despise Probabilities since it often happens that many of them in Conjunction have as convincing a force as most evident Demonstrations Of which Nature there are infinite Examples to be found in Physicks and Morality So that 't is often expedient to amass together a sufficient number of them in subjects not otherwise Demonstrable in order to come to the Knowledge of Truth impossible to be found out any other way And now I must needs confess that the Law I impose is very Rigorous and Severe That there are abundance of Those who had rather renounce Reasoning at all than Reason on such Conditions That 't is impossible to run so fast with such retarding Circumspections However it must be granted me that a Man shall walk with greater Security in observing it and that hitherto those who have march'd so hastily have been oblig'd to return upon the same Ground Besides there are a great number of Men who will agree with me in this That since Monsieur Des-Cartes has discover'd more Truths in Thirty Years than all the Philosophers that preceded him meerly for his Submission to that Law if many others would study Philosophy as he has done we should in time be acquainted with the greatest part of those things which are necessary to make Life as happy as is possible upon an Earth which God has Curs'd CHAP. IV. I. Of the Occasional Causes of Error whereof there are Five Principal II. The general Design of the whole Work III. The particular Design of the First Book WE have seen from what has been said that a Man falls not into Error but for want of making a due use of his Liberty that 't is for want of curbing that eagerness of the Will and moderating its Passion for the bare appearances of Truth that he is deceiv'd And that Error consists only in the Consent of the Will which has a greater Latitude than the Perception of the Understanding since we should never err if we only simply judg'd according as we perceiv'd But though to speak properly there is no other cause of Error than the ill use of our Liberty it may notwithstanding be said we have several Faculties that are the Causes of our Errors not Real Causes but such as may be term'd Occasional All the ways of our Perceiving are so many occasions of Deceiving us For since our false Judgments include two things namely the Consent of the Will and the Perception of the Vnderstanding it is manifest that all the ways of our Perception may afford us some occasion or other of falling into Error forasmuch as they may incline us to rash and precipitate Consents But because it is necessary first to make the Soul sensible of her Weaknesses and Wandrings in order to possess Her with just Desires of a Deliverance from them and that she may with greater ease shake off her Prejudices We will endeavour to make an exact Division of her Manners of Perception which may serve as so many Heads to one or other of which may be referr'd as we proceed the different Errors whereunto we are obnoxious The Soul has three several ways of Perception By Pure Intellect by Imagination and by the Senses By Pure Intellect she perceives things Spiritual Universals Common Notions The Idea of Perfection that of a Being infinitely perfect and in general all her own thoughts when she knows them by a Reflexion made upon her self 'T is likewise by Pure Intellect she perceives Material things Extension with its Properties For 't is the pure Understanding only which is capable of Perceiving a Circle and a perfect Square a Figure of a thousand sides and such like things Such sort of Perceptions bear the name of Pure Intellections or Pure Perceptions since there is no necessity of the Mind 's forming Corporeal Images in the Brain to represent them by By Imagination the Soul only perceives things Material when being Absent she makes them present to her by forming the Images of them in the Brain This is the way whereby a Man Imagines all sorts of Figures a Circle a Triangle a Face an Horse Towns and Fields whether he has already seen them or not This sort of Perceptions we may call Imaginations because the Soul represents to her self these things by framing Images of them in the Brain And for as much as Spiritual things cannot be represented
is perpendicularly over our Heads and 't is upon that account her Diameter grows greater in her Ascent above the Horizon because then she 's approaching nearest us The reason then that we see her Greater when she rises is not the Refraction of her Rays meeting with the Vapours which proceed from the Earth since the Image which is at that time form'd from those Rays is lesser but 't is the Natural Judgment we make of her Remoteness occasion'd by her appearing beyond those Lands which we see at a vast Distance from us as has been before explain'd and I am amaz'd to find Philosophers asserting that the reason of this Appearance and Delusion of our Sences is harder to be discover'd than the greatest Aequations of Algebra This Medium whereby we judge of the Remoteness of any Object by knowing the Distance of the things betwixt us and it is often of considerable use when the other means I have spoke of are wholly insignificant for by this last Medium we can judge that certain objects are many Leagues distant which we cannot do by any of the other And yet if we strictly survey it it will be found in several things deficient For first we can only make use of it about things upon the Earth since it can be but very rarely and then very unprofitably imploy'd upon those in the Air or in the Heavens Secondly it cannot be made use of on the Earth but about things a few Leagues distant In the third place we ought to be certain that there are neither Mountains nor Valleys nor any thing of the like nature betwixt us and the Object that hinders us from applying the afore-said Medium Lastly I am perswaded there is no body but has made sufficient Tryals upon the Subject to be convinc'd that it is a thing extreamly difficult to judge with any certainty of the Remoteness of Objects by a sensible View of the things lying betwixt us and them and we perhaps have dwelt two long upon it These then are all the Means we have to judge of the Distance of Objects in which since we have found considerable Imperfections we cannot but conclude that the Judgments that are grounded upon them must needs be very Precarious and Uncertain Hence it is easy to manifest the truth of the Propositions I have advanc'd The Object C was suppos'd considerably remote from A Therefore in many Instances it may be advanc'd on towards D or may have approach'd towards B and no one can discover it because there is no infallible Means whereby to judge of its Distance Nay it may recede towards D when it is thought to approach towards B because the Image of the Object is sometimes augmented and inlarged upon the Retina whether it be because the Air betwixt the Object and the Eye occasions a greater Refraction at one time than at another whether it proceeds from some little Tremlings which happen in the Optick Nerve or lastly that the Impression which is caus'd by an unexact Union of the Rays upon the Retina is diffus'd and communicated to the parts which ought to receive no Agitation from it which may proceed from any different causes Thus the Image of the same Objects being larger on these occasions gives the Soul reason to believe the Object approaches nearer The like may be said of the other Propositions Before I conclude this Chapter I would have it observ'd That it is of great concern to us in order to the Preservation of our Life to have a nicer Knowledge of the Motion or Rest of Bodies in Proportion to their Nighness to us and that it is a thing useless and insignificant to know exactly the truth of these things when happening in places very remote For this evidently shews that what I have generally advanc'd concerning all the Sences how they never Discover things to us as they are absolutely and in their own Nature but only in Relation to the Preservation of our Body is found exactly True in this particular since we know the Motion or Rests of Objects proportionably better as they approach nearer to us and are incapable of judging of them by the Sences when they are so remote as to seem to have no Relation at all or very little to our Body as for instance when they are five or six hundred Paces distant if they be of a Moderate Bigness or even Nearer than this when they are Lesser or somewhat farther off when they are proportionably Greater CHAP. X. Of our Errors about sensible Qualities I. The Distinction of the Soul and Body II. An Explication of the Organs of the Senses III. To what part of the Body the Soul is immediately united IV. An Instance to explain the Effect which Objects have upon our Bodies V. What it is they produce in the Soul and the Reasons why the Soul perceives not the Motions of the Fibres of the Body VI. Four things which are generally confounded in every Sensation WE have seen in the fore-going Chapters that the Judgments we form upon the Testimony of our Eyes concerning Extension Figure and Motion are never exactly true And yet it must not be allow'd that they are altogether false they contain so much Truth at least as this amounts to that there are Extension Figures and Motions whatever they be which are extrinsical or without our selves I confess we often see things that have no Existence nor ever had and it ought not to be concluded that a thing is Actually without us from our Seeing it without us There is no necessary Connexion between the Presence of an Idea to the Mind of a Man and the Existence of the Thing represented by the Idea Which is manifest enough from the Consideration of what happens to Men in a Dream or a Delirium And yet we may safely affirm that ordinarily Extension Figures and Motions are without us when we see them so These things are not in the Imagination only but are Real And we are not deceiv'd in believing them to have a Real Existence and wholly independent on our Mind tho' it be a very hard thing to prove it It is certain then that the Judgments we form concerning the Extension the Figures and Motions of Bodies contain some Truth But 't is another case in point of those Judgments we make concerning Light Colours Tasts Smells and all other Sensible Qualities For Truth has nothing to do with them as shall be made manifest in the remainder of this First Book We make not here any Distinction between Light and Colours because we suppose them to have no great Difference and that they cannot be separately Explain'd We shall likewise be oblig'd to speak of other Sensible Qualities in general at the same time we shall treat of these Two in particular because they may be accounted for upon the same Principles The things which follow demand the greatest Attention imaginable as being of the highest Importance and very different as to their
procure them which Union engages us in infinite Errors and excessive Miseries though we are not always sensible of these Miseries no more than we are of the Errors that occasion them I give here a remarkable Instance The Union that we had with our Mothers in their Womb which is the strictest possible to be had with Mankind was the Cause of two of the greatest Evils namely Sin and Concupiscence which are the Original of all our Miseries And yet for the forming of our Body it was necessary that Union should be so close and strict as it is This Union which was broken at our Birth was succeeded by another whereby Children are con-sociated to their Parents and their Nurses This second Union was not so strict as the former and therefore did us not so much mischief having only inclin'd us to believe and imitate all that our Parents and Nurses do and say 'T is plain this second Union was farther necessary not as the first for the forming but the preserving of our Body that we might know all the things useful or advantagious to it and might accommodate it to such Motions as are necessary to obtain them Last of all the Union which we have at present with all Men is unavoidably the cause of a great deal of Evil to us though it be not so strait as being less necessary to the Preservation of our Body For 't is upon the score of this Union we live by Opinion that we esteem and love what is esteem'd and lov'd in the World in spight of the Remorse of our Consciences and the true Idea's that we have of things I speak not here of the Union we have with the Mind of other Men in behalf of which it may be said we receive instruction from it I speak only of the sensible Union that is between our Imagination and the Air and Manner of those that speak to us We see then how all the Thoughts we have by the Dependance on the Body are false and so much the more dangerous to the Soul as they are the more useful to the Body Which being so let us try to rid our selves by degrees of the Delusions of our Sense of the Vision and Chimera's of our Imagination and of the Impression made by other Men's Imaginations on our Mind Let us carefully reject all the confus'd Idea's we have contracted through the Dependance we are in to our Body and let us only admit the clear and evident Idea's which the Mind receives through its necessary Union with the Divine Logos or with Eternal Wisdom and Truth as we shall explain in the following Book which treats Of the Vnderstanding or Pure Mind F. MALEBRANCHE'S TREATISE CONCERNING The Search after TRUTH BOOK the THIRD Concerning The UNDERSTANDING OR The Pure Intellect CHAP. I. I. Thought is only essential to the Mind Sensation and Imagination are only the Modifications of it II. We know not all the Modifications our Soul is capable of III. They are different from our Knowledge and our Love nor are they always Consequences of them THE Subject of this Third Book is somewhat dry and barren In which we enquire into the Mind consider'd alone and without any reference to the Body in order to discover the Infirmities peculiar to it and the Errors deriving only from it The Senses and Imagination are exuberant and inexhaustible Sources of Error and Deception But the Mind acting by it self is not so subject to straying and misconduct It was a difficult thing to put an end to the two last Treatises and 't is no less difficult to begin this not that there is not enough to be said on the Nature and Properties of the Mind but because we enquire not here so much into its Properties as its Weaknesses 'T is not therefore to be wonder'd if this Tract is not so large nor discovers so many Errors as the two fore-going nor ought it to be complain'd of for being somewhat Dry Abstract and Applicative For 't is impossible in all Discourses to move the Senses and Imaginations of others nor ought it always to be done A Subject of an abstract Nature in becoming sensible commonly grows obscure and 't is enough to be made intelligible So that nothing is more unjust than the usual Complaints of those who would know every thing and yet take pains for nothing who take pet if you desire them to be attentive who would ever be touch'd and mov'd and have their Senses and their Passions eternally gratify'd But we confess our selves unable to give them Satisfaction Writers of Comedies and Romances are oblig'd to please and to procure Attention but for us it 's sufficient if we can instruct even those that labour to make themselves attentive The Errors of the Senses and Imagination proceed from the Nature and Constitution of the Body and are expos'd to view by considering what Dependency the Soul 's in to it But the Errors of the Pure Understanding cannot be discover'd but by considering the Nature of the Mind it self and of the Idea's that are necessary to its knowing Objects And therefore to penetrate into the Causes of the Errors of the Pure Understanding 't will be necessary to insist in this Book on the consideration of the Nature of the Mind and of Intellectual Idea's In the first place I shall treat of the Mind consider'd in its own Nature without any Relation to the Body to which it is united So that what I shall say on this point will extend to pure Intelligences and by stronger Reason to what we call Pure Understanding For by the Word Pure Vnderstanding I mean only to design that Faculty the Mind has of knowing External Object without forming Corporeal Images of them in the Brain to represent them by After which I shall discourse of Intellectual Idea's by means of which the Pure Vnderstanding perceives Exteriour Objects I am perswaded no Man can doubt after he has seriously thought on it but the Essence of the Mind consists only in Thought as the Essence of Matter consists only in Extension and that according to the different Modifications of Thought the Mind one while Wills and another while Imagines or has many other particular Forms as according to the different Modifications of Extension Matter is sometimes Water sometimes Wood and sometimes Fire or has abundance of other particular Forms I only advertise thus much That by the word Thought I understand not here the particular Modifications of the Soul that is this or that particular Thought but Thought capable of all sorts of Modifications or of all sorts of Thoughts as by Extension is not meant this or that Extension round or square for instance but Extension capable of all sorts of Modifications or of Figures And this Comparison would have no difficulty in it but that we have not so clear an Idea of Thought as we have of Extension for we only know Thought by Internal Sentiment or Conscience as I make
the knowledge we have of them is most perfect I mean that the Idea that we have of Extension is sufficient for the displaying to us all the Properties Extension is capable of and we cannot desire a more distinct and fertil Idea of Extension of Figures and Motions than that which GOD furnishes us withal As the Idea's of things which are in GOD include all their Properties in seeing their Idea's we can see successively all the Properties of them for in seeing things as they are in GOD we constantly see them in the most perfect manner and the knowledge of them would be infinitely Perfect if the Mind that perceives them in him were infinite What is wanting to our knowledge of Extension its Figures and Motions is not the defectiveness of the Idea that represents it but of our Mind that considers it But 't is not so in point of the Soul we know her not by her Idea we see her not in GOD we know her only by Conscience and for that reason the knowledge we have of her is imperfect We know nothing of our Soul but what we feel pass within us If we never had had the sensation of Pain Pleasure Light c. it were impossible for us to know whether the Soul was capable of them because we know her not by her Idea But if we saw in GOD the Idea that answers to our Soul we should at the same time know or at least might know all the Properties she is capable of as we know all the Properties Extension is capable of because we know Extension by its Idea It is true we know well enough by our Conscience or by the internal sentiment we have of our selves that our Soul is something great and excellent But 't is possible that what we know of her is the least part of what she is in her self If all we knew of Matter were only Twenty or Thirty Figures wherewith it had been modify'd certainly our knowledge of it had been very inconsiderable in comparison of what we know by the Idea that represents it To understand then the Soul perfectly it is not sufficient to know that only which we receive by internal Sentiment since our Self-Consciousness discovers to us it may be but the least part of our Being It may be concluded from what has been said that though we know the existence of our Soul better than the existence of our Body or than of the things about us yet we have not so perfect knowledge of the Nature of our Soul as of the Nature of our Body which may serve to reconcile the different Sentiments of those who say there is nothing better known than the Soul and of others that affirm we understand nothing less This too may be of Use to prove that the Idea's which represent something to us that 's External are not Modifications of our Soul For if the Soul saw all things by considering her own Modifications she ought to have a more clear and perspicuous knowledge of her own Essence or Nature than of that of Bodies and of the Sensations or Modifications she is capable of than of all the Figures or Modifications incident to Bodies Mean while she knows not that she is capable of this or that Sensation by any View she takes of her self but by Experience whereas she knows Extension to be capable of an infinite number of Figures by the Idea which represents Extension There are morover certain Sensations as Colours and sounds which the generality of Men cannot discover to be Modifications of the Soul but there are no Figures which every one does not know by the Idea he has of Extension to be the Modifications of Bodies What I have been saying shews likewise the reason why we cannot give a Definition explanatory of the Modifications of the Soul For since we know neither the Soul nor its Modifications by Idea's but only by Sensations and such Sensations of Pleasure for instance Pain Heat or the like have no Connexion with Words It is plain that had a Man never seen Colour nor felt Heat he could not be made to understand these Sensations by all the Definitions in the World Now Men having their Sensations occasionally from the Body and all Men's Bodies being not dispos'd alike it often happens that these words are Equivocal and that those which are employ'd to express the Modifications of our Soul signify quite contrary to what they design so that thay often for instance make a Man think of Bitter when 't is suppos'd they make him think of Sweet But though we have not an entire knowledge of our Soul we are sufficiently instructed by Conscience for demonstrating her Immortality Spirituality Liberty and some other Attributes which it is necessary for us to know and for that reason GOD manifests her not to us by her Idea in the way that he gives us to know Bodies True the knowledge we have of our Soul by Conscience is imperfect but it is not false the knowledge on the contrary we have of Bodies by Sensation or Conscience if we may term Conscience that Sensation we have of what occurrs in our Bodies is not only imperfect but also false Wherefore the Idea of Bodies was necessary to correct the Sensations we had of them But we have no need of the Idea of the Soul since the Consciousness we have of her engages us not in Error and there is no fear of mistaking in the Knowledge of her if we be carefull not to confound her with the Body which may be done by Reason Lastly if we had had a clear Idea of the Soul as we have of the Body that Idea had made us consider her as too separate from it and so it had weakned the union of our Soul with our Body by hindring us from regarding our Soul as expanded through all our Members which I explain not more at large There remains now no other Objects of our Knowledge to be spoke to than the Souls of other Men and pure Intelligences and 't is manifest we know them only by Conjecture We know them not at present either in themselves or by their Idea's and whereas they are different from us it is not possible to know them by Conscience We conjecture that the Souls of other men are of the same Species with our own What we feel in our selves we presume that they feel too and when these Sentiments have no Relation to our Body we are sure we are not deceiv'd because we see certain Idea's and immutable Laws in GOD according to which we are certainly assur'd that GOD acts equally on all Spirits I know that twice two are four that it is better to be Righteous than Rich and I am not deceiv'd in believing others know these Truths as well as I. I love Good and Pleasure I hate Evil and Pain I am willing to be happy and I am not deceiv'd in thinking all Men and Angels and even Devils have
our natural Judgment so long as it 's not positively corrigible by Light and Evidence For every natural Judgment coming from God may be rightly seconded by our free Judgments when God furnishes us not with means to manifest its falsity And if on such occasions we mistake the Author of our Mind may seem in a manner to be the Author of our Errors and Delinquencies This Reasoning is possibly good though it must be acknowledg'd that it ought not to go for an Evident Demonstration of the Existence of Bodies For indeed God does not irresistibly force us to consent to it if we give our consent it is a free act and we may with-hold it if we please If this arguing I have made be just we are to believe it highly probable that there are Bodies but this bare Argumentation alone ought not to give us a plenary Conviction and Acquiescence otherwise it is we our selves that act and not God in us it being by a free act and consequently liable to Error that we consent and not by an invincible Impression for we believe it freely because we will and not because we see any obliging Evidence Surely nothing but Faith can convince us of the actual Existence of Bodies We can have no exact Demonstration of any other Being's Existence than the necessary and if we warily consider it we shall find it even impossible to know with perfect Evidence whether GOD is or is not the Creatour of a Material and sensible World for no such Evidence is to be met with except in necessary Relations which are not to be found betwixt GOD and such a World as this It was possible for him not to have created it If he has made it it is because he will'd it and freely will'd it The Saints in Heaven see by an evident Light That the FATHER begets the SON and that the HOLY GHOST proceeds from the FATHER and the SON for these are necessary Emanations But the World being no necessary Emanation from GOD those who most clearly see his Being see not evidently his External Productions Nevertheless I am perswaded that the Blessed are certain of the World's Existence but 't is because GOD assures them of it by manifesting his Will to them in a manner by us unknown and we on Earth are certain too but 't is because Faith obliges us to believe That GOD has created this World and that this Faith is conformable to our natural Judgments or our compound Sensations when they are confirm'd by all our Senses corrected by our Memory and rectify'd by our Reason I confess that at first sight the Proof or Principle of our Faith seems to suppose the Existence of Bodies Fides ex auditu It seems to suppose Prophets Apostles Sacred-Writ and Miracles but if we closely examine it we shall find that in supposing but the Appearances of Men Prophets Apostles Holy Scripture Miracles c. what we have learn'd from these supposs'd Appearances stands undeniably certain since as I have prov'd in several places of this Work GOD only can represent to the Mind these pretended Appearances and He is no Deceiver For Faith supposes all this Now in the Appearance of Holy Scripture and by the Seemingness of Miracles we learn That GOD has created an Heaven and an Earth that the Word is made Flesh and other such like Truths which suppose the Existence of a created World Therefore Faith verifies the Existence of Bodies and all these Appearances are actually substantiated by it 'T is needless to insist longer upon answering an Objection which seems too abstracted for the common part of Men and I believe that this will be enough to satisfie those who pretend not to be over-difficult From all which we are to conclude That we both may and ought to correct our Natural Judgments or compound Perceptions which relate to the sensible Qualities we attribute to the Bodies that surround us or to That we animate But as for natural Judgments which relate to the actual Existence of Bodies though absolutely we are not oblig'd to form free ones to accord with them yet we ought not to supersede doing it because these natural Judgments agree perfectly with Faith Finally I have made this Explanation chiefly to the intent we may seriously reflect upon this Truth That nothing but Eternal Wisdom can enlighten us and that all sensible Notices wherein our Body is concern'd are fallacious at least are not attended with that Light which we feel our selves oblig'd to submit to I am sensible that these Notions will not pass with the common sort of Men and that as they are dispos'd by the Superfluity or Poverty of their Animal Spirits they will either ridicule or flinch at the Reasonings I have laid down For the Imagination cannot endure abstract and un-ordinary Truths but either considers them as ghastly Spectres or ridiculous Phantasms But I chuse rather to be the Subject of Droll and Raillery for the strong and bold Imagination and the Object of Indignation and Fear to the weak and timorous than to be wanting in what I owe to Truth and to those generous Defenders of the Mind against the Efforts of the Body who know how to distinguish the Responses of illuminating Wisdom from the confus'd Noise of the perplexing and erroneous Imagination THE ILLUSTRATION UPON THE Fifth CHAPTER of the Second BOOK Of the Memory and Spiritual Habits I Had no mind to speak in this Chapter of the Memory and spiritual Habits for several Reasons the chief of which is That we have no clear Idea of our Soul For how can we clearly explain what are the Dispositions which the Operations of the Soul leave in her which Dispositions are her Habits whilst we have no clear Knowledge of the Nature of our Soul 'T is plain that 't is impossible to know distinctly the Changes whereof a Being is capable when we have no distinct Knowledge of the Nature of that Being For if for Instance we had no clear Idea of Extension in vain should we endeavour to discover its Figures However since I am desir'd to speak of a Matter which I know not in it self see what a compass I fetch that I may only keep to clear Idea's I suppose that there 's none but God who acts upon the Mind and represents to it the Idea's of all things and that if the Mind perceive any Object by a very clear and distinct Idea 't is because God represents that Idea in a most perfect manner I farther suppose that the Will of God being entirely conformable to ORDER and Justice we need but to have a Right to any thing to obtain it The Suppositions being laid down which are easily conceiv'd the Spiritual Memory is readily explain'd For Order requiring that Spirits which have frequently thought of any Object should more easily think again upon it and have a more clear and lively Idea of it that those who have but seldom consider'd it The Will of God which
upon its Center or successively approach another we perceive the motion of a sensible or Intelligible Figure though there be no motion in intelligible Extension For God sees not the motion of Bodies in his Substance or in the Idea he has of them in himself But only by the knowledge he has of his own Wills relating to them He sees their Existence only by that way because his Will only gives Being to all things The Wills of God change nothing in his Substance nor do they move it Perhaps Intelligible Extension is immoveable all manner of ways even intelligibly But though we see only this intelligible Extension immoveable or otherwise it seems moveable to us because of the Sensation of Golour or the confused Image remaining after the Sensation which we successively annex to the several parts of Intelligible Extension that furnishes us with an Idea when we see or imagine the motion of any Body From what I have said we may understand why we see the Intelligible Sun sometimes greater and sometimes less though it be always the same with respect to God For all that is requir'd to this is but to see one while a greater part of Intelligible Extension and another while a less and to have a lively Sensation of Light to bestow upon that part of Extension Now as all the Parts of Intelligible Extension are all of the same nature they may all indifferently represent any Body whatever It must not be imagin'd that the Intelligible World has any such relation to the material and sensible that there must be for instance an Intelligible Sun an intelligible Horse and an Intelligible Tree destin'd to represent to us the Sun an Horse and a Tree and that all those who see the Sun necessarily see this pretended intelligible Sun All intelligible Extension may be conceived Circular or to have an intelligible Figure of an Horse or a Tree and so may serve to represent the Sun an Horse and Tree and consequently be a Sun a Horse and a Tree in the intelligible World and likewise to become a sensible and visible Sun Horse and Tree if the Soul has any Sensation occasion by Bodies to affix to these Ideas Therefore when I said that we saw different Bodies by the knowledge we have of the Perfections of God which represent them I did not mean precisely that there were certain particular Ideas in God to represent each Body in particular and that we saw such a particular Idea in seeing such a particular Body For it is certain we could not see this Body sometimes great and sometimes small one while round and another while square if we saw it by a particular Idea that was always the same But I say we see all things in God by the application God makes of intelligible Extension to our mind in a thousand different ways and that thus intelligible Extension includes in it all the Perfections or rather differences of Bodies because of the different Sensations the Soul bestows upon the Ideas which she receives occasionally from them I have discours'd after another manner but it should be concluded that was only to make some of my proofs more forcible and sensible and it should not be gather'd from what I have here said that the foundation of those proofs is ruin'd I could give the reasons of the different ways wherein I explain my self if I thought it necessary I venture not to dive deeper into this Subject for fear of speaking things either too Abstract or Uncommon Or if that seem better for fear of hazarding to speak things which I neither know nor am capable of discovering Only let me produce those passages of Scripture which seem contrary to what I have now establish'd which I shall endeavour to Explain OBJECTION St. John in his Gospel and in the first of his Epistles says No man hath seen God at any time The only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the father he hath declar'd him ANSWER I answer that 't is not properly to see God to see the Creatures in him 'T is not to see his essence to see the essences of Creatures in his Substance as it is not to see a Mirrour to view only the Objects it represents Not but that we might say with St. Paul St. Austin St. Gregory and many other Fathers of the Church that we see God in this Life though in a very imperfect Manner The Words of St. Gregory in his Morals upon Job are these A luce incorruptibili caligo nos nostrae corruptionis obscurat cumque videri aliquatenus potest tamen videri lux ipsa sicuti est non potest quam longe sit indicat Quam si mens non cerneret nec quia longe esse videret Si autem perfecte jam cerneret profecto hanc quasi per caliginem non videret Igitur quia nec omnino cernitur nec rursum omnino non cernitur recte dictum est quia a longe Deus videtur Though St. Gregory in explaining this passage of Job Oculi ejus à longe prospiciunt says that in this Life we only see God a far of This is not as if God were not most present to us but that the Clouds of our Concupiscence conceal him from us Caligo nos nostrae corruptionis obscurat For in other places he with St. Austin compares the light of God which is God himself to the Light of the Sun which surrounds us and which we see not because we are blind or shut our Eyes when dazled with its Lustre In Sole oculos clausos tenemus St. Austin goes farther yet than his faithful Disciple St. Gregory For though he confesses that we know God but in a very imperfect manner at present yet he affirms in several places that God is better known to us than those things we fancy we know best He that has made all things says he is nearer us than his Creatures For in him we have Life and Motion and Being Most of Created Beings are not proportionate to our Mind because they are corporeal and of a sort distinguish'd from it And lower The Inquirers into the secrets of Nature are justly condemn'd in the Book of Wisdom for if they have been able to penetrate what is most secret and unreveal'd to Men with how much greater ease might they have discover'd the Author and Sovereign of the Vniverse The Foundations of the Earth are hid from our Eyes But he that laid the Foundations is present to our Minds And for this Reason that Holy Father believes that he that has Charity knows God better than he knows his Brother Ecce says he jam potest Notiorem Deum habere quam Fratrem Plane Notiorem quia praesentiorem Notiorem quia interiorem Notiorem quia certiorem I bring not any other proofs of St. Austin's Opinion Those who desire them may find all sorts in that learn'd Collection Ambrosius Victor has made of them in the second Volume of his Christian
est quod sponsa in canticis canticorum sponsi vocem quasi per somnium audierat quae dicebat Ego dormio cor meum vigilat Ac si diceret dum exteriores sensus ab â—ujus vitae sollicitudinibus sopio vacante mente vivacius interna cognosco Foris dormio sed intus cor vigilat quia dum exteriora quasi non sentio interiora solerter apprehendo Bene ergo Eliu ait quod per somnium loquitur Deus St. Gregory's Morals upon the 33. Ch. of Job THE ILLUSTRATION UPON THE Seventh CHAPTER of the Second PART of the Third BOOK Where I prove That we have no clear Idea of the Nature or Modifications of our Soul I Have often said and think sufficiently prov'd in the third Book of the preceding Treatise that we have no clear Idea but only the Conscience or inward Sensation of our Soul and that therefore we have a much more imperfect knowledge thereof than we have of Extension Which to me seem'd so evident that I did not think it necessary to prove it more at large But the Authority of M. des Cartes who possitively says That the nature of the Mind is better known than that of any other thing has so prepossess'd some of his Disciples that what I have said upon that Subject serves only to make them think me a weak Person unable to reach to and hold fast abstracted Truths which have nothing in them to welcome and retain the attention of their Contemplators I confess I am extreamly Feeble Sensible and Heavy and my Mind depends on my Body more ways than I can express I know it I feel it and I continually labour to increase this knowledge I have of my self For though we cannot help our being miserable we ought at least to have the knowledge and the sense of it we ought at least to be humbled upon the sight of our inward Miseries and to acknowledge the need we have of being deliver'd from this Body of Death which throws trouble and confusion into all the faculties of our Soul But yet the Question before us is so well proportion'd to the Mind that I can see no need of any great Application to resolve it and for that reason I did not insist upon it For I think it may be affirm'd that most Mens ignorance about the Soul as of its distinction from the Body of its Spirituality Immortality of its other properties is sufficiently demonstrative that we have no clear and distinct Idea of it It may be said that we have a clear Idea of Body because we need but consult the Idea that represents it to discover what Modifications it is capable of We plainly see that it may be either round or square in Rest or Motion We easily conceive that a square may be divided into two Triangles two Parallelograms or two Trapezia We never are at a stand what to answer to the demand whether this or that be implied or denied in Extension because the Idea of Extension being clear we may easily and by a bare perception discover what it includes and what it excludes But it does not appear to me that we have any such Idea of our Mind as can discover when we consult it the Modifications it will admit Had we never felt either Pleasure or Pain we could not tell whether our Soul were susceptible of either If a Man had never eaten a Melon felt Smart or seen Red or Blue he might have consulted long enough this pretended Idea of his Soul before he could distinctly discover whether it was capable or not of such Sensations or Modifications I say farther that though a Man actually feel Pain or sees Colour he cannot discover by a simple view whether these Qualities belong to the Soul He 'll imagine that Pain is in the Body which occasions him to suffer it and that Colour is diffus'd upon the surface of Objects though it be clearly conceiv'd that these Objects are distinguish'd from the Soul To be satisfied whether or no sensible Qualities are Modes of the Mind's existence this pretended Idea of the Soul is never consulted On the contrary the Cartesians themselves consult the Idea of Extension and reason in this manner Heat Pain Colour cannot be Modifications of Extension For this is capable but of different figures and Motions Now there are but two kinds of Beings Bodies and Minds Therefore Heat Pain and Colour and all other sensible Qualities are the Furniture of the Mind Whilst they are oblig'd to consult their Idea of Extension to discover whether sensible Qualities are Modifications of their Soul is it not evident they have no clear Idea of it For otherwise would they ever bethink themselves of so indirect a Conduct When a Philosopher would know whether Rotundity belongs to Extension does he enquire into the Idea of the Soul or any other besides that of Extension Does he not see clearly in the same Idea of Extension that Rotundity is a Modification of it And would it not be extravagance in him to argue thus to be instructed There are only two sorts of Beings Minds and Bodies Roundness is not a Modification of a Mind therefore it is a Modification of a Body We discover then by a bare perception without Argumentation and by the meer Application of the Mind to the Idea of Extension that Roundness and every other Figure is a Modification belonging to Body and that Pleasure Pain Heat and all other sensible Qualities are not Modifications of it There can be no Question propos'd about what does or does not appertain to Extension but may be easily readily and boldly answer'd by the sole consideration of the Idea that represents it All Men are agreed in their notion and beliefe upon this Point For those who will have Matter capable of Thought do not imagine this Faculty is to be attributed to iâ— because of Extension being perswaded that Extension consider'd precisely as such cannot Think But Men are not so well agreed about what they are to think of the Soul and her Modifications for some there are who fancy that Pain and Heat or at least that Clour does not belong to her And a Man would be laught at among some Cartesians that should affirm the Soul grows actually Blue Red Yellow and that she is dyed with all the Colours of the Rain-Bow when she contemplates it There are many who doubt and more that don't believe that the Soul becomes formally stinking upon the smell of carrion and that the tast of Sugar Pepper and Salt are properties belonging to her Where then is the clear Idea of the Soul that the Cartesians may consult it and may all agree about the subject where Colours Savours Odours ought to enter But though the Cartesians were agreed upon these difficulties yet we were not to conclude from their agreement that we have a clear Idea of the Soul For if they agree at last that 't is she which is actually Green or Red when a
entire Tulip We see in the Cicatricle of a new-laid Egg and which had never been brooded a Chicken which is possibly compleatly form'd We see Frogs in the Eggs of Frogs and we shall see other Animals still in their Cicatricles when we have Art and Experience enough to discover them But 't is not for the Mind to stand still when the Eyes can go no farther For the view of the Soul is of a greater compass than the sight of the Body Besides this therefore we ought to think That all the Bodies of Men and of Beasts which should be born or produc'd till the End of the World were possibly created from the Beginning of it I would say That the Females of the Original Creatures were for ought we know created together with all those of the same Species which have been or shall be begotten or procreated whilst the World stands We might push this Thought much farther yet and it may be with a great deal of Reason and Truth But we have just cause to fear lest we should be too desirous of penetrating too far into the Works of GOD We see nothing but Infinities round about us And not only our Senses and our Imagination are too limited to comprehend them but the Mind it self however pure and disengag'd from Matter is too gross as well as too feeble to pierce into the least of the Works of the Almighty 'T is lost 't is dissipated 't is dazled and amazed at the view of that which according to the Language of the Senses is call'd an Atom Notwithstanding the Pure Intellect has this advantage above the Imagination of the Senses that it acknowledges its own Weakness and the Almightiness of GOD Whereas our Imagination and our Senses bring down the works of GOD and audaciously set themselves above them and so throw us headlong and blind-fold into Error For our Eyes furnish us not with the Idea's of any of those things we discover by Microscopes and our Reason We perceive not by our Sight any less Body than an Hand-worm or a Mite The half of a Hand-worm is nothing if we rely on the Report of our Eyes A Mite is a Mathematical point in their account which you can't divide but you must annihilate Our Sight then does not represent Extension to us as it is in it self but as it is in Relation to our Body And because the half of a Mite has no considerable relation to our Body and has no influence either towards the Preservation or Destruction of it therefore our Eyes entirely conceal it from Us. But if we had Eyes made after the manner of Microscopes or rather if we were as little as Hand-worms and Mites we should judge of the Magnitude of Bodies in a far different manner For without doubt these little Animals have their Eyes so dispos'd as to see the Bodies that surround them and their own Bodies far greater than we see them for otherwise they could not receive such impressions as were necessary to the Preservation of Life and so the Eyes they have would be altogether useless But that we may throughly explain these things we must consider that our Eyes are in effect only Natural Spectacles that their humours have the same way of Operating as the Glasses in the Spectacles and that according to the figure of the Crystalline and its distance from the Retina we see Objects very differently insomuch that we cannot be assur'd there are two Men in the World that see Bodies of the self-same bigness since we cannot be assur'd there are two Men's Eyes altogether made alike 'T is a Proposition that ought to be imbrac'd by all those who concern themselves with Opticks That Objects which appear equally distant are seen so much bigger as the figure which is delineated in the fund of the Eye is bigger Now it is certain that in the Eyes of those Persons whose Crystalline is more convex the Images are painted lesser in proportion to the convexity Those then who are short-sighted having their Crystalline more convex see the Objects lesser than those whose Crystalline is of the common standard or than old People who want Spectacles to read with but see perfectly well at a distance since those whose Sight is short must necessarily have the Crystalline more convex on supposition their Eyes as to the other parts are equal 'T were the easiest thing in Nature to demonstrate all these things Geometrically and were they not of the number of those which are very well known I would insist longer upon them to make them evident But because several have already handled this Subject I desire such as are willing to be instructed therein to turn to them and consult them Since it is not manifest that there are two Men in the World who see Objects in the same bulk and magnitude and generally the same Man sees them bigger with his left Eye than his right according to the Observations which have been made and are related in the Journal of the Learned from Rome in January 1669 it is plain we ought not to build upon the Testimony of our Eyes so as to pass our judgment from it It is much better to attend to Reason which proves to us That we are unable to determine what is the absolute Magnitude of Bodies which encompass us or what Idea we ought to have of the Extension of a Foot-square or of that of our own Body so as that Idea may represent it to us as it is For we learn from Reason that the least of all Bodies would be no longer little if it were alone since it is compounded of an infinite number of parts out of each of which GOD could frame an Earth which yet would be but a single Point in comparison of the rest in conjunction Thus the Mind of Man is incapable of forming an Idea great enough to comprehend and embrace the least Extension in the World since the Mind has bounds but that Idea should be infinite It is true The Mind may come very near the Knowledge of the Relations these infinites have to one another which constitute the World it may know for instance one of them to be double to another and that a Fathom is the measure of six Foot Yet for all this it cannot form an Idea to it self that can represent these things as they are in their own Nature Well but let it be suppos'd that the Mind is capable of Idea's which equal or which measure the Extension of Bodies which we see for it would be a difficult undertaking to convince Men of the contrary Let us see what may be concluded from the Supposition Doubtless this will be the Conclusion That GOD does not deceive us That he has not given us Eyes like Glasses to magnifie or diminish the Object and therefore we ought to believe that our Eyes represent things as really they are 'T is true GOD never deceives us but we often deceive our selves by
expected that all the Accidents which befal those that have been sick of the Scurvy must befal him too The same Medicines therefore are prescrib'd him and 't is matter of amazement to find they have not the same Effect as they have been known to have had in others An Author applies himself to one kind of Study The Traces of the Subject he 's imploy'd about are so deeply imprinted and make such lively Radiations through the Brain as to confound and efface sometimes the Traces of things of a quite different kind There has been a Man for instance that has wrote many bulky Volumes on the Cross this made him discover a Cross in every thing he look'd upon and 't is with Reason that Father Morinus handsomly rallies him for thinking a Medal represented a Cross though it represented quite another thing 'T was by such another unlucky turn of Imagination Gilbertus and many others after having studied the Load-stone and admir'd its properties must needs reduce to these Magnetick Qualities abundance of Natural Effects that had no Relation to them in the World The Instances I have here alledg'd suffice to prove that the great facility of the Imagination's representing Objects that are familiar to it and the difficulty it finds in Imagining those that are Novel is the Reason of Mens forming almost ever such Idea's as may be styl'd mix'd and impure and of the Mind 's judging of things only with Relation to it self and its former Thoughts And thus the different Passions of Men their Inclinations Conditions Imployments Qualities Studies finally all their different Ways and Scopes of Life putting very considerable Differences in their Idea's occasion them to fall into innumerable Errors which we shall explain in the following Discourse Which was the reason of My Lord Bacon's speaking this most judicious Sentence Omnes perceptiones tam sensûs quam mentis sunt ex analogiâ hominis non ex analogiâ universi Estque Intellectus humanus instar speculi inaequalis ad radios rerum qui suam Naturam naturae rerum immiscet eamque distorquet inficit CHAP. III. Of the Mutual Connection between the Idea's and the Traces of the Brain and of the Mutual Connection there is between Traces and Traces Idea's and Idea's AMONG the whole Mass of Material Beings there is nothing more worthy of the Contemplation of Men than the Contexture of their own Body and the Correspondence found between the Parts that compose it And among all things Spiritual there is nothing the Knowledge whereof is more necessary than that of their Soul and of all the Relations she is indispensably under to GOD and Naturally to the Body 'T is not enough to have a confus'd Knowledge or Sensation that the Traces of the Brain are mutually connected to each other and that they are pursued by the Motion of the Animal Spirits that the Traces when excited in the Brain excite the Idea's in the Understanding and that the Motions that arise in the Animal Spirits raise the Passions in the Will We ought as far as is possible to have a distinct Knowledge of the Cause of all these different Connections but especially of the Effects they are capable of producing We ought to know the Cause thereof in as much as it is necessary to know our Guide and Conductor who alone is capable of acting in us and of rendring us happy or miserable and we ought to know the Effect of them it being necessary to know our selves as much as possible and other Men with whom we are oblig'd to live So should we know the means both of conducting our selves to and preserving our selves in the most happy and perfect state we are capable of attaining by the order of Nature and the Precepts of the Gospel and so should we be able to frame our Lives sociably with Men by exactly knowing the means of making use of them in our Exigencies and assisting them in their Miseries I pretend not to Explain in this Chapter a Subject so vast and Comprehensive nor have I that Opinion of my self as to think I should throughly do it in this whole Work There are many things I am still ignorant of and despair of ever knowing well and there are others which I presume I know but am unable to explicate For there is no mind so little and so narrow but may by Meditation discover more Truths than can be deduc'd at length by the most Eloquent Man in the World We are not to imagine with a great part of the Philosophers that the Mind becomes Body when united to the Body and that the Body becomes Mind when united to the Mind The Soul is not expanded through all the parts of the Body in order to give Life and Motion to it as the Imagination represents nor does the Body become capable of Sensation by its Union with the Mind as our treacherous and abusive Senses would seem to perswade us Either Substance preserves its own particular Being and as the Soul is incapable of Extension and Motions so the Body is incapable of Thought and Inclinations All the Affinity that we know between the Body and Mind consists in the Natural and Mutual correspondence of the Thoughts of the Soul with the Traces of the Brain and of the Emotions of the Soul with the Motions of the Animal Spirits When the Soul receives some new Idea's some new Traces are imprinted on the Brain and when Objects produce new Traces the Soul receives new Idea's Which is not said as if the Soul consider'd these Traces since she has no knowledge of them or as if these Traces included these Idea's since there is no Analogy betwixt them or lastly as if she receiv'd her Idea's from these Traces for 't is inconceivable as shall be explain'd hereafter how the Mind should receive any thing from the Body and become more enlightned than she is by turning towards it as the Philosophers pretend who would have the Souls Perception of all things to be caus'd Per conversionem ad phantasmata by the Conversion to the Phantasms or Traces of the Brain Thus when the Soul wills the moving of her Arm the Arm is mov'd though she not so much as knows what ought to be done to the moving it and when the Animal Spirits are agitated the Soul finds a Commotion in her self though she is ignorant whether there be any such thing as Animal Spirits in her Body When I come to treat of the Passions I shall speak of the Connection there is between the Traces of the Brain and the Motions of the Spirits and of that which is between the Idea's and the Emotions of the Soul for all the Passions have their Dependance thereon I am to Discourse at present only of the Connection between Traces and Idea's and the Connection Traces have with one another There are three very considerable Causes of the Connection of Idea's with the Traces of the Brain The first and most general
out hereafter I am farther perswaded it is impossible to conceive a Mind without Thought though 't is easie enough to conceive one without Actual Sensation Imagination and even without Volition in like manner as 't is impossible to conceive any Matter without Extension though it be easie to conceive one that 's neither Earth nor Mettle neither square nor round and which likewise is not in Motion Hence we ought to conclude that as there may be a Portion of Matter that is neither Earth nor Mettal neither square nor round nor yet in Motion so there may be a Mind that neither feels Heat nor Cold neither Joy nor Sorrow that Imagines nothing and even Wills nothing so that all these Modifications are not essential to it Thought therefore is only the Essence of the Mind as Extension only is the Essence of Matter But as Matter or Extension were it without Motion would be altogether useless and incapable of that variety of Forms for which it is created and 't is not conceivable that an Intelligent Being design'd to produce it in that manner so were a Mind or Thought without Volition it is plain it would be wholly useless since that Mind would have no tendency towards the Objects of its Perceptions nor would it love Good for which it was created So that 't is impossible to be conceiv'd that an Intelligent Being should have produc'd it in such a condition Notwithstanding as Motion is not the Essence of Matter since it supposes Extension so Volition is not the Essence of the Mind since Volition supposes Perception Thought therefore all alone is what constitutes the Essence of the Mind and the different manners of Thinking as Sensation and Imagination are only the Modifications it is capable of but wherewith it is not always modify'd But Volition is a Property that always accompanies it whether in Conjunction with or Separation from the Body which yet is not Essential to it since it supposes Thought and 't is possible to conceive a Mind without Will as a Body without Motion However the Power of Willing is inseparable from the Mind though it be not essential to it as the Capacity of being mov'd is inseparable from Matter though it be not included in its Essence For as it is impossible to conceive any Matter that cannot be mov'd so 't is impossible to conceive any Mind that has not the Power of Willing or is incapable of any Natural Inclination But again as Matter may be conceiv'd to exist without any Motion so the Mind may be conceiv'd to exist without any Impression of the Author of Nature towards Good and consequently without Will For the Will is nothing but the Impression of the Author of Nature which carries us towards Good in general as we have explain'd more at large in the first Chapter of the First Book What has been said in that Treatise of the Senses and what we have now said of the Nature of the Mind does not suppose we know all the Modifications it is capable of We are far from making such like Suppositions believing on the contrary that the Mind has a Capacity of receiving an infinite succession of diverse Modifications which the same Mind knows nothing of The least portion of Matter is capable of receiving a Figure of three six ten or of ten thousand Sides also a Circular or Elliptic Figure which may be consider'd as Figures of infinite Sides and Angles The different Species of each of these Figures are innumerable Infinite are Triangles of a different Species and more still are the Figures of four six ten or ten thousand Sides and of infinite Polygones For a Circle an Ellipsis and in general every regular or irregular Curvilin'd Figure may be consider'd as an infinite Polygone An Ellipsis for instance as an infinite Polygone but whose Sides or Angles are unequal being greater towards the little Diameter than the great and so of other infinite Polygones more compound and irregular A plain piece of Wax therefore is capable of infinite or rather infinitely infinite different Modifications which no Mind can comprehend What reason is there then to imagine that the Soul which is far more noble than the Body should be capable only of those Modifications she has already receiv'd Had we never Felt Pleasure or Pain had we never Seen Light nor Colour or had we been with respect to all things as the Blind and Deaf are in regard to Sounds and Colours should we have had Reason to conclude we were incapable of all the Sensations we have of Objects For these Sensations are only the Modifications of our Soul as has been prov'd in the Book concerning the Senses It must be granted then that the Capacity the Soul has of Receiving different Modifications is probably greater than the Capacity it has of Conceiving I would say that as the Mind cannot exhaust or comprehend all the Figures Matter can be fashion'd in so it can't comprehend all the different Modifications possible for the Almighty Hand of GOD to Mint the Soul into though it knew as distinctly the Capacity of the Soul as it knows that of Matter which yet it cannot do for the Reasons I shall bring in the Seventh Chapter of the Second Part of this Book If the Soul whilst we are on Earth receives but few Modifications 't is because it is united to the Body and depends upon it All her Sensations have reference to her Body and as she has not the Fruition of GOD so she has none of those Modifications this Fruition should produce The Matter whereof our Body is compos'd is capable but of very few Modifications in our Life-time it cannot be resolv'd into Earth and Vapour till after our Death It cannot at present become Air Fire Diamond or Mettal it cannot grow round square or triangular it must necessarily be Flesh and have the Figure of a Man to the end the Soul may be united to it 'T is the same case with our Soul She must necessarily have the Sensations of Heat Cold Colour Light Sounds Odors Tasts and many other Modifications to the end she may continue united to her Body All her Sensations are subservient to the Preservation of her Machine They trouble her and dismay her if but the least inward Spring chance to break or slaken which necessarily subjects the Soul to her Body as long as her Body is subject to Corruption But when the Body shall be cloath'd with Immortality and we shall no longer fear the Dissolution of it parts 't is reasonable to believe the Soul shall be no longer touch'd with those incommodious Sensations which we feel against our Will but with infinite others of a different kind whereof we have at present no Idea which will exceed all that we can think and will be worthy the Greatness and Goodness of the GOD we shall enjoy 'T is therefore unreasonable for any one to think he so throughly comprehends the Nature of the Soul as
six hours a day they sometimes study six different things 'T is visible that this fault proceeds from the same Cause as the others I have been speaking of For there is great probability that if those who studied in this manner knew evidently how disproportion'd it was to the Capacity of their Mind and that it was more apt to fill it with Error and Confusion than with true Science they would not let themselves be transported with the disorderly motives of their Passion and Vanity For indeed this is not the way to be satisfy'd in our pursuits but the most ready means to know nothing at all CHAP. IV. I. The Mind cannot dwell long upon Objects that have no Relation to it or that include not something of Infinity in them II. The Inconstancy of the Will is the Cause of that want of Application and consequently of Error III. Our Sensations take us up more than the Pure Idea's of the Mind IV. Which is the Source of the Corruption of our Morals V. And of the Ignorance of the Vulgar sort of Men. THE Mind of Man is not only subject to Error for want of being Infinite or for being of less Extent than the Objects of its Consideration as has been explain'd in the two last Chapters But because it is Inconstant and nothing Resolute in its Action and unable to keep the View fixt and steady on the Object long enough to examine all the parts of it The better to conceive the Cause of this Inconstancy and Levity of the Mind we must know that the Will is the Directress of its Action that the Will applies it to the Objects which it loves and that the same Will is it self in perpetual fluctuation and disquietude whereof I assign this to be the Cause 'T is not to be doubted but GOD is the Author of all things and has made them only for Himself and that he draws the Heart of Man towards him by a Natural and Invincible Impression which he perpetually influences him withal 'T is impossible for GOD to have will'd that there should be any Will that did not love Him or that lov'd Him less than any other Good if there could be any other besides Himself it being impossible for Him to ordain that a Will should not love that which was supreamly Amiable or should love that more which was less lovely And thus Natural Love must needs carry us to GOD as proceeding from GOD and nothing being able to stop the motions thereof unless GOD Himself that impresses them There is then no Will whatever but necessarily follows the motions of this Love The Righteous and the Wicked the Blessed and the Damned love GOD with this Love and 't is this Love in one sense that is the Cause of the Misery of the latter For this Natural Love we have for GOD being the same thing with the Natural Impression which carries us towards Good in general towards Infinite Soveraign Good 't is manifest that all Minds love GOD with this Love since there is no other that is the Universal the Infinite the Soveraign Good For lastly All Spirits and even the Divels passionately desire to be Happy and to possess the Soveraign Good and they desire it without Choice Deliberation and Liberty by the bent and necessity of their Nature Being therefore made for GOD for an Infinite Good for a Good that comprehends in Himself all Goods the Natural Motion of our Heart can never stop till we arrive to the possession of this Good The Will then labouring thus with a perpetual thirst being toss'd and agitated with Desires Eagerness and Restless longings for that Good it is not in Possession of cannot but with much Uneasiness suffer the Mind to dwell any time upon Abstract Truths which don't affect it and which it judges incapable of making it Happy It therefore pushes the Mind forward continually to the Research of other Objects and when in this hurry and agitation communicated to it by the Will it meets with any Object that carries the Mark of Good I mean that by approaching the Soul makes it sensible of some internal Delight or Satisfaction then this Thirst of the Heart rises anew these Desires Eagernesses and Fervencies are re-kindled and the Mind oblig'd to wait on them fixes it self only on the Object that either is or seems to be the cause of them to approximate it to the Soul that regales and feeds upon it for some time But the Emptiness of the Creatures being unable to fill the Infinite Capacity of the Heart of Man these little Pleasures instead of extinguishing its Thirst only provoke and inflame it and give the Soul a foolish and vain Hope of being satisfy'd in the multiplicity of Earthly Pleasures which produces a far greater Inconstancy and an inconceivable Levity in the Mind which ought to make the Discovery to the Soul of all these Goods It 's true when the Mind falls by chance upon an Object of an Infinite Nature or which includes something great and mighty in it its unsettledness and casting about ceases for some time For finding that this Object bears the badge and character of that which the Soul desires it dwells upon it and closes in with it for a considerable time But this closing and adhesion or rather obstinacy of the Mind to examine Subjects infinite or too vast and unweildy is as useless to it as that Levity wherewith it considers those that are proportion'd to its Capacity since 't is too weak to accomplish so difficult an Enterprise and in vain it endeavours to effect it That which must render the Soul happy is not as I may speak the Comprehension of an Infinite Object this she is not capable of but the Love and Fruition of an Infinite Good whereof the Will is capable through the Motion of Love continually impress'd on it by GOD Himself Which being thus we need not wonder at the Ignorance and Blindness of Mankind because their Mind being subjected to the Inconstancy and Levity of their Heart which incapacitate it from considering any thing with a serious Application is unable to penetrate into a subject any whit perplex'd and difficult For in short the Attention of the Mind is to intelligible Objects what a steady View of the Eyes is to those of Sight And as a Man that can't fix his Eyes on the Bodies that are about him can never see them well enough to distinguish the differences of their least parts and to discover all the Relations those little parts have to one another So a Man who cannot fix the Eye of his Mind upon the things desir'd to be known can never have a sufficient Knowledge to distinguish all the parts and to observe all the Relations that may possibly be between themselves or themselves and other subjects Yet it is certain that all our Knowledge consists in a clear View of the Relations things stand in to one another So that when it happens as
Objects by considering its own Perfections That none but GOD sees them in that manner THE fourth Opinion is That the Mind stands in need of nothing but it self to perceive Objects and that it may by reflecting on it self and its own Perfections discover all things that are External to it It is certain that the Soul perceives in her self and without Idea's all the Sensations and Passions she is capable of Pleasure Pain Cold Heat Colours Sounds Odours Tasts her Love her Hatred her Joy her Sorrow and the rest Because all the Sensations and Passions of the Soul represent nothing out of her self which resembles them and they are only the Modifications the Mind is capable of But the difficulty lies in knowing whether the Idea's that represent things exteriour to the Soul and resemble them in one manner as the Idea's of the Sun of an House of an Horse of a River are nothing but the Modifications of the Soul So that the Mind has no need of any thing but it self to represent all these things that are without it There are those who make no scruple to affirm That the Soul being made for Thinking has in it self I mean by considering its own Perfections all that is necessary to its Perception of Objects For being in Effect more noble than all the things it distinctly conceives it may be said to contain them in some Eminent sort as the Schools love to speak that is in a more noble and sublimated manner than they are in themselves They pretend that superiour Beings comprehend after this manner the Perfections of the inferiour And hereupon being the noblest Creatures that they know they flatter themselves with possessing in a Spiritual manner all that is in the Visible World and with being able by diversly modifying themselves to perceive all that the Humane Mind can attain to know In a word they would have the Soul to be a sort of an Intelligible World that comprehends in it self the Material and Sensible World and infinitely more But methinks 't is a bold Stroke to offer a Defence of this Opinion 'T is if I mistake not a Natural Vanity the love of Independency and the desire of resembling Him who comprehends in Himself all Beings that confounds the Mind and makes us imagine our selves the Possessors of what we have not Say not says St. Augustin that ye are a Light to your selves For 't is only GOD that is a Light to Himself and who may by considering Himself see all that he has produc'd and all that he is able to produce 'T is most certain That there was none but GOD before the Creation of the World and that He was not able to produce it without Knowledge or without Idea That consequently the Idea's which GOD had are not different from Himself and so all the Creatures even the most Terrestrial and Material are in GOD though in a manner altogether Spiritual and to us incomprehensible GOD sees therefore in Himself all Beings by Reflection made on His own Perfections that represent them to Him He has besides the perfect Knowledge of their Existence For since they depend upon His Will for their Existence and He cannot be ignorant of His own Wills it follows that He cannot be ignorant of their Existence and consequently GOD beholds within Himself not only the Essence of things but their Existence also But 't is not the same with Created Spirits as not being able to see in themselves either the Essence or the Existence of Things They cannot see the Essence of them in themselves since being of a short and limited Capacity they contain not all Beings as GOD does who may be stil'd an Universal Being or simply He that is as He calls Himself Seeing then the Humane Mind is capable of knowing all Beings and Infinite Beings and yet contains them not in it self 't is an infallible Argument that it sees not their Essence in it self For the Mind has not only a successive sight of first one thing then another it also actually perceives INFINITE Though it does not comprehend it as has been said in the foregoing Chapter Wherefore being neither actually infinite nor capable of infinite Modifications at the same time it is absolutely impossible it should see in it self what it does not contain it sees not then the Essence of things by considering its own Perfections or by the diverse modifying of it self Nor does it see their Existence in it self because they depend not on its Will for their Existence and the Idea's of things may be present to the Mind though they do not exist at all For every one may have the Idea of a golden Mountain though there be no such thing as a golden Mountain in Nature And though we rely on the Testimonies of the Senses in our judging of the Existence of Objects yet Reason does not assure us that we ought always to believe them since we manifestly discover that they abuse us When a Man's Blood for instance is well warm'd or only when he sleeps he sees sometimes before his Eyes Fields Battles and the like which yet are not present and which possibly never were 'T is then indubitable that the Mind neither in it self nor by it self sees the Existence of things but in that particular depends on something else CHAP. VI. That we see all things in GOD. WE have examin'd in the preceding Chapters Four different ways for the Mind 's perceiving External Objects none of which seems likely to be true There only remains the Fifth which alone seems agreeable to Reason and the properest to manifest the Dependance our Minds have on GOD in all our Thoughts 'T is requisite to our perfect Understanding it to call to Mind what has been deliver'd in the foregoing Chapter viz. That 't is absolutely necessary for GOD to have in Himself the Idea's of all the Beings He has created since otherwise he could not have produc'd them And that hereby he sees all these Beings by considering the Perfections he includes whereunto they are related We ought to know farther that GOD is most strictly united to our Souls by His Presence so that He may be said to be the place of Spirits as Space is the place of Bodies These two things being suppos'd it is certain that the Mind can see what there is in GOD which represents Created Beings that being most Spiritual most Intelligible and most closely Present to the Mind And so the Mind may see in GOD all the Works of GOD supposing GOD willing to discover to it what He has in Himself that represents them Here then are the Reasons which seem to prove He would rather do this than create an infinite number of Idea's in every Mind In the first place though it be not deny'd absolutely that GOD might have made infinite upon infinite Numbers of Beings Representative of Objects with every Mind he has created yet it is not to be believ'd that He has done it For
it is not only most agreeable to Reason but moreover apparent from the Oeconomy of all Nature that GOD never effects by most Round-about and difficult ways what can be done in ways most simple and easie GOD makes nothing needless and without Reason That which shews His Wisdom and His Power is not the working little things by great means this is against Reason and the sign of a limited Understanding But on the contrary the effecting great things by most simple and easie ways Thus it is that purely with Extension He produces all we see admirable in Nature even that which gives Life and Motion to Animals For those who would have absolute Substantial Forms and Faculties and Souls in Animals distinguish'd from the Blood and Organs of their Body for the performance of their functions will at the same time have GOD to want Understanding or suppose him unable to effect those admirable things with Extension all alone They measure the Power of GOD and His supream Wisdom by the Littleness of their own Mind Since then it is possible for GOD to to make all things visible to our Minds by simply Willing they should see what is in the midst of themselves that is what He has in Himself Relative and Representative of these things it is not likely He should have done otherwise and that He should produce for that purpose infinite upon infinite Idea's with every Mind that He has created But 't is to be well observ'd that we cannot conclude that our Minds see the Essence of GOD from their seeing all things in GOD in this Nature because what they see is most imperfect whereas GOD is most perfect They see matter Divisible Figur'd c. and in GOD there is nothing Divisible or Figur'd For GOD is all Being as being infinite and comprehending all But He is not any Being in particular mean while what we see is only one or more Beings in particular and we comprehend not that perfect Simplicity of GOD who concludes all Beings within Himself Besides which it may be said that we see not the Idea's of Things so much as the Things represented by the Idea's for in seeing a Square for instance we use not to say we see the Idea of that Square which is united to the Mind but only the Square that is without The second Reason which obliges me to think that we see all Beings because GOD wills the discovery of what is in Himself representing them and not because we have so many Idea's created with us as there are things to be seen is that this instates created Minds in an absolute Dependance upon GOD and in the greatest that possibly can be For it being so we not only can see nothing but what GOD will have us see but also can see nothing except what He makes us see We are not sufficient of our selves but our sufficiency is of GOD Non sumus sufficientes cogitare aliquid à nobis tanquam ex nobis sed sufficientia nostra ex Deo est 'T is GOD Himself that enlightens the Philosophers in that Science which ungrateful Men call Natural though it is deriv'd to them from Heaven GOD hath shewed it unto them Deus enim illis manifestavit He is properly the Light of the Mind and the Father of Lights Pater Luminum 'T is He who teaches Men Knowledge Qui docet hominem Scientiam In a word He is the true Light that lighteth every Man that cometh into the World Lux vera quae illuminat omnem hominem venientem in hunc mundum For 't is no easie thing to comprehend distinctly the Dependance our Minds have on GOD in all their particular Actions supposing they have every thing we distinctly know to be necessary to their Acting or all the Idea's of things present to their Mind And that general and confus'd term Concourse whereby they offer to explain the Dependance Creatures have on GOD raises no distinct Idea in a considerate Mind and yet it is convenient Men should most distinctly know how altogether impotent they are without GOD. But the strongest Reason of all is the manner of conduct the Mind takes in the perceiving every thing It is manifest and known to every one 's own experience that when we would think on any thing in particular we first cast about our View upon all Beings in general and afterwards apply our selves to the consideration of the Object we desire to think on Now it is undoubtedly certain that we could not desire the sight of any particular Object but we must have already seen it though it were confusedly and in general So that it being possible to desire the seeing all Beings sometimes one and sometimes another it is certain that all Beings are present to our Mind and it seems that all Beings can be no otherwise present to our Mind than as GOD is present to it that is He that contains all things in the simplicity of his Essence It seems too that the Mind would not be capable of representing to it self the universal Idea's of Genus Species and the like unless it saw all Beings included in one For every Creature being a particular Being it can't be said we see any thing created when we see for example a Triangle in general In fine I do not believe there is any way of accounting for the manner of the Mind 's knowing several abstract and general Truths but by the presence of Him who can enlighten the Mind ten thousand different ways In short the finest the most sublime the most solid and primary proof or that which supposes least things of the Existence of a GOD is the Idea we have of what is infinite For it is certain that the Mind perceives infinite though it does not comprehend it and that it has a most distinct Idea of GOD which can only arrive through the Union it has with Him Since 't is inconceivable that the Idea of a Being infinitely perfect as is that we have of GOD should be any thing of a created Nature But the Mind has not only the Idea of infinite but this Idea is precedaneous to that of finite For we conceive infinite Being from our conceiving Being only not considering whether it be finite or infinite But in order to conceive Finite Being it is necessary to prescind somewhat from that general Notion of Being which consequently must precede it So then the Mind perceives not any thing except in the Idea it has of Infinite and so far is that Idea from being form'd of a confus'd collection of all the Idea's of particular Beings as the Philosophers imagine that on the contrary all these particular Idea's are only participations of that general Idea of infinite as GOD derives not his Being from the Creatures but all the Creatures have their subsistence from Him The last Proof which possibly may go for a Demonstration with those who are us'd to abstract Reasonings is this 'T is impossible for GOD
as that Good ought to be lov'd and Evil avoided that Righteousness ought to be lov'd more than Riches that 't is better to obey GOD than to command Men and infinite other Natural Laws For the knowledge of all these Laws is not different from the knowledge of that impression which they constantly feel within themselves though they do not always follow it by the free choice of their Will and which they know to be common to all Minds though it be not equally strong and powerful in them all 'T is by this Dependance of our Mind and its Relation and Union to the WORD of GOD and of our Will to his Love that we are made after the Image and Similitude of GOD. And though this Image be very much blurr'd and defac'd by Sin yet it is necessary for it to subsist as long as we our selves But if we bear the Image of the WORD humbled upon Earth and obey the Motions of the Holy Spirit that Primitive Image of our first Creation that Union of our Mind to the WORD of the FATHER and to the Love of the FATHER and of the SON will be repair'd and be made indelible We shall become like GOD if we be like the Man-God Lastly GOD will be wholly in us and we shall be wholly in GOD in a far perfecter manner than that whereby it is necessary to our Subsistence that we should be in Him and He in us These then are some of the Reasons that induce us to believe that our Minds perceive all things through the intimate presence of Him who comprehends all things in the Simplicity of his Essence Let every one judge of them according to the internal conviction he shall receive after he has seriously consider'd them But for my own part I can see no probability in any other way of explaining it and I presume this last will appear more than probable Thus our Souls depend on GOD all manner of ways For as it is He who makes them feel Pleasure and Pain and all the other Sensations by the Natural Union He has instituted between them and their Bodies which is no other than His Decree and general Will So it is He who by means of the Natural Union He has plac'd between the Will of Man and the Representation of Idea's included in the immensity of the Divine Essence gives them to know all that they know Nor is this Natural Union any thing but his general Will. So that 't is He only who can enlighten us by representing all things to us as 't is He alone that can make us happy by giving us to taste all sorts of Pleasures Let us persist then in our perswasion that GOD is the intelligible World or the place of Spirits as the material World is the place of Bodies That 't is from His Power they receive all their Modifications that 't is in His Wisdom they discover all their Idea's and 't is by His Love they are influenc'd with all their regulated Motions And because His Power and His Love are nothing but Himself let us believe with St. Paul that He is not far from every one of us and that in Him we live and move and have our Being Non longè est ab unoquoque nostrûm in ipso enim vivimus movemur sumus CHAP. VII I. Four different manners of Perception II. How it is that we know GOD. III. How we know Bodies IV. How we know our own Souls V. How we know the Souls of other Men and Pure Spirits IN order to give an extract and illustration of the Notion I have just establish'd concerning the manner of our Minds perceiving all the different Objects of its knowledge it is necessary I should distinguish in it Four manners or ways of Knowing things The First is that whereby we know things by themselves The Second is that of knowing them by their Idea's that is as I understand it in this place by something that is different from themselves The Third is that of Conscience or by internal Sensation The Fourth is their knowing them by Conjecture We know things by themselves immediately and without Idea's when being of a most intelligible Nature they can penetrate the Mind or discover themselves to it We know things by their Idea's when they are not intelligible by themselves whether because they are Corporeal or that they cannot penetrate the Mind or discover themselves to it We know by Conscience whatever is not distinguish'd from our selves Lastly we know by Conjecture the things which are different from our selves and from those we know in themselves and by Idea's when we think that some things are like some others that we already know Of all the things that come under our Knowledge we know none but GOD by Himself For though there be other Spiritual Beings besides Him and such as seem intelligible by their own Nature yet in our present State there is none but He that penetrates the Mind and discovers Himself to it 'T is GOD alone that we see with an immediate and direct View and possibly He alone is able to enlighten the Mind by his own Substance Finally in this Life it is from nothing but the Union that we have with Him that we are capable of knowing what we know as has been explain'd in the foregoing Chapter For he only is our Master who presides over our Mind according to St. Austin without the Deputation or Interposition of any Creature It cannot be conceiv'd that any thing Created can represent infinite that Being without restriction the immense Being the universal Being can be perceiv'd by an Idea that is by a particular Being and a Being different from the universal and infinite Being But as to particular Beings there is no difficulty to conceive how they can be represented by the infinite Being that includes them and includes them in a most Spiritual and consequently most intelligible manner Thus it is necessary to say that GOD is intelligible by Himself though the knowledge we have of Him in this Life be very imperfect and confus'd and that Corporeal things are intelligible by their Idea's that is to say in GOD since GOD alone contains the intelligible World wherein are found the Idea's of all things But though things are possible to be seen in GOD it does not follow that we do see all things in Him We see only those things in Him whereof we have Idea's and there are things We see without Idea's All things in the World whereof we have any knowledge are either Bodies or Spirits properties of Bodies and properties of Spirits As to Bodies 't is not to be doubted but we see them together with their Properties by their Idea's forasmuch as being unintelligible of themselves there is no possibility of seeing them except in that Being which contains them in an intelligible manner Bodies then and their Properties are seen in GOD and by their Idea's and for this reason
which methinks could not happen were it not for the facility they have at considering the Idea of Being in general which is always present to their Mind through the intimate presence of Him who includes all Beings If the vulgar Philosophers would be content to let their Physicks go for simple Logicks which furnish'd out Terms for the Discoursing of Natural things and if they would give those Men leave to be quiet who affix to these Terms distinct and particular Idea's to make themselves intelligible we should have nothing to reprehend in their Conduct But they set up themselves for the explaining Nature by general and abstract Idea's as if Nature were her self abstract and will absolutely have the Physicks of their Master Aristotle to be real Physicks which searches to the bottom of things and not a simple Logick only though it has nothing sufferable in it except it be some Definitions so loose and indefinite and some so general Terms as may be employ'd in all sorts of Philosophy In fine their Heads are so full of these imaginary Entities and these loose and indeterminate Idea's which spring up naturally in their Minds that they are too incapable of fixing their Thoughts for any time upon the real Idea's of things to discover their solidity and evidence And this is the Cause of that their extream ignorance of the true Principles of Natural Philosophy 'T is necessary to give a proof of it The Philosophers are sufficiently agreed That that ought to be look'd upon as the Essence of a thing which is acknowledg'd the First in that thing which is inseparable from it and on which all the Properties which belong to it depend So that to discover wherein consists the Essence of Matter we must consider all the Properties that comport with it or are included in the Idea we have of it as Hardness Softness Fluidness Motion Rest Figure Divisibility Impenetrability and Extension and enquire immediately which of these Attributes is inseparable from it Thus Fluidity Hardness Softness Motion and Rest being to be separated from Matter since there are many Bodies without Hardness Fluidity or Softness which are not in Motion or lastly which are not at rest it clearly follows that none of these Attributes are essential to it And now there remain only four which we conceive inseparable from Matter namely Figure Divisibility Impenetrability and Extension wherefore in order to understand which Attribute is to be taken for its Essence we must no longer think of separating them but only examine which is the Primary and that supposes none before it Now we easily discover that Figure Divisibility and Impenetrability suppose Extension and that Extension presupposes nothing But this being given Divisibility Impenetrability and Figure necessarily follow Extension then ought to be concluded the Essence of Matter on Supposition it has no other Attributes than those beforemention'd and such as are like them and I am perswaded no Man in the World can doubt of it when he has seriously consider'd it But all the difficulty is to know Whether Matter has not some other Attributes different from Extension and its Dependants so that Extension it self may not be essential to it but may suppose some other thing both as its Subject and its Priâ—ciple Many Men after having most attentively consider'd the Idea which they have of Matter by all the Attributes that are known of it after having meditated likewise on the Effects of Nature as much as their Strength and Capacity of Mind would permit them have been strongly convinc'd that Extension supposes not any thing in Matter whether because they have had no distinct and particular Idea of that thing pretended precedaneous to Extension or because they have found no visible Effect to prove it For even as to our being perswaded that a Watch hath no Entity different from the Matter it is compos'd of it suffices to know how the different Disposition of the Wheels is able to effect all the Movements of a Watch without having any other distinct Idea of what might possibly be the Cause of these Motions though there be many Logical to had So because these Persons have no distinct Idea of what could be in Matter were Extension taken away and see no Attribute that can explicate its Nature and because Extension being granted all the Attributes conceiv'd to belong to Matter are at the same time granted and because Matter is the Cause of no Effect which may not be conceiv'd producible by Extension diversly configur'd and diversly mov'd therefore they are perswaded that Extension is the Essence of Matter But as no Man can infallibly demonstrate there is not some Intelligence or New-created Entity in the Wheels of a Watch so no Man can without a particular Revelation be assur'd as of a Geometrical Demonstration that there is nothing but Extension diversly configur'd in a Stone For 't is absolutely possible for Extention to be joyn'd with something which we don't conceive because we have no Idea of it though it seems very unreasonable to believe and assert it it being contrary to Reason to assert what we neither know nor have any conception of Yet though we should suppose That there were something besides Extension in Matter yet that would be no Impediment if we well observe it why Extension should not be its Essence according to the Definition we have given of the Word For in short 't is absolutely necessary that every thing in the World should be either a Being or a Mode of being and no Thinking and Attentive Man can deny it But Extension is not the Mode of a Being therefore it is a Being But because Matter is not constituted of several Beings as Man who is compos'd of a Body and Mind Matter being one simple Being it is manifest that Matter is nothing but Extension Now to prove that Extension is not a Mode of Being but a real Being it must be observ'd That a Mode of Being cannot be conceiv'd but the Being must at the same time be conceiv'd whereof it is the Mode We cannot conceive Rotundity for Instance but we must conceive Extension because the Mode of Being or Existence being only the Being it self in such a sort of state the Roundness of tbe Wax for Instance being but the Wax it self in such a sort or fashion it is plain that we cannot conceive the Mode without the Being If then Extension were a Mode of Being we could not conceive Extension without the Being whereof Extension was the Mode whereas we easily conceive Extension all alone Wherefore it is not a Mode of Being but consequently a Being of it self And so it is the Essence of Matter since Matter is but a simple Being and not compos'd of many Beings as I have already said But many Philosophers have so accustom'd themselves to general Idea's and Logical Entities as to have their Mind more possess'd with them than those that are distinct particular and Physical Which is evident
enough from hence that their Argumentations upon Natural things are founded merely on Logical Notions such as Act Power and an infinite number of Imaginary Entities which they take no care to distinguish from such as are Real These Gentlemen therefore finding it wonderful easie to see after their manner what they have a Mind to see imagine they have better Eyes than other Men and that they perceive distinctly Extension supposes something else and that 't is only a Property of Matter which Matter may be divested of as of the rest Yet if you make a Demand of them that they would please to explain that thing which they pretend to perceive in Matter besides Extension they offer to do it several ways every of which makes it apparent that they have no other Idea of it than that of Being or of Substance in general This is extreamly evident if we take notice That this their Idea includes no particular Attributes which agree to Matter For whilst we take Extension from Matter we rob it of all the Attributes and Properties which we distinctly conceive do belong to it and though we leave that imaginary thing which they suppose the Essence of it it being manifest that neither Earth nor Heaven nor any thing we see in Nature could be made of it Whereas on the contrary if we take away what they fancy the Essence of Matter provided we leave Extension and we leave all the Attributes and Properties we distinctly conceive included in the Idea of Matter For it is certain that out of Extension all alone might be fram'd an Heaven an Earth and all the Visible World and infinite others So this Something which they suppose over and above Extension having no Attributes distinctly to be conceiv'd belonging to it and clearly included in the Idea we have of it can have nothing real in it if we will credit our Reason nor can be of any use in explaining Natural Effects And that which is said of its being the Subject and Principle of Extension is said gratis and without any distinct Conception in them that say it that is they have no other than a General and Logical Idea of it as of Subject and Principle In so much that we may further imagine a new Subject and a new Principle of this Subject of Extension and so in infinitum the Mind having the Power of representing the General Idea's of Subject and Principle as long as it pleases 'T is true there is a great probability that Men had not so puzzl'd and obscur'd the Idea that they have of Matter had they not some Reasons for it and that there are many who maintain contrary Conclusions to these of ours upon Theological Principles Doubtless Extension is not the Essence of Matter if that be contrary to our Faith And we willingly acknowledge it We are thank GOD very well perswaded of the Feebleness and Limitedness of an Humane Mind We know it is of too little Extent to measure an Infinite Power that GOD can do infinitely more than we can conceive that he communicates only those Idea's which represent to us the things that arrive by the order of Nature and hides the rest from us Wherefore we are always ready to submit our Reason unto Faith but there is need of better proofs than are generally urg'd to ruin the Reasons we have establish'd Because the manner of explaining the Mysteries of Faith are not of Faith and we believe these Mysteries without conceiving how the manner of them can be distinctly explaind We believe for instance the Mystery of the TRINITY though the Humane Mind is unable to conceive it and yet we cease not to believe that the things that differ not in any third differ not in themselves though this Proposition seems to overthrow it For we are convinc'd that Reason is not to be made use of except in Subjects proportion'd to its Capacity and that we ought not to look steadfastly on our Mysteries for fear of being dazel'd by them according that Admonition of the Holy Spirit Qui scrutator est Majestatis opprimetur à gloriâ However if we thought it convenient for the satisfaction of some Men's Minds to explain how our Notion upon this matter may be reconcil'd with what we are taught by Faith concerning Transubstantiation we probably could do it in a way very distinct and perspicuous and could no ways offend against the Decisions of the Church But we think this Explication may be dispens'd with especially in this Work For it ought to be observ'd That the Holy Fathers have almost always look'd upon it as an incomprehensible Mystery and that they never play'd the Philosophers to explain it but contented themselves for the most part with unexact Comparisons fitter to make known the Doctrine than to give a Satisfactory Explication to the Mind Therefore Tradition is for such as Philosophize not on this Mystery and who sumit their Reason to the Rule of Faith without distracting their Brain to no purpose about most abstruse and difficult Questions We should be to blame should we require the Philosophers to give us clear and easie Explications of the manner of our LORD's Body being in the Eucharist for this would be to demand of them novelties in Divinity And in case the Philosophers should make an impudent Answer to the Demand they must be necessarily obnoxious either to the having their Philosophy or Divinity condemn'd For if their Explications were obscure they would give reason to despise the Principles of their Philosophy if their Answer were easie and apparent we should have reason to be apprehensive of Novelty in their Divinity Since then Novelty in point of Divinity bears the Impress and Character of Error and the World has a right and priviledge of despising Opinions merely on the Account of their being Novel and having no foundation in Tradition we ought not to undertake to give easie and intelligible Explications of those things which the Fathers and Councels have not perfectly explain'd and 't is sufficient to hold the Doctrine of Transubstantiation without offering to make out the manner of it For otherwise we might sow the seeds for fresh Disputes and Quarrels whereof there are too many already and the Enemies of the Truth would not fail to use them to malicious purpose and for the oppressing of their Adversaries Disputes in point of Theological Explications seem to be the most useless and most dangerous of any and they are with greater reason to be fear'd for that even Religious Persons often fancy they have a right of breaking their Charity with such as break with their Opinions We have but too common Experience of this Practice and the cause of it lies not very deep Wherefore 't is always the best and surest way not to be eager to speak of things whereof we have no Evidence and which others are not dispos'd to conceive Nor ought obscure and uncertain Explications of Mysteries of Faith which we are under no
Consequences to settle the General Rules of our Behaviour though few there are that do it whilst daily Disputes arise about Questions of Morality which are the immediate and necessary Results of so self-evident a Principle as this before us The Geometricians are continually making new Discoveries in their Science and if they do not much advance it 't is because they have already drawn from their Principles the most useful and necessary consequences But the greatest part of Mankind seem incapable of concluding any thing from the First Principle of Morals All their Ideas vanish and dissipate when their Will inclines them barely to consider it Because they will not as they ought and they will not as they ought because they cannot taste it or that having tasted it are presently distasted For 't is an Abstract Metaphysical and purely Intellectual Principle and not attainable by Sense or Imagination And therefore seems to Carnal Eyes or Minds that see no farther than their Eyes to have no solidity Nothing appears in this Principle likely to settle and compose the restless agitation of their Will and thereupon to stop the View of their Mind and fix it attentively on considering it What hope then is there they should see it well comprehend it right and draw those direct Inferences from it which they ought Those who should have but an imperfect apprehension of this Geometrical Proposition That the sides of Similar Triangles are proportional could certainly be no great Geometricians But if besides that confus'd and imperfect Perception of that Fundamental Proposition of Geometry they had some Interest why the sides of Similar Triangles should not be proportional and if False Geometry were as suitable to their perverse Inclinations as False Morals we should see as absurd Paralogisms in Geometry as Morality because their Errours would be pleasant to them and Truth would only trouble perplex and confound them Hence we need not wonder at the Blindness of Men in former Ages who liv'd whilst Idolatry flourish'd in the World or of such as live at present unenlightned with the Sun-shine of the Gospel It was needful for Eternal Wisdom to cloath it self with Sensibility to instruct Men that enquire only of their Senses Four thousand Years together Truth was manifested by speaking to their Mind but not entring into themselves they did not hear it 't was requisite therefore it should speak unto their Ears The Light which enlightens all Men shin'd upon their Darkness without dispersing it and they could not behold it Intelligible Light must veil it self and become Visible The Word must be made Flesh and hidden and inaccessible Wisdom must instruct Men in a Carnal manner Carnaliter says St. Bernard The Generality of Men and especially the Poor who are the worthiest Object of their Creator's Mercy and Providence those who are oblig'd to labor for their Living are extremely ignorant and stupid They hear only because they have Ears and see only because they have Eyes But are incapable of retiring into themselves by any Effort of Reason there to examine Truth in the silence of their Senses and their Passions Truth they cannot apply to because they cannot relish it and commonly that application enters not their Heads because they cannot think of applying themselves to unaffecting Objects Their desultory and restless Will continually casts the View of their Mind upon all sensible Objects the Variety of which is pleasant and diverting For the Multiplicity and Diversity of Sensible Goods serve to conâ—eal their Vanity and to keep up our Hopes of finding among them the True Good which we desire Thus though the Counsels which JESUS CHRIST in quality of Man of the Way and of Author of our Faith gives us in the Gospel are much more proportion'd to the weakness of our Mind than those which the same CHRIST as He is Eternal Wisdom Internal Truth Intellectual Light inspires into our most inward Reason and though He renders these His Counsels delectable by His Grace sensible by His Example and convincing by His Miracles yet Men are so stupid and inconsiderate even as to things of greatest importance to be known that they scarce ever think of them as behooves them Not many perceive the Excellency of the Gospel nor the Soundness and Necessity of the Precepts of our LORD few there are that meditate on them so as to nourish and strengthen the Soul by them The continual tossing and agitation of the Will which looks for the Enjoyment of Good permitting not those Truths to be insisted on which seem to deprive the Soul of it Here follows another proof of what I am asserting Doubtless it much concerns and lies upon the Wicked to know whether their Soul is Mortal as they suppose it or Immortal as Faith and Reason assure as being a thing of geatest moment and importance to them since the Question lays their Eternity at stake and the quiet of their Mind depends on the resolve Whence comes it that they are ignorant or doubtful in the matter but from their want of serious Attention and the Restlesness and Corruptness of their Will not suffering the Mind to take a steady View of the Reasons which contradict the Opinion they wish to be true For in brief is it so difficult to discover the difference between the Body and Soul betwixt a Thinking and an Extended thing Must a Man bring so great an Attention to perceive that a Thought is neither Round nor Square that Extention is capable only of different Figures and Motions but not of Thought and Reasoning and so that what Thinks and what 's Extended are two Beings altogether opposite And yet this is all that 's requisite to demonstrate the Immortality of the Soul and that she is not perishable though the Body should be annihilated True it is when a Substance perishes that the Modes or Manners of its Existence perish with it as were a piece of Wax annihilated it is certain the Figures of that Wax would be annihilated also because the Roundness for instance of the Wax is really nothing but the Wax it self existing in such a manner and so cannot subsist without the Wax whose Mode it is But though God should destroy all the Wax in the World it would not follow from thence that any other Substance or Modes of Substance should be annihilated All Stones for example might subsist together with their Modes Because Stones are Substances or Beings and not Modes of Being of the Wax So though God should annihilate the half of a Body it would not follow that the other half was annihilated The latter half is united to the other but is not one with it And therefore one half being annihilated it might be reasonably inferr'd that the other half was no longer related to it but not that it did it self exist no longer for being a different Being it could not be reduc'd to nothing by the annihilation of the other Thence 't is manifest that Thought
being not the Modification of Extension our Soul is not annihilated on supposition that our Body were annihilated by Death But we have no reason to imagine that even the Body is annihilated when it is destroy'd The parts that make it up are dissolv'd into Vapours and reduc'd into Dust we neither see nor know them any more I confess but we cannot hence conclude they exist not For the Mind perceives them still If we separate a Mustard-seed into two or four or twenty parts we annihilate it to our Eyes because we see it no longer But 't is not annihilated in it self or to the Mind for the Mind discerns it though divided into a thousand or an hundred thousand parts 'T is a common Notion and receiv'd by all that use their Reason rather than their Senses That nothing can be annihilated by the ordinary force of Nature For as 't is naturally impossible for something to be produc'd from nothing so 't is impossible for a Substance or Being to be reduc'd to nothing Bodies indeed may corrupt if you call Corruption the Changes that befall them but cannot be annihilated What is round may become square what is Flesh may become Earth Vapour and whatever you please for all Extention is capable of all sorts of Configuration But the Substance of what is round or Flesh can never perish There are certain settled Laws in Nature by which Bodies change successively their Forms because the successive Variety of these Forms makes the Beauty of the Universe and causes us to admire its Author But there is no Law in Nature for the annihilation of any Being because Nothingness wants all Beauty as well as Goodness and the Author of Nature is the Lover of his works Bodies then may change but can never perish But if any one sticking to the Verdict of his Senses shall obstinately maintain that the dissolution of Bodies is a true Annihilation because the parts they resolve into are invisible Let him do so much as remember that Bodies cannot be divided into these invisible parts but by reason of their Extension For if the Mind be not extended it must be indivisible and if indivisible must be acknowledg'd incorruptible in that sense But how can the Mind be imagin'd extended and divisible A right Line will divide a Square into two Triangles Parallelograms or Trapezia But by what Line may a Pleasure a Pain or a Desire be conceiv'd to be divided and what Figure would result from that Division Certainly I cannot believe the Imagination so fruitful in false Ideas as to satisfie it self in this particular The Mind therefore is neither extended nor divisible nor susceptible of the same changes as the Body and yet it must be own'd that it is not immutable by its Nature If the Body is capable of an infinite number of different Figures and different Configurations the Mind is likewise capable of a world of different Ideas and different Modifications And as after our Death the Substance of our Flesh will resolve into Earth Vapours and infinite other Bodies without annihilation so our Soul without falling back into Nothing will have Thoughts and Sensations very different from those she has during this Life At present 't is necessary that we live and that our Body be compos'd of Flesh and Bone and in order to live 't is necessary the Soul should have Ideas and Sensations relating to the Body she is joyn'd to But when she shall be divested of her Body she shall enter upon a perfect Liberty of receiving all sorts of Ideas and Modifications very different from those she has at present as the Body on its part shall be free to receive all sorts of Figures and Canfigurations nothing like those it is oblig'd to make the Body of a living Man It is if I mistake not manifest from what I have said That the Immortality of the Soul is no such hard thing to comprehend Whence comes it then that so many doubt of it but from their Inadvertency and want of Attention to the Reasons that are requisite to convince them or whence proceeds this negligence but from the Unsetledness and Inconstancy of the Will incessantly disturbing the Understanding So as not to give it leasure for a distinct Preception even of Ideas that are the most present to it such as are those of Thought and Extension as a Man in the heat of a Passion casting his Eyes round about him seldom distinguishes the Objects that are nearest and most expos'd to View For indeed the Question of the Immortality of the Soul is one of the easiest to be resolv'd when without listning to the Imagination we bring the Mind attentively to consider the clear and distinct Idea of Extension and the Relation it can have with Thought If the Inconstancy and Levity of the Will hinders the Understanding from piercing to the bottom of things that are most present to it and of mightiest Importance to be known 't is easie to judge what greater Remoras it will afford the Mind to prevent its Meditating on such as are Remote and Unconcerning So that if we are under the Grossest Ignorance and Blindness as to most things of greatest consequence to be known I can't tell how we should be very Intelligent and Enlightened as to those that seem altogether Impertinent and Fruitless This I need not stand to prove by tedious Instances and which contain no considerale Truths for if we must be ignorant of any thing that best can be despens'd with which is of no use and I had rather not be credited than make the Reader lose time by unprofitable things Though there are but very few that are seriously taken up with things altogether Vain and Useless yet those few are too many But the number can't be too great of such as neglect them and despise them provided only they forbear to judge of them A limited Understanding is not blameable for not knowing several things but only for judging of them For Ignorance is an unavoidable Evil But Errour both may and ought to be avoided Ignorance of many things is excusable but headlong inconsiderate Judgments never When things are nearly related to us are Sensible and easily Imaginable we may say that the Mind intends them and that some Knowledge of them is attainable for knowing that they relate to us we think of them with some inclination and feeling them to affect us our Application grows pleasant and delightful So that we should as to many things be wiser than we are but for the Restlesness and Agitation of our Will that perpetually troubles and fatigues our Attention But when things are abstract and insensible 't is difficult to acquire any certain Knowledge of them not that abstract things are in their own Nature intricate and puzling but because the Attention and View of the Mind commonly begins and ends with the Sensible View of Objects for as much as we mostly think of only what we see and feel and
Simple or Compound But I have not oblig'd my self to account for all the different Motions whereof the Mind is capable I am willing to have it known that my principal Design in all the foregoing Treatise concerning the Search after Truth was to make Men sensible how weak and ignorant they are and how subject to Errour and Sin I have said it and I say it again perhaps it will be remembred I had never design'd a Thorough particular Explication of the Nature of the Mind but I have been oblig'd to say something of it to lay open its Errours in their Principle to unfold them methodically in a Word to make my self intelligible If I have transgress'd the Bounds I had prescrib'd my self â—t was because I had methought new things to say which seem'd of moment and which I believ'd might be read with Pleasure Perhaps I was mistaken but that Presumption was necessary â—o encourage me to write them For who would say any thing if he did not hope to be attended to I have said it 's true several things which seem to have less Analogy with the present Subject than would be the particular Treatment of the Motions of the Soul and I acknowledge it But 't is not my Intention to put my self under any Constraint when I propose to my self a Method I lay down a Rule to go by but I presume it may be permitted me to turn aside as I walk when any thing falls in my way to be consider'd I presume too I have the Liberty of diverting to a Resting Place provided I lose not Sight of the Road I am to pursue Such as will not ease themselves with me may go on if they please 't is but turning to a new Page But if they take it amiss I would let them know that there are many who find that the Resting Places I have made choice of make their Journey easier and more pleasant The End of the First Volume PREFACE to the Second Volume Which may serve as an Answer to the ANIMADVERSIONS on the First SOme time since was publish'd a Book entituled Animadversions upon the Search after Truth wherein at the same time are examin'd part of M. des Cartes 's Principles being a Letter by an Academick in Paris c. 'T is said this Book attacks me and truly not without Reason for the Title shews it and the Author manifests it was his Design which gives me a Right and imposes on me a sort of Obligation of speaking my Thoughts of it For besides that I ought to disabuse some people who delight in these petty Quarrels and immediately determine on the side of the Criticks that gratifie their Passion I think my self bound to give some Answer to the Aggressor that I may not be thought to be â—ilent out of Insolence or Impotence The Animadverter may pardon me if he pleases if I sometimes seem to give him Provocation I should be very sorry so much as to design it But I cannot defend my self without wounding him nor repell the Blows he makes at me without making him feel and others know his Weakness and Imbecillity Self-defence is a natural Obligation but the Defence of Truth is absolutely indispensible See here in short his Design He supposes the Book he animadverts on is a Method for laying the Foundations of the Sciences He reduces this Method to fourteen Heads and shews that they are either Suppositions without Proof or Assertioâ—s without Foundation and consequently that the Substance of the Book is intirely useless to the Enquiry after Truth though there are here and there some Observations in it that place it in the rank of Works which have gain'd the Estimation of our Age. I answer in General that the Author of the Animadversions has not understood or has dissembled the Understanding the Design of the Book he impungs it being plain that the principal Design of it is to discover the Errours we are subject to 'T is true it treats of the Nature of the Senses Imagination and Intellect but 't is manifest and I precaution in several places that this is only to discover these Errours in their Causes This being the Method I always endeavour to observe as believing it most advantageous to the enlightning the Mind The Title of the first Page of the Book he opposes wherein are to be seen in Capitals CONCERNING THE ERROURS OF THâ— SENSES the very Table of the same Book or rather the Place where I make the Division of the whole Work might have taught him my Design if he had desir'd to know it where he might have read these words which methinks are clear enough And so all the Errours of Men and the Causes of them may be reduc'd to five Heads and we shall treat of them according to that order First We shall speak of the Errours of the SENSES Secondly Of the Errours of IMAGINATION Thirdly Of the Errours of the PURE INTELLECT Fourthly Of the Errours of our INCLINATIONS And fifthly Of the Errours of the PASSIONS And thus having made an Essâ—y to rid the Soul of the Errours which she is subject to WE SHALL Lastly LAY DOWN A GENERAL METHOD TO CONDUCT HER IN THE SEARCH OF TRUTH 'T is plain enough from this Division that the first Volume which is the subject of our Aâ—thor's Animadversions treats only of the Senses Imagination and Intellect and that the Method which he supposes I have given ought to be the Subject of the Second Volume Nevertheless as he is pleased to make me undertake a Design I do not execute that he may have the more to Charge upon my Conduct so he goes to prove it was my Design to lay down a Method in that Book I do him no Injury says he in looking on his Book as a Method to lay the Foundations of the Sciences For besides that the Title expresses so much he declares himself upon the Point in the following manner Let us examaine the Causes and Nature of our Errours and since the Method of examining things by considering them in their Birth and Origin is the most regular and perspicuous and serves better than others to give us a thorough knowledge of them let us try to put it here in practice I do a Man no Injury when I say he designs to draw an Hercules but if I shew that instead of an Hercules he takes a Polyphemus or Thersites I make him ridiculous Should I say with many others that the Animadverter is a Cartesian or that he designed by his Animadversions on my Book to defend the Doctrine of Des Cartes I should not wrong him but if at the same time I should shew that he opposes me without understanding me I should possibly offend him 'T is then injuring a Man to charge upon him Designs which he never had to render him ridiculous But a Man must be wretchedly in the wrong who imposes them on such as have like me in several places explain'd themselves clearly upon
Motions unless it be for the Preservation of Life that sensible Pleasure bears the like Proportion to Good as Sensations to Truth and that as our Senses deceive us in Matters of Truth so do likewise our Passions in point of our Good that we ought to yield to the Delectation of Grace because it evidently moves us to the Love of a true Good is not followed with the secret Reproaches of Reason as the blind Instinct and confused Pleasure of the Passions but is always attended with a secret Joy suitable to the good State we are in Last of all since God alone can operate upon the Mind of Man he cannot find any Happiness out of God unless we would suppose that God rewards Disobedience or that he commands to love more what less deserves to be loved CHAP. V. That the Perfection of the Mind consists in its Vnion with God by the Knowledge of Truth and the Love of Vertue and contrariwise that its Imperâ—ection proceeds only from its Dependency on the Body caused by the Disorder of the Senses and Passions THE shortest Reflection is sufficient to let us know that the Good of the Mind must needs be something of a Spiritual Nature for our Bodies are much inferiour to our Mind they are unable to act upon it by their own strength they cannot immediately unite themselves to it lastly â—hey are not intelligible of themselves and therefore cannot be its Good whereas Spiritual things being intelligible of their own Nature can be united to the Mind and consequently be its Good provided they be Superiour to it For that a thing may be the Good of the Mind it must not only be Spiritual as it self but it must also be Superiour to it that it may act upon it enlighten it and reward it since otherwise it cannot make it perfecter and happier nor by consequence be its Good Now of all Intelligible or Spiritual things God alone is thus Superiour to the Mind whence it follows That nothing but God alone either is or can be our true Good and that we cannot become either more happy or more perfect but by enjoying him Every one is persuaded that the Knowledge of Truth and the Love of Vertue make the Mind moâ—e perfect and that the Blindness of the Mind and the Depravation of the Heart lessens its natural Perfection The Knowledge of Truth and the Love of Vertue cannot then be any thing else but the Union of the Mind to God or if I may so speak a Possession of him and on the conâ—rary the Blindness of the Mind and the Depravation of the Heart can be nothing else but a separation of the Mind from God and its Union with something Inferiour to it viz. with the â—â—dy since that is the only Union that can make it imperfect and unhappy And therefore to know the Truth or to know things as far as they are agreeable to the Rules of Truth is really to know God And to love Vertue or to love things as far as they are amiable or according to the Rules of Vertue is to love him The Mind is situate as it were betwixt God and Bodies betwixt Good and Evil between that wâ—iâ—h enlightens and that which blinds it that which rules and that which misrules it that which can make it perfect and happy and that which can render it imperfect and miserable When it discovers some Truth or sees things as they are in their own Nature it sees them in the Ideas of God that is discovers them by a clear and distinct view of what is in God representing them For as I have observed elsewhere the Mind of Man contains not in it self the Perfections or Ideas oâ— all the Beings it is capable of perceiving 't is not the universal Being and therefore cannot see iâ— it self such things as are distinguish'd from it self It does not instruct or enlighten it self by consulting with it self as being neither Perfection nor Light to it self it stands in need to be enlightned by the immense Light of Eternal Truth Thus the Mind by knowing Truth is united to God and in some manner knows and possesses him We may not only say That a Mind perceiving the Truth partly knows God who comprehends it we may add also That in some sort it knows things as God himself knows them For the Mind knows their true Relations and so does God the Mind sees them in viewing the Perfections of God that represent them God perceives them the same way for God neither perceives by Sense nor Imagination but sees in himself as being the Intellectual World the Corporeal and Sensible World which he has created 'T is the same with the Mind in its Knowledge of Truth it comes not to it by Sensation or Imagination for Sensations and Pantasms offer but false Representations of things to the Mind so that whosoever discovers the Truth sees it in the Intellectual World to which 't is united and in which Good sees it for this material and sensible World is not intelligible of it self so that the Mind sees in the Light of God as does God himself all the things which it plainly sees though it sees them very imperfectly and so very differently from God in that respect Thus when the Mind sees Truth it not only is united to God possesses and beholds God but also sees Truth in one sense as God himself sees it So when we love according to the Rules of Vertue we love God for by regulating our Love according to these Rules the Impression of Love towards him which he continually produces in our Heart is not turn'd off by free Will nor chang'd into Self-Love The Mind at that time freely follows the Impression which God gives and God never giving any Impression which does not tend towards him since he only acts for himself it is plain That to love according to the Rules of Vertue is to love God But 't is not only to love God 't is likewise to love as God loves He loves himself only and his Works but because they relate to his Perfections and proportionably to the degrees of Conformity they have with them It being the same Love by which God loves himself and whatever he has made or done To love according to the Rules of Vertue is to love God only to love him in all things and to love things proportionably as they partake of his Goodness and Perfections since this is to love them according to the degree they are lovely In short 't is to love by the Impression of the same Love by which God loves himself for 't is the Love by which God loves himself and whatever else with relation to him that animates us when we love as we ought whence I conclude That we then love as God loves It is therefore evident That the Knowledge of Truth and the regular Love of Vertue constitute all our Perfection since they are the costomary Attendants on our Union with God which also
great and solid Truth which they have rendred familiar and which bears 'em up and strengthens them in all Occasions CHAP. IX Of Love and Aversion and their principal Species LOve and Hatred are the Passions that immediately succeed Admiration for we dwell not long upon the Consideration of an Object without discovering the Relations it hath to us or to something we love The Object we love and to which consequently we are united by that Passion being for the most part present as well as that which we actually admire our Mind quickly and without any considerable Reflection makes the necessary Comparisons to find out the Relations they have to each other and to us or else is naturally aware of them by a preventing Sense of Pleasure and Pain Then it is that the Motion of Love we have for our selves and for the beloved Object extends to that which is admired if the Relation it has immediately to us or to something united to us appear advantageous either by Knowledge or Sensation Now that new Motion of the Soul or rather that Motion of the Soul newly determin'd join'd to that of the Animal Spirits and followed with the Sensation that attends the new Disposition that the same new Motion of the Spirits produces in the Brain is the Passion we call here Love But when we feel by any Pain or discover by a clear and evident Knowledge that the Union or Relation of the admired Object would prove disserviceable to us or to something united to us then the Motion of the Love we have for our selves or for the Thing united to us terminates in us or cleaves to the united Object without following the View of the Mind or being carried to the admired Thing But as the Motion towards Good in general which the Author of Nature continually imprints on the Soul carries her to whatever is known and felt because what is either intelligible or sensible is Good in it self so it may be said that the Resistance of the Soul against that natural Motion which attracts it is a kind of voluntary Motion which terminates in Nothingness Now that voluntary Motion of the Soul being join'd to that of the Spirits and Blood and followed by the Sensation that attends the new Disposition which that Motion of the Spirits produces in the Brain is the Passion we call here Aversion or Hatred That Passion is altogether contrary to Love and yet 't is never without Love It is altogether contrary to it because Aversion separates and Love unites the former has most commonly Nothingness for its Object and the latter has always a Being The former resists the natural Motion and makes it of no effect whereas the latter yields to it and makes it victorious However Aversion is never separated from Love because Evil the Object of the former is the Privation of Good so that to fly from Evil is to fly from the Privation of Good that is to say to tend to Good And therefore the Aversion of the Privation of Good is the Love of Good But if Evil be taken for Pain the Aversion of Pain is not the Aversion of the Privation of Pleasure because Pain is as real a Sensation as Pleasure and therefore is not the Privation of it But the Aversion of Pain being the Aversion of some internal Misery we should not be affected with that Passion should we not love our selves Lastly If Evil be taken for what causes Pain in us or for whatever deprives us of Good then Aversion depends on Self-love or on the Love of something to which we desire to be united So that Love and Aversion are two Mother-Passions opposite to each other but Love is the First the Chief and the most Universal As at that great Distance and Estrangement we are from God since the Fall we look upon our Being as the Chief Part of the Things to which we are united so it may be said in some sense that our Motion of Love for any thing whatsoever is an Effect of Self-love We love Honours because they raise us our Riches because they maintain and preserve us our Relations Prince and Country because we are concern'd in their Preservation Our Motion of Self-love reaches to all the Things that relate to us and to which we are united because 't is that Motion which unites us to them and spreads our Being if I may so speak on those that surround us proportionably as we discover by Reason or by Sensation that it is our Interest to be united to them And therefore we ought not to think that since the Fall Self-Love is only the Cause and Rule of all other Affections but that most part of other Affections are Species of Self-love For when we say that a Man loves any new Object we must not suppose that a new Motion of Love is produc'd in him but rather that knowing that Object to have some Relation or Union with him he loves himself in that Object and that with a Motion of Love coeval to himself For indeed without Grace there is nothing but Self-love in the Heart of Man The Love of Truth of Justice of God himself and every other Love that is in us by the first Institution of Nature have ever since the Fall been a Sacrifice to Self-love There is no doubt however but the most wicked and barbarous Men Idolaters and Atheists themselves are united to God by a natural Love of which consequently Self-love is not the Cause for they are united to him by their Love to Truth Justice and Vertue they praise and esteem good Men and do not love them because they are Men but because they see in them such Qualities as they cannot forbear to love because they cannot forbear to admire and judge them amiable And therefore we love something besides our selves but Self-love over-rules all the rest and Men forsake Truth and Justice for the smallest Concerns For when by their natural Force they venture their Goods and Lives to defend oppress'd Innocence or on any other Occasion their greatest Spur is mere Vanity and the hopes of getting a Name by the seeming Possession of a Vertue which is reverenc'd by all the World They love Truth and Justice when on their side but never against themselves because without Grace they cannot obtain the least Victory over Self-love There are many other sorts of natural Love We naturally love our Prince Country Relations those that have any Conformity of Humour Designs and Employments with us But all those sorts of Love are very weak as well as the Love of Truth and Justice and Self-love being the most violent of all conquers them so easily as to find no other Resistance but what it creates against it self Bodies that strike against others lose their Motion proportionably as they communicate it to the stricken and after having moved many other Bodies may at last entirely lose their own Motion It is not so with Self-love It determines every
a great Number but also differ by the different Perceptions and Judgments that cause or accompany them Those different Judgments of the Soul concerning Good or Evil produce different Motions in the Animal Spirits to dispose the Body in relation to the Object and consequently cause in the Soul Sensations that are not altogether like Whence it proceeds that some Passions are observ'd to differ from each other though their Commotions be not different In the mean while the Commotion of the Soul being the chief Thing observable in every Passion 't is better to refer them to the Three original Passions in which those Commotions are very different than to treat confusedly and disorderly of them in reference to the different Perceptions we may have of the Good and Evil that raises them For we may have so many different Perceptions of Objects in reference to Time to our selves to what belongs to us to the Persons or Things to which we are united either by Nature or Choice that it is wholly impossible to make an accurate Enumeration of them When the Soul perceives any Good which she cannot enjoy it may perhaps be said that she hopes for it though she desires it not However 't is plain that this her Hope is not a Passion but a simple Judgment And therefore 't is the Commotion that attends the Idea of any Good of which we take the Enjoyment to be possible that adopts Hope into a true Passion It is the same when Hope grows into Security For the latter is a Passion only because of the Commotion of Joy that mixes with that of Desire since the Judgment of the Soul that considers any Good as certain is a Passion but as much as it is a foregoing Taste of the Good that affects us Last of all When Hope diminishes and is succeeded by Despair 't is visible again that the latter is a Passion but because of the Commotion of Sorrow that mixes with that of Desire for the Judgment of the Soul that considers any Good as unattainable would not be a Passion should we not be actuated by that Judgment But because the Soul never looks upon Good or Evil without any Commotion and even without any Alteration in the Body we often give the Name of Passion to the Judgment that produces it confounding together whatever happens both to the Soul and Body at the sight of any Good or Evil For the Words Hope Fear Boldness Shame Impudence Anger Pity Derision Grief and the Names of all other Passions in common use are short Expressions made up of several Terms by which can be explain'd in particular whatever Passions contain We understand by the Word Passion the View of the Relation any thing has to us the Commotion and Sensation of the Soul the Concussion of the Brain and the Motion of the Spirits a new Commotion and Sensation of the Soul and lastly a Sensation of Pleasure that always attends the Passions and makes them grateful All these we commonly understand by the Name of Passions but sometimes it only signifies either the Judgment that raises it or only the Commotion of the Soul or the bare Motion of the Spirits and Blood or lastly something else that accompanies the Commotion of the Soul It is very useful for the Knowledge of Truth to abridge Ideas and Expressions but that often causes some considerable Errour especially when those Ideas are abridg'd by popular Use For we ought never to abridge them but when we have made them very clear and distinct by a great Application of Mind and not as 't is ordinarily done as to Passions and sensible Things when we have made them familiar to us by their Sensations and the mere Action of the Imagination which easily imposes on the Mind There is a great difference betwixt the pure Ideas of the Mind and the Sensations or Commotions of the Soul Pure Ideas are clear and distinct but 't is a hard Task to make them familiar whereas Sensations and Commotions are intimate with us but can never plainly and distinctly be known Numbers Extension and their Properties may be clearly known but unless we make them sensible by some expressive Characters 't is very difficult to represent them to our Mind because whatever is abstracted moves us not On the contrary the Commotions and Sensations of the Soul may easily be represented to the Mind though the Knowledge we have of them be but confused and imperfect for all the Words that raise them lively strike the Soul and make it attentive Thence it proceeds that we often imagine we rightly understand some Discourses that are altogether incomprehensible and that reading some Descriptions of the Sensations and Passions of the Soul we persuade our selves that we perfectly comprehend them because they strongly move us and that all the Words that reverberate upon our Eyes agitate our Soul The hearing of the very Names of Shame Despair Impudence c. straightway excite in our Mind a confused Idea and obscure Sensation that powerfully influences us and because this Sensation is very familiar to us and presents it self without any Trouble or Endeavour of the Mind we fancy it to be clear and distinct These Words however are the Names of compounded Passions and by consequence abridg'd Expressions which popular Use has made up of many confused and obscure Ideas Seeing we are oblig'd to employ such Terms as common Use has approv'd of the Reader should not be surpriz'd to meet with Obscurity and sometimes with a sort of Contradiction in our Words And if it were but consider'd that the Sensations and Commotions of the Soul that answer to the Terms us'd in such Discourses are not wholly the same in all Men because of their different Dispositions of Mind they would not so easily condemn us when they could not enter into our Opinions This I say not so much to prevent Objections against my self as that we may understand the Nature of the Passions and what we are to think of Books treating of such Matters After so many Cautions I shall not stick to say that all the Passions may be referr'd to the three Primitive namely Desire Joy and Sorrow and that it is specially by the different Judgments the Soul makes of Goods and Evils that such as relate to the same Primitive Passion differ from each other For Instance I may say that Hope Fear and Irresolution that is the Mean betwixt them both are Species of Desire That Boldness Courage and Emulation c. have a greater Relation to Hope than to all others and that Timidity Cowardise Jealousie c. are Species of Fear I may say that Alacrity and Glory Kindness and Gratefulness are Species of Joy caused by the Sight of the Good that we know to be in us or in those to whom we are united as Derision or Jeering is a sort of Joy commonly arising at the Sight of the Evil that befalls those from whom we are separated Lastly That Distaste
there is any Thing useful and which may be certainly and exactly known but it may be found out by an Arithmetical and Algebraical Method So that those two Sciences are the Foundation of all others and help us to the true Means to acquire all those that are accurate because the Capacity of the Mind cannot be better managed than it is by Arithmetick and especially by Algebra THE SECOND PART OF THE SIXTH BOOK Concerning METHOD CHAP. I. Of the Rules that are to be observed in the Search after Truth HAving explain'd the means how to improve the Attention and Extension of the Mind by which alone it may acquire a greater perfection that is become more enlightned sagacious and piercing it is time to set down those Rules the Observation whereof is absolutely necessary to resolve any Question whatsoever I shall insist long upon it and endeavour to explain them by several Instances that their necessity may be better known and the Mind accustomed to make use of them it being not so difficult or necessary to know them theoretically as to put them in Practice Let none expect here very extraordinary surprizing and abstruse things For on the contrary that those Rules may be good they must be very simple natural and few very plain and intelligible and depending on each other in short such as may lead our Mind and rule our Attention without distracting either For Experience shews that the Logick of Aristotle is of no great use because it takes up the Mind too much and disturbs the Attention it ought to give to the Subjects of its Enquiry Let then those Lovers of Mysteries and rare Inventions lay aside for a while that capricious humour and consider as attentively as they can whether the Rules we shall prescribe are sufficient to preserve Evidence in the Preceptions of the Mind and to discover the most hidden Truths Unless they suffer themselves to be unjustly prejudiced against those Rules by the simplicity and easiness of the same I hope that the great use which may be made of them as we shall shew hereafter will convince them that the most clear and simple Principles are the most pregnant and fecund and that rare and difficult things are not always so useful as our fruitless Curiosity endeavours to persuade us The Principle of all those Rules is that we must always preserve Evidence in our Reasonings to discover Truth without Fear and danger of being mistaken From that Principle follows this general Rule that respects the Subject of our Studies We ought only to Reason upon such things whereof we have clear and distinct Ideas and by a necessary consequence we must still begin with the most simple and easie Subjects and insist long upon them before we undertake the Enquiry into such as are more composed and difficult The Rules that concern the Method to be taken in resolving Questions depend likewise on the same Principle and the first of those Rules is that we must very distinctly conceive the State of the Question proposed to be resolv'd that is have Ideas of the Terms so distinct as that we may compare them together and discover the Relations which we look for When those Relations cannot be found out by an immediate comparison of their Ideas then the second Rule is that we must try by an Essay of Thought to discover one or several intermediate Ideas that may be a means or common measure to discover the Relations that are betwixt those things A special care is to be taken that those Ideas be the more clear and distinct as the Relations we endeavour to discover are more nicely exact and numerous When the Questions are very difficult and require a long Examination the third Rule is that we must carefully take off from the Subject to be consider'd all things whose Examination is not needful to the Discovery of the Truth we are in quest of For the Capacity of the Mind must not be vainly shar'd and divided but its strength must only be employed in such things as may enlighten it so that all those things which are to be laid aside are such as concern not the Question and which when taken off leave it whole and entire When the Question is thus brought within the least compass the fourth Rule is to divide the Subject of our Meditations into Parts and consider them one after the other in a natural order beginning with the most simple or those that contain the least number of Relations and never medling with the more composed before the most simple are distinctly known and become familiar When they are become familiar by Meditation the fifth Rule is to abridge Ideas and dispose them in the Imagination or write them upon Paper that they may no longer clog and fill up the Capacity of the Mind Though that Rule be always useful yet 't is not of absolute necessity unless it be in very intricate Questions that require a great extent of Mind for the Mind is only enlarg'd by the abridgment of Ideas But the use of that Rule and the following is best known by Algebra The Ideas of all the things that necessarily require Examination being clear familiar abridg'd and disposed and ranged in good order in the Imagination or written upon Paper the sixth Rule is to compare them all by the Rules of Complications one with the other alternately either by the View of the Mind alone or by the Motion of the Imagination attended with the View of the Mind or by the Calculation of the Pen joined to the attention of the Mind and Imagination If amongst all the Relations that result from those Comparisons you find not that which you enquire after then take off again all the Relations that are not subservient to resolve the Question make the others familiar abridge them posture and dispose them in the Imagination or write them upon Paper compare them together by the Rules of Complications and then see whether the composed Relation that is look'd for is one of the composed Relations that result from those new Comparisons If none of those new discover'd Relations contain the Solution of the Question then take off again those that are useless make the other familiar c. That is doe the same over and over and continuing thus you shall discover the Truth or Relation you enquire after how composed soever it may be provided you can extend the Capacity of your Mind to it by abridging your Ideas and still in all your Operations having before your Eyes the Scope you aim at For 't is the continual and steady view of the Question which must regulate all the advances of the Mind since we should always know whither we are going We must above all take care not to satisfie our selves with some glimpse or likelyhood but begin anew so often the Comparisons that are conducible to discover the Truths enquired after as that we may not withold our Assent to it without feeling the secret Lashes
be true one needs only comprehend well what they say The falsely-learn'd are not pleased with this and obtain not the Admiration they pursue in using intelligible Principles for as soon as one understands their Notions he plainly perceives that they say nothing But when they make use of unknown Principles and speak of very complex'd Things as though they exactly knew all their Relations they are admired by their Hearers who understand not what they say because we are naturally inclin'd to reverence whatever goes above the reach of our Understanding Now as obscure and incomprehensible Things seem to hang better with each other than with such as are clear and intelligible so incomprehensible Principles are much more made use of in very difficult and abstruse Questions than such as are easie and intelligible There is nothing so difficult but by the means of these Principles Philosophers and Physicians will solve it in few Words for their Principles being yet more incomprehensible than any Questions that can be proposed them those Principles being taken for granted no Difficulty can afterwards put them to a Nonplus Thus for instance they boldly and without boggling make answer to these dark and undetermin'd Questions viz. Why the Sun attracts Vapours Why the Peruvian Bark stops the Quarâ—an Ague Why Rhubarb purges Choler and the Polychrest-Salt Phlegm and the like Most Men seem pretty well satisfied with their Answers because obscure and incomprehensible Things shake Hands together But unintelligible Principles suit not Questions that may be clearly and easily resolv'd because by that Solution it plainly appears that they are altogether insignificant The Philosophers cannot explain by their Principles How Horses draw a Coach Why Dust stops a Watch How the Trepoly-Stone cleanses Metals and a Brush our Clothes For they would appear ridiculous to all the World should they suppose a Motion of Attraction and Attractive Faculties to explain why the Coach follows the Horses and a Detersive Faculty in the Brush for cleansing of Clothes c. So that their great Principles are only serviceable in dark and intricate Questions by reason of their Incomprehensibility We ought not therefore to insist upon any Principle that appears not plain and evident and of which it may be supposed that some Nations reject it But we must attentively consider the Ideas we have of Extension Figure and Local Motion and the Relations they have between them If we conceive them distinctly and find them so plain and clear as to be persuaded they were ever generally received by all Nations we must dwell upon them and examine all their Relations But if they seem obscure and dark to us we must endeavour to find others For if to avoid the Fear of Mistakes and Errours it is always requisite to preserve Evidence in our Percepâ—ions it follows that we must argue only from clear Ideas and from Relations distinctly known To consider in order the Properties of Extension we must as Des Cartes did begin with the most simple Relations and thence proceed to the more composed not only because this Method is the most natural and bears up the Mind in its Operations but also because God ever acting with Order and by the most simple Ways that sort of Examination of our Ideas and their Relations will better manifest to us his Works And if we consider that the most simple Relations always offer themselves first to the Imagination when 't is not determin'd to think rather on one Thing than another it will appear that to find out that Order we prescribe and to discover very composed Truths it is sufficient to look attentively and without prejudice upon Objects provided always we skip not too hastily from one Subject to another When we look attentively upon Matter we easily conceive that one Part may be separated from another that is to say we easily conceive a Local Motion which Motion produces a Figure in each of the Bodies moved The most simple of all Motions which first occurs to the Imagination is a Motion in a Right Line Supposing then that some Part of Matter is moved in a Right Line it will necessarily displace some other Portion of Matter it shall find in its way which latter shall circularly move to take the Room which the former has left Hence comes a Circular Motion And if we conceive infinite Motions in a Right Line in an infinite number of similar Parts of that immense Extension we consider it will again necessarily follow that all these Bodies mutually hindring each other shall all conspire by their reciprocal Action and Re-action that is by the mutual Communication of all their particular Motions to produce one that is Circular That first Consideration of the most simple Relations of our Ideas already discovers to us the necessity of the Vortexes of Des Cartes that their Number will be so much greater as the Motions in a Right Line of all the Parts of the Extension having been more contrary to each other shall with more difficulty have been reduc'd to the same Motion and that amongst those Vortexes the greatest will be those in which most Parts shall have concurr'd together to the same Motion or whose Parts shall have had more Strength to continue their Motion in a Right Line In the mean while care must be taken not to dissipate nor weary our Mind by vainly applying it to the vast Number and unmeasurable Greatness of those Vortexes We must rather insist upon some one of them for some time and orderly and attentively enquire after all the Motions of the Matter it contains and all the Figures wherewith the Parts of that Matter may be endued As there is no simple Motion but that in a Right Line we must first consider it as that in which all Bodies cotinually tend to move themselves since God always acts by the most simple Ways And if Bodies move Circularly 't is only because meeting with constant Oppositions they are perpetually turn'd from their direct Motion So that all Bodies being not of an equal Bulk and the biggest having more Strength than others to continue their Motion in a Right Line we easily conceive that the smallest Bodies must sink to the Centre of the Vortex and the biggest rise towards the Circumference since the Lines which moving Bodies are suppos'd to describe at the Circumference of a Circle are nearer to a Right Line than those which they describe towards the Centre If we conceive again that every Part of that Matter could not at first move and meet with a perpetual Opposition to its Motion without being smooth'd and rounded and having its Angles broken off we shall discover that all that Extension will be compos'd of two sorts of Bodies viz. of round Globules which perpetually turn upon their own Centre and that in several different Ways and besides that particular Motion are carried about by the Motion common to all the Vortex and of a very fluid and agitated Matter produced from the
Existence by the continual Sensations which God produces in us and which we cannot correct by Reason without offending Faith though we can correct by Reason the Sensations that represent them as endu'd with some Qualities and Perfections that are not in them So that we ought not to believe that they are such as we see or imagine them but only that they exist and that they are such as we conceive them by Reason But that we may proceed orderly we must not yet examine whether we have a Body whether there are others about us or whether we have only bare Sensations of Things which exist not Those Questions include too great Difficulties and are not perhaps so necessary as may be imagin'd to perfect our Mind and to have an accurate Knowledge of Natural and Moral Philosophy and some other Sciences We have within us the Ideas of Numbers and Extension whose Existence is undeniable and their Nature immutable and which would eternally supply us with Objects to think on if we desire to know all their Relations It is necessary to begin to make use of our Minds upon those Ideas for some Reasons which it will not be amiss to explain whereof the principal are Three The First is That those Ideas are the most clear and evident of all For if to avoid Errour we must still keep to Evidence in our Reasonings 't is plain that we must rather argue from the Ideas of Numbers and Extension than from the confus'd or compos'd Ideas of Physicks Morals Mechanicks Chymistry and other Sciences Secondly Those Ideas are the most distinct and exact of all especially those of Numbers So that the Habit which proceeds from the Exercise of Arithmetick and Geometry of not being content till we precisely know the Relations of Things endues the Mind with such an Exactness of Thought as is not to be found in those that are satisfied with the Probabilities so obvious to be met with in other Sciences The Third and chief Reason is That those Ideas are the immutable Rules and common Measure of all the Objects of our Knowledge For those that perfectly know the Relations of Numbers and Figures or rather the Art of making such Comparisons as are requisite to know them have a kind of Universal Knowledge and a very sure Means evidently and certainly to discover whatever goes not beyond the ordinary Limits of the Mind But those that are not skilful in this Art cannot with Certainty discover such Truths as are somewhat intricate though they have very clear Ideas of Things and endeavour to know their Compound Relations These or the like Reasons mov'd some of the Antients to apply their Youth to the Study of Arithmetick Algebra and Geometry Undoubtedly they well knew that Arithmetick and Algebra endue the Mind with such an Insight and Penetration as was not to be gotten by other Studies and that Geometry manages the Imagination so well as that it is not easily puzzl'd or confounded for that Faculty of the Soul so necessary to Sciences acquires by the Use of Geometry such an universal Nicety as promotes and preserves the clear View of the Mind even in the most intricate Difficulties And therefore he that desires always to preserve Evidence in his Perceptions and discover naked Truâ—hs without Mixture of Darkness and Errour must begin with the Study of Arithmetick Algebra and Geometry after he has obtain'd some Knowledge at least of himself and the Sovereign Being As for Books that make the Way to those Sciences easie I may refer to the Meditations of des Cartes as to the Knowledge of God and our selves to the Elements of Mathematicks newly printed as to Arithmetick and Algebra to the New Elements of Geometry printed in 1667 or to the Elements of Father Taquet Jesuit printed at Antwerp in 1665 as to ordinary Geometry and as to Conick Sections and the Solution of Geometrical Problemes to the Treatises of Monsieur de la Hire intituled Of Conick Sections Of Geometrical Places and Of the Construction of Equations to which may be added the Geometry of des Cartes I would not have advis'd to the Elements of Mathematicks as to Arithmetick and Algebra if I knew any Author who had clearly demonstrated those Sciences but Truth obliges me to a thing for which I may be blam'd by some People for Algebra and Analyticks being altogether requisite for the Discovery of compos'd Truths I must needs shew my Esteem for a Book which carries those Sciences very far and which in the Opinion of many Learned explains them more clearly than they had been hitherto By the careful Study of those general Sciences we shall evidently know a great Number of Truths very serviceable in all accurate and particular Sciences We may afterwards study Natural and Moral Philosophy as being very useful though noâ— very fit to make the Mind nice and quick-sighted And if we desire to preserve Evidence in all our Perceptions we must take a special Care not to be opinionated of any Principle that is not evident and to which the Chinese for instance would not be suppos'd to dissent after having throughly weigh'd and consider'd it And therefore we must only admit in Physicks those Notions which are common to all Men such as Axioms of Geometry and the clear Ideas of Extension Figure Motion Rest and others of that nature if there be any Perhaps it will be said that Extension is not the Essence of Matter But what is that to the purpose 'T is sufficient that the World which we conceive to consist of Extension appears like to that we see though it be not made of such a Matter which is good for nothing and altogether unknown whilst so much Noise is made about it It is not absolutely necessary to examine whether there are actually External Beings corresponding to those Ideas for we argue not from those Beings but from their Ideas We must only take care that our Reasonings which we make upon the Properties of Things agree with our inward Consciousness that is that our Thoughts perfectly agree with Experience because in Physicks we endeavour to discover the Order and Connexion of Effects with their Causes either in Bodies if they exist or in the Sense we have of them if they are not in being I say not however that we can doubt whether Bodies are actually existing when we consider that God is not a Deceiver and that the Order he has constituted in our Sentiments of Things both as to natural Occurrences and such as are wrought to create our Belief of what Reason is at a Loss to comprehend is very regular But I observe this because 't is not necessary to insist at first very long upon a thing which no body doubts of and is not extremely conducible to the Knowledge of Physicks consider'd as a true Science Neither must we puzzle our Heads with enquiring whether there are in the Bodies about us some other Qualities besides those of which we have clear
as we that he needed but open his Eyes to see Bodies and to draw near and handle them to be satisfied whether his Eyes abused him in their Reports He well enough knew the Mind of Man to judge that such like Proofs had been acceptable and welcome But he did not seek for sensible Probabilities nor vain and popular Applauses preferring despis'd Truth before the Glory of an unmerited Reputation and chusing rather to render himself ridiculous to little Souls by Doubts thought by them extravagant than to assert what he thought not certain and undeniable But though M. des Cartes has given the strongest Arguments that bare Reason could furnish out for the Existence of Bodies though it be evident that God is no Deceiver and it may be said he would really deceive us did we deceive our selves whilst we made a due use of our Mind and the other Faculties whereof he is the Author yet it may be affirmed that the Existence of Matter is not yet perfectly demonstrated For in fine in point of Philosophy we are to believe nothing till the Evidence of it obliges us but to make use of our Liberty as much as we can giving no greater Extent to our Judgments than our Perceptions Wherefore when we see Bodies we should judge only that we see them and that these visible or intelligible Bodies actually exist But why must we judge positively there is a Material World without us like the Intelligible World we perceive But say you we see these Bodies without us and likewise very remote from that we animate We may then judge they are without us and yet our Judgments reach no farther than our Perceptions But what Don't we see Light without us and in the Sun though it be not in it But be it so Bodies that we see without us are really without us for indeed it is not to be deny'd But is it not evident that there are Outnesses and Remotenesses and intelligible Spaces in the intelligible World which is the immediate Object of our Mind The material Body which we animate observe it well is not the same we see when we behold it I mean when we turn our corporeal Eyes upon it but an intelligible Body and there are intelligible Spaces between this intelligible Body and the intelligible Sun we see as there are material Spaces between our Body and the Sun which we behold Certainly God ordain'd Spaces between Bodies which he created but he neither sees these Bodies nor these Spaces by themselves he can only see them by Bodies and Spaces intellectual God derives no Knowledge but from himself he sees not the material World save in the intelligible World which he comprehends and in the Knowledge he has of his own Will which gives actually Existence and Motion to all things Therefore there are intelligible Spaces between the intelligible Bodies which we immediately see as there are material Spaces between Bodies which our Eyes behold Now it ought to be observ'd that as there is none but God who knows his Will by himself which produces all Beings it is impossible to know from any other whether there be actually without us â— material World like that we see because the material World is neither Visible nor Intelligible of it self Therefore to be fully convinc'd of the Existence of Bodies it is not only necessary to demonstrate there is a God and that he is no Deceiver but also that this God has assur'd us there is such a World actually created Which thing I find wanting in M des Cartes's Works God speaks to the Mind and obliges it to assent but two several ways By Evidence and Faith I acknowledge that Faith obliges us to believe the Existence of Bodies But as to Evidence methinks it wants something to be perfect and that we are not invincibly carry'd to believe there is any thing Existing besides God and our own Mind 'T is true we have an extream propension to believe there are such things as circumambient Bodies So far I agree with M. des Cartes But this Propension however natural does not evidently force us but only perswasively induce us by the impression But we ought only to form our Free Judgments as Light and Evidence oblige us for if we leave our selves to the guidance of sensible Impressions we shall seldom or ever be unmistaken For how comes it that we erre in the Judgments we make about sensible Qualities about the Magnitude Figure and Motion of Bodies but from our following an Impression like that which induces us to believe the Existence of Bodies Do not we sensibly perceive the Fire to be hot Snow to be white and the Sun to be all glorious with a radiating Light Do not we see that sensible Qualities no less than Bodies are without us And yet 't is certain that the former which we see without us are not really so or if you had rather there is no certainty about it What Reason then have we to judge that besides intelligible Bodies which we see there are others that we behold Or what Evidence can a Man have that an Impression not only delusive in respect of sensible Qualities but also in regard to the Magnitude Figure and Motion of Bodies should not be as treacherous in respect to the actual Existence of the Bodies themselves I ask what Evidence can a Man have For as to Probabilities I grant they are not wanting I know very well there 's this Difference between sensible Qualities and Bodies that Reason much easier corrects the Impression or natural Judgments which relate to sensible Qualities than those which concern the Existence of Bodies and likewise that all the corrections made by Reason with reference to sensible Qualities perfectly comport with Religion and Christian Morality and that we cannot deny the Existence of Bodies through a Principle of Religion 'T is easie to conceive that Pleasure and Pain Heat and even Colours are not Modes of corporeal Existence that sensible Qualities in general are not contain'd in the Idea we have of Matter In a Word that our Senses do not represent sensible Objects as they are in their own nature but as they are with reference to the preservation of our Health and Life which is conformable not only to Reason but much more to Religion and Christian Morality as has been evidenc'd in several places of this Treatise But 't is not so easie to be positively ascertain'd of the Non-existence of External Bodies as it is to be positively convinc'd that Pain and Heat are not in the Bodies which seem to cause them in us 'T is most certain at least that there 's a possibility of outward Bodies We have no Argument to prove there are none and we have a very strong inclination to believe there are and therefore we have more reason to conclude for the Existence than the Non-existence of them and consequently it seems that we ought to believe they are For we are naturally inclin'd to follow
on Order and Eternal Laws and Truths we do not naturally enquire the Cause for they have none We do not clearly see the necessity of this Decree nor do we think immediately upon it On the contrary we perceive evidently by a simple view that the nature of numbers and intelligible Ideas is immutable necessary and independent We see clearly that it is absolutely necessary for 2 times 4 to be 8 and that the square of the Diagonal of a square is double to that square If we doubt of the absolute necessity of these Truths 't is because we turn our back upon their Light reason upon a false Principle and search for their nature their Immutability and independance out of themselves Thus the Decree for the Immutability of these Truths is a fiction of the mind which supposing it sees not what it sees in the Wisdom of God and knowing him to be the cause of all things thinks it self oblig'd to imagine a Decree to ascertain immutability to these Truths which it cannot choose but acknowledge to be immutable But this Supposition is false and we ought to beware of it 'T is only in the Wisdom of God that we see Eternal immutable and necessary Truths nor can we see any where else the Order which God himself is oblig'd to follow as I have said before The mind is made for that Wisdom and in one sence it can see nothing else For if it can see the Creatures 't is because He whom it sees though in a very imperfect manner during this life comprehends them all in the immensity of his Being in an intelligible manner and proportionate to the mind as I have shown in another place If we had not in our selves the Idea of Infinite and if we saw not all things by the natural union of our mind with universal and infinite Reason it seems evident that we could not have liberty to think on all things For the mind cannot desire to consider things except it has some Idea of them and it is not in its Power to think actually on any thing but what it may desire to think on And so we shall cashier Man of his Liberty of thinking on All if we separate his mind from him who comprehends all Again since we can love nothing but what we see if God should only give us particular Ideas it is manifest he would so determine all the Motions of our Will that it would be necessary for us to Love only particular Beings For in brief if we had not the Idea of infinite we could not love it and if those who positively affirm they have no Idea of God speak as they think I scruple not to affirm they have never lov'd God for nothing seems certainer to me than that nothing can be the Object of our Love which is not of our conception Lastly If Order and Eternal Laws were not immutable by the necessity of their nature the clearest and strongest proofs of Religion would I question not be destroy'd in their Principle as well as Liberty and the most certain Sciences For it is evident that the Christian Religion which proposes JESUS CHRIST as a Mediator and Restorer supposes the Corruption of nature by original Sin But what proof can we have of this Corruption The flesh wars you will say against the Spirit has brought it into subjection and tyrannizes over it This I grant But this says a Libertine is no Disorder This is as it pleas'd God who ordain'd it so who is the Master of his own decrees and who constitutes what Order he thinks fit amongst his Creatures How shall it be prov'd that 't is a Disorder for Minds to be subjected to Bodies unless we have a clear Idea of Order and necessity and know that God himself is oblig'd to follow it by a necessary Love which he bears to himself But farther supposing that Order depends on a free Decree of God we must still have recourse to him to be inform'd of it God must nevertheless be consulted notwithstanding the aversion which some of the Learned have to apply to him and this truth must still be granted that we have need of God to be instructed But that suppos'd free Decree which is the cause of Order is a meer fiction of mind for the Reasons I have given If it be not a necessary Order that Man should be made for his Author and that his will should be conformable to Order or to the essential and necessary will of God If it be not true that Actions are good or ill because agreeable or repugnant to an immutable and necessary Order and that this same order requires that the Good should be rewarded and the Evil punish'd Last of all if all Men have not naturally a clear Idea of Order even of such an one as God himself cannot will the contrary to what it prescribes since God cannot will Disorder certainly I can see nothing but Universal Confusion For what is there to be blam'd in the most infamous and unjust actions of the Heathens to whom God has given no Laws What will be the reason that will dare to judge them if there be no supream reason that condemns them There is a Poet who says 't is impossible to distinguish Justice from Injustice and a Philosopher that will have it an infirmity to blush or be asham'd for infamous actions These and the like Paradoxes are often asserted in the heat of Imagination and in the transport of the Passions But how can we condemn these Opinions if there be not an Universal and Necessary Order Rule or Reason which is also present to those who can retire into themselves We fear not on several occasions to judge others and also our selves but by what Authority should we do it if the inward Reason that judges when we seem to pronounce Sentence against others and our selves be not supream and common to all men But if this Reason were not present to those who retreat into their own Breast and if the Heathens too had not naturally some union with the order we speak of upon the score of what Sin or Disobedience could they be reckon'd culpable and by what Justice could God punish them This I say upon a Prophet's teaching me that God is willing to make Men the Arbiters betwixt him and his People provided they determine by the immutable and necessary order of Justice Nero kill'd his Mother it is true But in what has he done amiss He follow'd the natural Motion of his Hatred God gave him no Precept to the contrary the Laws of the Jews were not made for him You 'll say perhaps that such actions are restrain'd by the Natural Law and that was known to him But what proof can you have of it For my own part I agree to it because indeed this is an irresistible Proof for an Immutable and Necessary Order and for the Knowledge which every Mind has of it and that so much more clear
as it is more united to Universal Reason and less sensible to the impression of the Senses and Passions In a word as it is more reasonable But 't is requisite that I explain as clearly as possibly I can the sense I have about Natural or Divine Order and Law For the difficulty that is found to embrace my Opinion proceeds it may be from the want of a distinct conception of my meaning 'T is certain that God comprehends in himself after an intelligible manner the Perfections of all the Beings he has created or can create and that by these intelligible Perfections he knows the Essence of all things as by his own Wills he knows their Existence Which perfections are likewise the immediate Object of the Mind of Man for the Reasons I have given Therefore the intelligible Ideas or the Perfections which are in God which represent to us what is external to him are absolutely necessary and immutable But Truths are nothing but relations of Equality or Inequality that are found between these Intelligible Beings since it is only true that 2 times 2 are 4 or that 2 times 2 are not 5 because there is a Relation of Equality between 2 times 2 and 4 and of Inequality between 2 times 2 and 5. Therefore Truths are as immutable and necessary as Ideas It has ever been a truth that 2 times 2 are 4 and 't is impossible it should ever be false which is visible without any Necessity that God as supream Legislator should have establish'd these Truths so as is said by M. des Cartes in his Answer to the six Objections We easily comprehend then what is Truth but Men find some difficulty to conceive what is this immutable and necessary Order what is this Natural and Divine Law which God necessarily wills and which the Righteous likewise will For a Man's Righteousness consists in his Loving Order and in his conforming his Will in all things to it as that which makes a Sinner in his disliking Order in some things and willing that it should conform to his Desires Yet methinks these things are not so mysterious as is imagin'd and I am perswaded all the difficulty that is found in them proceeds from the trouble the mind is at to aspire to abstract and Metaphysical Thoughts Here then is in part what are my Thoughts of Order 'T is evident that the perfections which are in God representative of created or possible Beings are not all Equal That those for Example which represent Bodies are less noble than others that represent Spirits and that even in those which represent only Bodies or Spirits there are degrees of perfection greater and lesser ad infinitum This is clearly and easily conceiv'd though it be hard to reconcile the simplicity of the Divine Essence with that variety of Intelligible Ideas included in his Wisdom For 't is evident that if all the Ideas of God were equal he could see no difference between his Works since he cannot see his Creatures save in that which is in himself representing them And if the Idea of a Watch which shows the Hour with all the different Motions of the Planets were no perfecter than that of another which only points to the hour or than that of a Circle and a Square a Watch would be no perfecter than a Circle For we can judge of the Perfection of Works only by the Perfection of the Ideas we have of them and if there was no more understanding or sign of Wisdom in a Watch than a Circle it would be as easie to conceive the most complicated Machines as a Square or a Circle If then it be true that God is the Vniversal Being who includes in Himself all Beings in an intelligible manner and that all these intelligible Beings which have in God a necessary Existence are not equally perfect 't is evident there will be between them an Immutable and Necessary Order and that as there are Eternal and necessary Truths because there are Relations of Magnitude between intelligible Beings there must likewise be an immutable and necessary Order by reason of the Relations of Perfection that are between these Beings 'T is therefore an Immutable Order that Spirits should be nobler than Bodies as it is a necessary Truth that 2 times 2 should be 4 or that 2 times 2 should not be 5. But hitherto immutable Order seems rather a Speculative Truth than a necessary Law For if Order be consider'd but as we have just now done we see for Example that it is True that Minds are more noble than Bodies but we do not see that this Truth is at the same time an Order which has the force of a Law and that there is an Obligation of preferring Minds before Bodies It must then be consider'd that God loves himself by a necessary Love and therefore has a greater degree of love for that which in him represents or includes a greater degree of perfection than for that which includes a less So that if we will suppose an Intelligible Mind to be a thousand times perfecter than an Intelligible Body the love wherewith God loves Himself must necessarily be a thousand times greater for the former than for the latter For the Love of God is necessarily proportion'd to the Order which is between the intelligible Beings that he includes Insomuch that the Order which is purely Speculative has the force of a Law in respect of God himself supposing as is certain that God loves himself Necessarily And God cannot love Intelligible Bodies more than Intelligible Minds though he may love created Bodies better than created Minds as I shall show by and by Now that immutable Order which has the force of a Law in regard of God himself has visibly the force of a Law in reference to us For this Order we know and our natural love comports with it when we retire into our selves and our Senses and Passions leave us to our Liberty In a word when our Self-love does not corrupt our Natural Being we are made for God and that 't is impossible for us to be quite separate from him we discern in him this Order and we are naturally invited to love it For 't is His Light which enlightens us and his Love which animates us though our Senses and Passions obscure this Light and determine against Order the Impression we receive to love according to it But in spite of Concupiscence which conceals this Order and hinders us from following it it is still an essential and indispensable Law to us and not only to us but to all created Intilligences and even to the Damn'd For I do not believe they are so utterly estrang'd from God as not to have a faint Idea of Order as not to find still some beauty in it and even to be ready to conform to it in some particular Instances which are not prejudicial to Self-Love Corruption of Heart consists in Opposition to Order Therefore Malice or Corruption of
Will being not equal even among the Damn'd it is plain they are not all equally opposite to Order and that they do not hate it in all cases unless in consequence of their Hatred to God For as no one can hate Good consider'd barely as such so no one can hate Order but when it seems to thwart his Inclinations But though it seem contrary to our Inclinations it nevertheless retains the force of a Law which Condemns and also punishes us by a Worm that never dies Now then we see what Order is and how it has the strength of a Law by that necessary Love which God has for himself We conceive how this Law comes to be general for all Minds God not excepted and why it is necessary and absolutely indispensible Lastly we conceive or we may easily conceive in general that it is the Principle of all Divine and Humane Laws and that 't is according to this Law that all Intelligences are judg'd and all Creatures dispos'd in the respective rank that belongs to them I acknowledge it is not easie to explain all this in particular and I venture not to undertake it For should I go to show the Connexion particular Laws have with the general and account for the agreement which certain manners of acting have to Order I should be forc'd to engage in Difficulties that it may be I could not resolve and which would lead me out of sight of my subject Nevertheless if it be consider'd that God neither has nor can have any other Law than his own Wisdom and the necessary Love he has for it we shall easily judge that all Divine Laws must depend on it And if it be observ'd that he has made the World with reference only to that Wisdom and Love since he acts only for Himself we shall not doubt but all natural Laws must tend to the Preservation and Perfection of this World according to indispensable Order and by their dependance on necessary Love For the Wisdom and Will of God regulates all things There is no need I should explain at present this Principle more at large what I have already said being sufficient to infer this Consequence That in the first institution of Nature it was Impossible for Minds to be subjected to Bodies For since God cannot act without Knowledge and against his Will he has made the World by his Wisdom and by the motion of his Love He has made all things by his Son and in his Holy Spirit as we are taught in Scripture Now in the Wisdom of God Minds are perfecter than Bodies and by the necessary Love God has for himself he prefers what is more perfect to what is less so Therefore it is not possible that Minds should be subject to Bodies in the first institution of Nature Otherwise it must be said that God in creating the World has not follow'd the Rules of his Eternal Wisdom nor the Motions of his natural and necessary Love which not only is inconceivable but involves a manifest contradiction True it is that at present the created Mind is debas'd below a material and sensible Body but that 's because Order considered as a necessary Law will have it so 'T is because God loving himself by a necessary Love which is always his Inviolable Law cannot love Spirits that are repugnant to him nor consequently prefer them to Bodies in which there is nothing evil nor in the hatred of God For God loves not Sinners in themselves Nor would they subsist in the Universe but through JESUS CHRIST God neither preserves them nor loves them but that they may cease to be Sinners through the Grace of CHRIST JESUS or that if they remain eternally Sinners they may be eternally condemned by immutable and necessary Order and by the Judgment of our LORD by vertue of whom they subsist for the Glory of the Divine Justice for without Him they would be annihilated This I say by the way to clear some difficulties that might remain touching what I said elsewhere about Original Sin or the general Corruption of Nature 'T is if I mistake not a very useful reflection to consider that the Mind has but two ways of knowing Objects By Light and by Sensation It sees them by Light when it has a clear Idea of them and when by consulting that Idea it can discover all the properties whereof they are capable It sees things by Sensation when it finds not in it self their clear Idea to consult it and so cannot clearly discover their properties but only know them by a confus'd Sensation without Light and Evidence 'T is by Light and a clear Idea the mind sees the Essences of things Numbers and Extension 'T is by a confus'd Idea or Sensation that it judges of the Existence of Creatures and knows its own What the Mind perceives by Light or by a clear Idea it perceives in a most perfect manner moreover it sees clearly that all the Obscurity or Imperfection of its Knowledge proceeds from its own Weakness and Limitation or from want of Application and not from the Imperfection of the Idea it perceives But what the mind perceives by Sensation is never clearly known not for want of any Application on part of the Mind for we always are very applicative to what we feel but by the defectiveness of the Idea which is extreamly obscure and confus'd Hence we may conclude that it is in God or in an immutable nature that we see all that we know by Light or a clear Idea not only because we discover by Light only numbers Extension and the Essences of Beings which depend not on a free Act of God as I have already said but also because we know these things in a very perfect manner and we should even know them in an infinitely perfect manner if our thinking Capacity were infinite since nothing is wanting to the Idea that represents them We ought likewise to conclude that we see in our selves whatever we know by Sensation However this is not as if we could produce in our selves any new modification or that the sensations or modifications of our Soul could represent the Objects on occasion whereof God excites them in us But only that our Sensations which are not distinguished from our selves and consequently cannot represent any thing distinct from us may nevertheless represent the existence of Beings or cause us to judge that they exist For God raising Sensations in us upon the presence of Objects by an action that has nothing sensible we fancy we receive from the Object not only the Idea which represents its essence but also the Sensation which makes us judge of its existence For there is always a pure Idea and a confused Sensation in the Knowledge we have of things as actually existing if we except that of God and of our own Soul I except the Existence of God For this we know by a pure Idea and without Sensation since it depends not on any cause and
giving him relief For on these occasions he sometimes does a great deal who does no mischief I conclude then that we must have recourse to Physicians and refuse not to obey them if we would preserve our Life For though they cannot be assur'd of restoring our Health yet sometimes they may contribute much for it by reason of the continual Experiments they make upon different Diseases They know indeed very little with any exactness yet still they know much more than our selves and provided they will give themselves the trouble of studying our constitution of carefully observing all the Symptoms of the Disease and diligently attending to our own inward Feeling we may hope from them all the Assistances that we may reasonably expect from Men. What we have said of Physicians may in a manner be apply'd to Casuists whom 'tis absolutely necessary to consult on some occasions and commonly useful But it sometimes happens not only to be most useless but highly dangerous to advise with them which I explain and prove 'T is commonly said that humane Reason is subject to Error but herein there is an equivocal sence which we are not sufficiently aware of For it must not be imagin'd that the Reason which Man consults is corrupted or that it ever misleads when faithfully consulted I have said it and I say it again that none but the Soveraign Reason makes us Rational None but the Supream Truth enlightens us nor any but God that speaks clearly and knows how to instruct us We have but one True Master even JESUS CHRIST Our LORD Eternal WISDOM the WORD of the Father in whom are all the Treasures of Wisdom and the Knowledge of God And 't is Blasphemy to say this Vniversal Reason whereof all Men participate and by which alone they are reasonable is subject to Error and capable of deceiving us 'T is not Man's Reason but his Heart that betrays him 'T is not his Light but his Darkness that hinders him from seeing 'T is not the Union he has with God which seduces him noâ— in one sence his Union with the Body But 't is the dependance he has on his Body or rather 't is because he will deceive himself and enjoy the Pleasure of Judging before he has been at the Pains of Examining 't is because he will rest before he arrives to the place of the Rest of Truth I have more exactly explain'd the cause of our Errors in many places of the preceding Book and I here suppose what I there have said Which being laid down I affirm it is needless to consult Casuists when it is certain that Truth speaks to us which we are sure it does when Evidence displays it self in the Answers that are made to our Enquiries that is to the attention of our Mind Therefore when we retire into our own Breast and in the silence of our Senses and Passions hear a Voice so clear and intelligible that we cannot be doubtful of the Truth of it we must submit to it let the World think of us what they please We must have no regard to custom nor listen to our secret Inclinations nor defer too much to the resolves of those who go for the Learned part of Men. We must not give way to be misguided by the false shew of a pretended Piety nor be humbled by the oppositions of those who know not the Soul which animates them But we must bear patiently their proud Insults without condemning their Intentions or despising their Persons We must with simplicity of heart rejoice in the Light of Truth which illuminates us and though its Answers condemn us yet ought we to prefer them before all the subtil Distinctions the Imagination invents for the justification of the Passions Every Man for Example that can enter into himself and still the confus'd noise of the Senses and Passions clearly discovers that every motion of Love which is given us by God must Center upon him and that God himself cannot dispense with the Obligation we have to Love him in all things 'T is evident that God cannot supersede acting for Himself cannot create or preserve our Will to will any thing besides him or to will any thing but what he Wills Himself For I cannot see how it is conceivable that God can Will a Creature should have more Love for what is less lovely or should Love Soveraignly as its end what is not Supreamly amiable I know well that Men who interrogate their Passions instead of consulting Order may easily imagine that God has no other Rule of his Will than his will it self and that if God observes Order 't is meerly â—ecause he will'd it and has made this same Order by a Will absolutely Free and Indifferent There are those who think there is no Order immutable and necessary by its Nature And and that the Order or Wisdom of God whereby he has made all things though the first of Creatures is yet it self a Creature made by a Free-Will of God and not begotten of his Substance by the necessity of his Essence But this Opinion which shakes all the Foundations of Morality by robbing Order and the Eternal Laws depending on it of their Immutability and overturns the entire Edifice of the Christian Religion by divesting JESUS CHRIST or the WORD of God of his Divinity does not yet so perfectly benight the Mind as to hide from it this Truth That God Wills Order Thus whether the Will of God Makes Order or Supposes it we clearly see when we retire into our selves that the God we Worship cannot do what plainly appears to us to be contrary to Order So that Order Willing that our Time or the Duration of our Being should be for him that preserves us that the Motion of our Heart should continually tend towards him who continually impresses it in us that all the Powers of our Souls should labour only for him by vertue of whom they act God cannot dispense with the Commandment he gave by Moses in the Law and repeated by his Son in the Gospel Thou shalt Love the Lord thy God with all thy Heart and with all thy Soul and with all thy Mind and with all thy Strength But because Order requires that every Righteous Person should be happy and every Sinner miserable and that every Action conformable to Order and every Motion of Love to God should be rewarded and every other contrary to Order or that tends not to him punish'd It is evident that whoever will be happy must constantly tend towards God and reject with abhorrence whatever stops or retards him in his course or Weakens his propension to the true good And for this he need not consult any Casuists For when God speaks 't is fit that Men should be silent And when we are absolutely certain that our Senses and Passions have no Voice in those resolves we hear in our most Secret and inward Reason we ought always respectfully to attend and submit to them Would we be