Truths to consist in the Agreement of those Empty Similitudes till at length as Fancy let loose to fly at its full Random and driven forward with a quick Wit does naturally and genuinly lead they had introduced a kind of Fanaticism into Philosophy built in the main or in great part on a pretended Inward Light by means of those Imaginary and Visionary Ideas From this Introversion upon these unsolid Aiery Bubbles and thence their neglecting the Things themselves and our Solid Natural Notions Mr. Locke was brought to Confound Corporeal and Spiritual Natures and consequently these two being the Adequate Object of all Philosophy all Philosophical Knowledge was rendred impossible And Cartesius left us no means to know whether Man is One Thing made up of Soul and Body or Two Things tack'd together by virtue of some Accident which well consisted with their Substantial Distinction Hence also it came that GOD was brought in at every Hard Pinch to act contrary to what the Natures of Things requir'd without which they could not lay their Principles or make their Scheme cohere that is they would needs make GOD as he is the Author and Orderer of Nature to work either Preternaturally or else Supernaturally which is a plain Contradiction Nay Mr. Locke finding no Fancy in his Imaginative Power that suits with our Notion of Thing would perswade the World that no Man living knows what a Thing or Substance is that is that none knows what the Word Thing means which is so Evident to our Natural Thoughts that it is impossible for the rudest Person in the World to be Ignorant of it In a Word their Fancy so inveigled their Reason that they came to deny Self-evident Truths and held many other Propositions which were absolutely Impossible and Contradictory Wherefore seeing Philosophy reduced to this lamentable Condition and that Solid Rationality and all Truth in Natural Objects were thus in imminent Danger to be over-run and born down by Imaginary Conceits and apprehending that GOD's Providence had fitted and enabled me to redress such great Mischiefs I thought it became me to re-instate Reason in her Soveraignty over Fancy and to assert to her the Rightful Dominion Nature had given her over all our Judgments and Discourses I resolved therefore to disintricate Truth which lay too deep for Superficial Fancy to fathom from all those Labyrinths of Errour I observ'd that Philosophy labour'd and languish'd under many Complicated Distempers all springing from this way of Ideas and that they were grown Epidemical nor could they be cur'd by the Application of Remedies to this or that Particular Part or by confuting this or that Particular Errour Hereupon having found out the true Cause of all these Maladies of Human Understanding I saw it was necessary to Stub up by the Roots that Way it self and by Closâ— and Solid Reasons the most Decisive Weapons in Truâ—â—â— Armory to break in Pieces the brittle Glassy Essences of those Fantastick Apparitions which if a Right Way of Reasoning be settled and understood will disappear and vanish out of the World as their Elder Sisters the Fairies have done in this last Half Century I know my Lord Reformation made by a Single Man tho' but in Philosophy seldom gains Credit to him who attempts it And it must be confess'd that to pretend to reform where there is no Necessity has an Ill Name and is justly held to spring from Policy Interest Pride or some such other Sinister Motive But I am very confident that whoever peruses this Treatise nay but even the Preface will see that the Occasion of this Undertaking was not only Expedient but Cogent Nor can any Man justly tax him of Arrogance or of Usurping a Dictature over other Men's Judgments tho' he opposes Great Multitudes of Speculaters who offers his Reasons to convince theirs To this Necessity now laid open of Reforming Philosophy I shall add another of a much more weighty Concern and which may also rectifie some zealons well-meaning Friends who judging of Things by their own Short Reach think that the Advancing Truth in Philosophy is little better than Time and Labour lost whereas I on the Contrary do really think that the Supplying what the World most wants is the Greatest and most Universal Good I can possibly do This other Necessity then of my rectifying our Modern Philosophy which will make others see how great a Good it is is this Those Truths which are of a higher and more Sacred Nature can never be rightly Explicated nor consequently such Men not valuing Authority be duly recommended to those who Dissent from them unless True Principles of Philosophy be Settled and Unsound ones Confuted For since no Explication of Faith can be made by Faith it self all of them must necessarily be made by our Reason shewing the Conformity they have to our Natural Notions or to such Knowledges as we had from the Things in Nature especially since Dissenters draw their Chief Objections from the Repugnancy of those Points to our Natural Principles 'T is a known Truth that as every Definition must be the Self-same Notion with what is defin'd so must every right Explication too it being in reality nothing but the Unfolding what was before wrapt up Closer Whence follows that when he who has the ill Luck to have taken up False Principles comes to explicate the Trinity the Incarnation the Resurrection or any High Point of Reveal'd Faith his Explication must always be Contrary to True Principles of Nature and perhaps may have twenty real Contradictions in it and so Common Reason as was said telling all Sensible Men that the Explication must be the same Sense with the Point which it Explicates the Tenet of Faith will suffer in the Opinion of Witty Men by such an Untoward and Senseless Explication be Ridiculous to Adversaries and be held perfect Nonsense and Contradiction Whereas if the Philosophy by which those Tenets are Explicated be True and Solid then since both Natural and Reveal'd Truths are Children of the same Father the GOD and Author of All Truth who cannot contradict Himself and therefore those two Sorts of Truths cannot but agree it will follow that the Explication of all Reveal'd Points made according to True Philosophy must needs appear to Intelligent Men to be most Rational and most Consonant and not Contradictory to True Natural Principles Which will Comfort Faith in those who believe already Recommend it to all Ingenuous and Indifferent Seekers help to Convert to Christianity those whose Reason was formerly Dissatisfy'd upon such Sinister Misconceits and Lastly Confound Adversaries by putting them past Opposing it by any Principles of True Philosophy and leave nothing for them to object against it but Idle and Ill-grounded Fancies whose weak Attempts are easily defeated Whence I could heartily wish that were True Philosophy in Fashion all Sects so the State thought fit might have Free Liberty to Print the best Reasons they can muster up against Christianity Resting confident
Sensation our own Existence as well as that of any other Body whatever I doubt not but Mr. Locke will grant they would Since then the Embryo in the Womb lies in a Roundish Posture why may not one part of it by touching another or operating upon it cause in us as soon as the Soul which has a Capacity of Receiving Notions is in it a Notion of our own Existence by way of Sensation Especially since Operation is nothing but the Existence of the Agent Body press'd or imprinted as it were upon another by Motion Certainly it becomes us who deny Innate Ideas to shew how all our First Notions do come into us by Impressions on the Senses and not to say rawly that some of them come by Intuition which is the Way of Knowing Proper to Angels whose Knowledges are all Innate and none of them Acquir'd either by Sense or Discourse for they have neither This I say is certainly best for the Interest of our Tenet of which Intuition gives but a slender Account I believe Mr. Locke proceeds upon this that he finds he not only does but must as firmly assent to the Proposition Ego sum as he does to the most Evident Proposition whatever nor can he at all doubt of it nor can it need Proof But my Judgment is that this Introversion and Studying our own Interiour is a very Fallacious Guide and will often lead us astray if we keep not a steady Eye attentively bent to our Principles which he seems here to neglect For many Positions need no Proof and force our Assent and yet their Certainty may depend on Different Causes 10. The 12th Chapter treats of the Improvement of our Knowledge which Mr. Locke says does not depend on Maxims But First he mistakes the Use of General Maxims They are not made for the Vulgar or Beginners to gather Knowledge by them tho' it may be observ'd that Men of all sorts do naturally use them when they sute their purpose nay sometimes make Proverbs of them Nor was this Maxim a Whole is bigger than a Part ever intended for Boys or to teach them that their Hand is bigger than their Little Finger or such like but being premised to the ensuing Proofs they are occasionally made use of by Learned Men in the Process of their Discourse to clinch the Truth of the Point when it needs it by their Self-Evidence In the same manner as my self have very frequently had recourse to Metaphysical Principles and made use of them in my Preliminaries and Reflexions as Occasion presented to make my Discourses Evident and to rivet the Truths I advance in the Minds of my Readers as any Attentive Peruser of them may easily observe He speaks against our Receiving Principles without Examination and of Principles that are not Certain that is against such Sayings as are no Principles for if they can either need or admit of Examination or if they be not Certain none but meer Fops will let them pass for Prinples Yet tho' Mr. Locke does thus oppose Maxims and Principles 't is notwithstanding very evident that himself must make use of some Maxims and Principles all the while he disputes aganst their Usefulness otherwise he cannot discourse at all or his Discourse can have no Force In the same manner as he that wrastles with another must either fix his Foot on some Firm Ground or he will fall himself instead of overthrowing his Adversary Let us then examin his Principles He alledges that the Knowledge of the Certainty of Principles depends only upon the Perception of the Agreement or Disagreement of our Ideas This then is one of his Principles both because it runs through good part of his 3d and 4th Books as also because 't is Equivalent to this Universal All Certainty of Principles depends c. Now this is so far from Self-evident that it needs Examination enough and is one of those I judge not Certain and therefore can be no Ground or Principle at all Nor is it possible it should unless the Word Idea be cleared to mean Spiritual Notions in our Mind and not meer Resemblances or Material Representations in our Fancy to clear which tho' the whole Treatise needs it no Provision is made but on the contrary those two vastly different things are rather carelesly confounded as is shewn in my First Preliminary Another Principle seems to be this None ought with a Blind and Implicit Faith to Receive and Swallow Principles This is of Universal Influence and Self-Evident and therefore in all Points well qualify'd for a Principle For Principles were not Principles if they needed either Faith or Deductions of Reason to make them go down since they ought to be Evident by their own Light But what Good can this do to any but to such as have renounc'd Common Sense even to Ridiculousness And perhaps Mr. Locke had some such weak Writers in his Eye when he advanc'd this cautious Position as a Warning to Learners 11. Now the General Maxims and Principles on which the Learned Part of the World has hitherto proceeded can onely be overthrown if they must needs be so by other Principles more Evident than themselves are or else it will be but a drawn Match and so they may hope still to stand as the Lawyers phrase it in their full Force Effect and Vertue We are to consider then what Principle Mr. Locke has substituted in their room when they are discarded for 't is a very ill Case to be left without any Principles at all 'T is this All Knowledge of the Certainty of Principles and consequently the Way to improve our Knowledge is to get and fix in our Minds Clear Distinct and Compleat Ideas as far as they are to be had and annex to them Proper and Constant Names Now if the Ideas must be Clear the Terms must be very Simple and consequently as was shewn above General ones and this will force us back upon General Maxims which it was intended we should avoid as good for little To be Distinct if we go to work like Artists we must distinguish those General and Common Notions which will bring us back into the old Road of those Ten Common Heads called Predicaments and consequently of Genus Species and Differences which was lately dislik'd I suppose because it was too much travell'd in and beaten tho' I think such a Common Path should not be left because some may have here and there laid a Block or Briar in the way Lastly Compleat Ideas as he grants are not to be had of the Species much less of the Individuums And as for Names 't is not we that are to annex them but the Common Usage of the Vulgar or of the Generality of Learned Men in case they be Artificial ones for these are they who gave them their Constant and Proper Signification Whence is seen that so many Difficulties are involv'd in this one Thesis or Principle besides what is said
and regularly upon their Anvil may make as good Consequences as those he speaks of and puts them to be a great part of our Reason I have observ'd that this Acute Author fancies Unintelligible Mysteries in the Annexing Words to his Ideas Nay as appears here in Words taken without Ideas or the Sense of them that is in Senseless Sounds or Characters Whereas my weak Speculation tho' I bend my sight never so strongly cannot discern any Annexion other than this that Men have agreed that such Words shall signify such and such Things or Notions all other Annexion being Unaccountable Nor can I see how in such sayings as this Mr. Locke does as Philosophers ought guide himself by the Natures of the Things in hand viz. Words and Reason For Words abstracted from his Ideas which he puts to be signify'd by them are meer Articulate Sounds and out of the Mind whereas Reason and all its Acts are compleated in the Mind and Sense How then the Consequence of Words thus understood should be a great part of Reason which is Sense or what Reason which is an Internal and Spiritual Power has to do with those External and Material Sounds or Motions of the Ayr more than to know their Signification and to take care they be not Ambiguous quite surpasses my Understanding The Complexion of Ideas he speaks of which the Words are to signify is confessedly made first by the Understanding and the Memory can retain our Notions as well or better than it can Sounds and tho' such Sounds thro' the use of the Words are apt to re-excite the Memory yet all this amounts to no more but their Aptness thro' use to signify our Notions let them be what they will Which is plain Sense and easily Understood Whereas the Consequence of Sounds Abstracted from our Notions is very Amusing and utterly Unintelligible 8. The 18th Chapter Of Faith and Reason and their distinct Provinces is admirably Clear and in great part very solid I grant no new Simple Ideas that are proper ones can he Convey'd by Traditional Revelation The Author of Nature gave us our Natural Notions and the Author of Grace who is the same Person brought no unheard-of Objects of our Senses to increase the Stock already sufficient for all our Knowledge yet if the Points thus convey'd are Spiritual ones as most points of the Revealed Faith are there will be convey'd new Metaphorical Notions translated from our Natural ones which are Proper I grant too that Revelation cannot be admitted against clear Evidence of Reason I wish that instead of the word Revelation he had rather said Pretence of Revelation for otherwise some Readers may hap to take his words in a Dis-edifying sense as if it were a possible Case that Revelation it self may be supposed to be opposit to Clear Evidence of Reason and which is worse in case they hap to contract must truckle and submit to it My Judgment in the Point is this that supposing the Revelation is grounded on the Means laid by God to assure us he has Reveal'd such and such Points which therefore cannot but be Certain to us or Evident at least to those who are Guides to others the Case imply'd here is impossible because it is impossible that God who gave us our Nature should as Mr. L. well expresses it will us to admit any thing for true in a direct Contradiction to the Clear Evidence of our Understanding I add not to admit it as True if the Motives be but Probable or which is the same if the Thing may be False What I am here to note is that Two Cautions are necessary in this occasion The one that since God does nothing needlessly therefore the Points Reveal'd by God are such as Humane Reason could not other ways attain to whence they being such as those Mr. Locke holds to be above Reason hence they must oft look very oddly to those Low Conceptions which the Course of Nature affords us Whereas the Motives laid by God for Mankind to embrace Christian Faith do for that very regard lie level to our Natural Reason Wherefore in our Enquiry what we are to embrace what not we ought not to begin our quest by scanning the Points propos'd to us as Reveal'd but by examining whether the Motives to judge they are Reveal'd be Certain or no. Otherwise we shall Neglect to employ our Reason in such Things as are suitable to her Capacity and in which she can have Evidence and task it to Consider what 's perhaps above her reach and of which consequently she can have no Evidence which way of Proceeding is clearly Irrational How many are there in the world who are reputed for Learned men and yet have no Principles which are not taken from Fancy Let then such short Speculaters loose to judge of the Verity of Points perhaps Incomprehensible to our Natural Reason they will be apt to fancy twenty Contradictions in the Trinity the Incarnation a Virgins Conceiving the Resurrection and in many other main Points of Christian Faith And were it allowable for any to begin his Search after Truth on this preposterous manner the Persons must be highly Qualify'd to decide what is a Contradiction what not ere their Sentiments can be thought to have any kind of weight They must be excellent Logicians to know the force of a Consequence and how many things go to make a Contradiction They must be acute Metaphysicians to know all the many several Respects belonging to Things without which it will be hard to determin certainly what Notions are in all respects Contradictory which not And if they be not thus Qualify'd their Skill is Incompetent for such a Performance Again if the Point do concern the Nature of Body they must be able to Comprehend the Nature of that Subject And in a word unless they can demonstrate their own Opposit Tenet plain Terms give it that they can never show the other side to be a Contradiction For since both sides of a Contradiction cannot be True they must demonstrate their Tenet to be True or they cannot demonstrate the other to be False and Contradictory for 't is one labour to do both 9. The other necessary Caution is that men do not take the Bad Explications of some weak Divines for the Point of Faith it self For such men as Mr. L. well notes being very forward to stop the mouths of all Opponents by crying out such a Position is of Faith and withall having a high Opinion of their own Sentiments and Miscall'd Authority are apt to fancy that all is of Faith which belongs to their own Explication of it or seems to them Consequent from it or Connected with it which is no better in Effect than to obtrude their own Skill in drawing Consequences upon Men for Divine Revelation Now if the Explicater be not truly Learned and Candid then in stead of showing the Point of Faith Conformable to Nature as a Solid Divine ought
reflect on it Nature teaches us to define by a Genus and a Difference * B. 1. L. 3. § 2. Those who oppose this Method must be forced to use it The Mind does not frame Universal Notions designedly but as forced to it by Nature Nominal Essences Groundless and Catachrestical Aristotle's Definition of Motion defended * See Method to Science B. 1. L. 8. §. 2. Aristotle's Definition of Light most Proper The Cartesian Definition of Motion Faulty Individuums under the same Species differ essentially * B. 1. L. 3. § 11. Whence we must take our Measure of Simple and Compound Notions The same Rule holds in Accidents as well as Substance The Idea or Notion can never be in Fault when we Name things wrong Confused Notions may have more Distinct ones Annext to their Subject Confused Notions do not exclude but include those distinct ones which are yet Undiscover'd We must not judge which Notions are Simple which Compounded from the Clear or Obscure Appearances they make to our Fancy but from the Râ—le given above § 18 19. Shown hence because thâ—se Men conceit that Metaphysical Notions are Obscure whereas they are evidently the Clearest Not the Design of avoiding different Signification of Words but plain Nature forces us to â—put Real Essences Words are not Ambiguous for want of setled Standards in Nature The Thing signify'd is not to be blam'd for the Abuse of Words but their Ambiguity ill Contexture or Mis-application Imperfect Knowers agree in the Thing and not in the Name only The Knowing Things by Abstract Notions promotes and not hinders Science By Mr. Locke's Principles there is no Way to remedy the Abuse of Words Mr. Locke's Sentiments after all Ambiguous Of the Second Operation of our Understanding Mr. L.'s Definition of Knowledge in many respects Faulty Knowledge cannot consist in the Connexion or Disagreement of Ideas The true Definition of Knowledge Our Definition of Knowledge farther maintain'd Hence there is but One Sort of Connexion in which Knowledge consists viz. that of Co-existence The Degrees of our Knowledge assign'd by Mr. L. very Solid Every Step we take in Demonstrative Knowledge or every Consequence must be grounded on Self-evidence The great Usefulness of this last Position Scepticism and Dogmatism are both of them highly prejudicial to Science We have Sensitive Knowledge of other Notions besides Existence Onely Principles and Demonstration and not Experiments can give us any Intelligible Explication of Natural Qualities Short Hints of the true Aristotelian Grounds * See Method to Science B. 1. L. 3. § §. 1 2. How all Secondary Qualities come to be made The Course of Nature is fundamentally built on the Admission of Ratity and Density That by these Grounds the Nature of Secondary Qualities is Demonstrable The true Reason why some Men think them Inexplicable The Possibility of demonstrating them shewn by the Instance of Colour The State of the Question How we know the Things by means of Ideas Inexplicable The Ideists must be forced to grant that the Thing known is in the Mind The Necessity of the Thing 's being in our Mind farther inforced Mathematical and Moral Knowledges are grounded on the Thing in the Mind All Essential Predicates and Accidental ones too are truly the Thing and the whole Thing imply'd consusedly That our Complex Notions are Regular and well grounded Mr. L's not so In what manner we compound such Notions All Pleas fail the Ideists unless they perfectly distinguish Phantasms from Notions Odd Miscarriages of Nature ought not to shock Natural Principles Hence no Vacuum The Cartesians are concluded against by J. S. as well as other Ideists or rather more All Truth consists in Joining or Separating Partial Conceptions of the Things and not in Joining or Separating Ideas The Distinction of Truth into Mental and Verbal Extravagant and the Parts of it Coincident Universal Propositions in the Mind are easily Knowable Antecedently to Words 'T is not necessary to know the precise Bounds and Extent of the Species Unnecessary Knowledge not to be coveted nor the Want of it complain'd of The Nature and Use of General Maxims mistaken by Mr. Locke The Terms of General Maxims Clearer than those of Particular Propositions Such General Maxims are never used to deduce Conclusions from them but to reduce Inferiour Truths to them * Book 3. Less 4. The Absolute Necessity of First Principles Asserted How other General Maxims do govern all our Actions and Sayings The Discarding General Maxims destroys all Science This Errour springs from Men's taking wrong Measures in judging what Notions are Clear what Confused That not General Maxims but their Abuse breeds Danger to Science His Instance that General Maxims are fit to prove Contradictions shows he quite mistakes the Notion of Body Ideism is the Genuin Parent of Enthusiasm in Philosophy Identical Propositions not to be ridicul'd The right Way how to use them and that Mr. Locke himself does and must rely upon them See Meth. to Science B. a. L. 2. § 18 Neither Ideas nor Names can be Predicate or Subject but the Thing it self as conceived by us in whole or in part Mr. L.'s new Instructive Way is utterly Insignificant That the Signification of Words is the Meaning of them their Meaning is our Notion and our Notion is the Thing Universals mnst relate to the Existence they have in the Mind To put any Knowledge in Brutes is against the Nature of the Thing and Implicatory Mr. L. confound Material and Spiritual Natures Mr. L's Principles confound Human and Brutal Natures To create is the Peculiar Effect of Self-existence The Thought cannot move the Body and why See Method to Science Book 1. Less 5. §. 7. The Notion or Nature of the Deity being once settled to be Self-existence all that can be said of it follows Demonstratively We can know there are Angels tho' they do not operate'on us We know at first our own Existence in the same manner as we know the Existence of other Things i. e. by Sensation and not by Intuition See Method to Science Book 1. Less 8. §. 7. No Improvement of Science without fome General Principle Mr. Locke's Principles examin'd Mr. Locke's main Principle which is to ascertain all other Principles Inevident What Things hinder the Advancement of Science Euclid and such others not blameable for laying Principles or General Maxims The Point stated Mr. L. confounds Outward Action to which we may proceed upon a Probability with Inward Assent to which we may not A strange Character of our Judging Faculty That God has provided due Motives of Enjoin'd Assent to all Mankind if they be not wanting to themselves * See Method to Science B. 3. L. 8. To assent upon a Probability is against the Commonest Light of Reason There cannot be in proper Speech any Degrees of Assent Probable Assent is Nonsense or Impertinent What kinds of Distinctions are Disallowable in Disputation Charity to Sincere and Weak Misunderstanders is a Christian Duty Tradition built on meer Hearsay has little or no Force A more Firm Assent is due to Points certainly known to be Reveal'd than to Scientifical Conclusions How Syllogisms came to be invented at first The True Use and Abuse of them Objections against Syllogistick Arguing clear'd Syllogisms are useful for Demonstration Syllogisms are of no use in Probable Discourses Other Mistakes about Syllogism Clear'd Inferences and Consequences of Words abstracting from their Sense is strangely against all Reason and Preposterous What is due to Reason what to Divine Revelation The First Caution to be observ'd in order to this Point The second Caution to be used in this Point Reason is not to be rely'd on in things beyond its Sphere The Notion of is True must be distinguish'd from the Notion of may be true or may not be true Therefore that no Assent ought to be built on Probable Mediums is Demonstrable All Errour comes by Assenting upon Probability The Tenet that we ought to Assent upon Probability is highly prejudicial to Piety and to best Christian Morality To apply our selves to the Right Method to find out Truth and Science is the onely Antidote against Errour No possible Way or Certain Standard to take the Just Measures of Probabilities The Certain Rule not to be mis-led by Authority Mr. Locke seems to take someThings for onely Probable which or the Authority for them are Demonstrable The Members of Mr. Locke's Division of Sciences are partly Co-incident partly not belonging to Science at all The Connatural way how Sciences are to be Divided and Subordinated Some very Useful Corollaries concerning that Subject
the Profession he made to love and esteem it but tho' he sees Errour and Ignorance and Probable Talking overspread the Face of Philosophy and stifle Truth and Knowledge both he sits still Unconcern'd Now and then indeed there is a Writer who attempts to confute this or that particular Errour some Casual Circumstance addicting him to that Employment But what Man sets himself to lay the Ax at the Root or writes against Uncertain Methods and Groundless Babbling What Man goes about to make Mankind aware of the Mischief that comes to Rational Nature by the Sophisticate Ways of talking prettily neatly and wittily tho' perhaps not a Word Groundedly and Solidly Nay what Man is not well-Appay'd and Pleased with a well-penn'd Piece tho' were the Reason in it sifted to the Bottom perhaps there is not one Evident Ttuth in it to build that Discourse on that is not one Word of Sense in it but only such a way of Plausible Discourse or Language-Learning as may serve equally and indifferently to maintain either side of the Contradiction 11. Lastly which is the Chief Point Who is there that applies himself to find out a CERTAIN METHOD to arrive at Truth and attain Knowledge without which all our Studies are to no purpose Logick is the Proper Art to give us this Method and I see Students do generally make use of any Logician so he but talks dâ—yly of the Operations of the Understanding of Propositions Syllogisms and Demonstration tho' perhaps he gives not one Word of Reason for his Unprov'd Sayings to enlighten the Understanding of the Learner or inform him ex Natura rei whence and why this and the other Rudiment or Rule must be so Such an Author may indeed enable a Learner to say as he says and talk after him in imitation as it were but he can never instruct him to understand what 's True and why it is True or to demonstrate himself which was the main Design of my METHOD 12. But my greatest Complaint against others and my best Excuse for putting my self forwards with such a Confident Ayr is that I see not that any Learned Men do endeavour to make Head against Scepticism which thro' this Universal Connivence or rather Civil and Kind Toleration and in some sort Encouragement creeps by insensible Degrees into even the most Learned Societies infects the best Wits of our Nation threatens to bear down all true Philosophy to extinguish the Natural Light of Men's Understandings and drown their best Faculty Reason in a Deluge of Profound Ignorance For if this Vogue should obtain still in the World to look upon any loose Discourse for brave Sense so it be but sprucely dress'd up in neat Language and Sauc'd with a little Piquancy of brisk Wit and let it pass current for True Learning and Knowledge Scepticism will not only insinuate it self slily into all sorts of Men but be recommended to the World by such an Universal Approbation of well-clad gentile Ignorance Nor does this mischievous Inundation stop its Career in bereaving us of Natural Truths but having once darken'd in us the Knowledge of Nature it disposes Men to doubt of and too often to deny the Existence of the Author of Nature himself who is best made known to Mankind by Science or the Exact Knowledge of his Creatures from which we glean all the Notions and consequently all the Knowledge we by Ordinary Means have or ought to have All these Mischiefs I may add and all Immorality too are owing to the Insensible Growth of this Lethargy of our Understanding SCEPTICISM which benums and chills our Intellectual Faculties with a Cold Despair of ever attaining Evident Knowledge of any thing for which as its Natural Perfection our Soul was fitted and ordain'd I saw this Gloomy Evening overcasting the Clear Sky of Science and drawing on the Cimmerian Night of Dark Ignorance and Black Infidelity and thence it was that to awaken Men's Souls out of this drowzy Sleep and Torpor of their Mind I did so often boldly and fearlessly tho' as I judg'd truly declare and proclaim aloud that Demonstration in Philosophy might be had and that I had actually Demonstrated in such and such Particulars 13. Lastly 'T is for this Reason and to rescue all Sincere Lovers of Truth from this spreading Contagion of Scepticism that with an unusual Boldness I did as was said before attempt to write a Demonstrative Logick to comprehend which whoever shall bestow half that Pains as Men usually do who study the Mathematicks for such Connected Discourses are not to be perused with hopes of profiting by them with a Cursory Application will I am sure be able to set all his Natural Notions in a Right and Distinct Order know how to connect two of them with one another in a Solid Judgment and both of them with a Third to frame a Conclusive Discourse and not only have the True Nature of Demonstration knowingly fix'd in his Mind by comprehending the Reason of it but by having it there he himself will be enabled to work according to that Nature or to Demonstrate himself without Ability to know or do which none ought to pretend to be a Philosopher Lastly To carry this Good Work forward as far as was possible I have here as a Supplement to my METHOD and an Introduction to my Reflexions added Five Preliminary Discourses shewing the true and solid Bottom-Ground on which all Exact Knowledge or Philosophy is built and that the Things themselves and not Ideas Resemblances or Fancies which can never make us know the Things are and must be the only Firm Foundation of Truth and of our Knowledge of all Truths whatsoever 14. I must not pass over another Complaint made of me by some of the Cartesian School viz. That in the Preface to my METHOD I so deeply Censure Malbranche as a Phanatick in Philosophy nay the whole Way it self as disposing to Enthusiasm To the First Part of my Charge I reply That I cited that Author 's own Words which are such strong Proofs of a Fanatick Genius that I cannot believe any Arguments of mine can add Weight to the Full Evidence and Force they carry'd with them to manifest that his Philosophy is built upon Inspiration or as himself expresses it comes to him by Revelation And for my pretending that the whole Cartesian Way of Philosophizing is of the same Leven I can need no other Compurgatour than that French Author who with much Exactness wrote the Life of Cartesius and was his good Friend and Follower The Book is now made English where in the 34th Page he tells us that To get rid of all his Prejudices that is to Unlearn amongst other Things all that the Clear Light of Nature had taught him Cartesius did undergo no less than to UNMAN himself A pretty Self-denying Beginning And Pag. 35 36. that he wearied out his Mind to that Degree in his Enquiry after this Happy Means viz. that his Imagination should represent
a Created Spiritual Nature but by a Negation of what 's Proper to Body so we can have no Notion of the Divine Nature but by Denying of him all that belongs properly to the Natures of such a Body and Spirit both and by acknowledging them infinitely short of resembling or even shadowing him Lastly We have no Notion or Expression that can sute with him no not even the most Metaphysical ones Ens includes Potentiality to Existence and all Potentiality signifying Imperfection must be utterly denied of him Existence seems to come nearer yet because it signifies a Formality supervening to Ens as 't is Existent and so is as it were a kind of Compart it cannot be Proper for his infinitely Simple Being And even Self-existence signifies a kind of Form or Mode of the Subject that Self-exists So that we have no kind of Notion or Expression that can perfectly agree to God's Infinite Essence but we are forc'd to content our selves to make use of sometimes one Attribute sometimes another that signifies some Perfection with Infinite annex'd to it which is not found in Creatures or which is denied of them or is Incommunicable to them Whence comes that Maxim of the Mysticks that God is better known by Negations or by affirming he is none of those Positive Perfections we find in Creatures than by applying any of our Positive Notions to him And this is all we can do in this State till Grace raising us up to Glory we come to know his Divine Essence as it is in its Self or as we phrase it See him Face to Face in contemplating which consists our Eternal Happiness 40. Thus much of our Notions which we call the First Operations of our Understanding and how they are caused in our Soul How our Judging and Discoursing which are the other two are made in it is shewn at large in the Second and Third Books of my Method to Science 41. If any Learned Man is dis-satisfied with this Discourse or has a mind to oppose it I think I have Right to require of him two Things First That he would not object his own Fancies or Dis-like of it or think that this is sufficient to invalidate it but that he would go to work like a Man of Reason and shew that This or That part of it does contradict Such and Such a Principle in Logick Physicks or Metaphysicks This is the only Solid Way of Objecting all other being but Empty Talk and Idle Cavil Next I think I have Right to demand since it is fundamentally necessary to Philosophy that this Point be clear'd that he would set himself to frame some Orderly and Coherent Discourse of his own built upon Evident Principles how or by what particular Means the first Knowledge of the Things without us comes into our Soul In doing which he will oblige the World very highly and my self very particularly And unless he does this he will be convinced to find fault with what himself cannot mend Which will manifest that he either wants true Knowledge or which is a far greater Defect Ingenuity PRELIMINARY Fifth Of the Proper and Genuine Signification of those Words which are of most use in Philosophy 1. THE main Hindrance of Science viz. The Mistake of Fancies for Realities or of meer Similitudes for Notions being provided against the other Grand Impediment to true Knowledge which is the taking Words us'd in Philosophy in an Ambiguous or wrong Sense is to be our next Care The Inconveniences which arise hence and the ways how to detect and avoid Equivocation are in my Method discours'd of in common and I have here in my Second Preliminary clear'd also in common the Signification of all Abstract Words and shewn that they mean the thing it self quatenus such or such or according to such or such a Consideration of it as is express'd by that Word My present Business to which my Circumstances oblige me is to clear in particular the Notion or Meaning of those most Important Words which being made use of by Learned Men and taken by them often-times in different Senses do so distract them in their Sentiments and by drawing their Intellectual Eye now to one side now to the other make them so frequently miss the Mark while they aim at true Science Not that my Intention in this Preliminary is to pursue the Mistakes of others but only to settle the True and Genuine Sense of such Words to be applied afterwards to the Mis-accepters of them as occasion requires tho' I may hint now and then some Abuses of them that so I may the better clear their proper Signification 2. I begin with Existence express'd by the Word is which is the Notion of the Thing precisely consider'd as it is Actually Being This is the most simple of all our Notions or rather indeed the only Simple Notion we have all the rest being but Respects to it For it has no kind of Composition in it not even that Metaphysical one of grounding divers Conceptions or Considerations of it as all others have Whence all Notions being by their Abstraction Distinct and Clear this most Abstracted Notion is so perfectly clear and self-evident that as it cannot need so it cannot admit any Explication They who go about to explain it show themselves Bunglers while they strive to approve themselves Artists For by telling us that 't is Esse contra Causas they put Esse which is the Notion defin'd in the Definition which is most absurd and against all Art and Common Sense Nay they make it more obscure than it was before by adding Extra Causas to it which are less clear than it self was By the Word Causes I suppose they mean Natural ones and so tho' it gives no Clearness to the Signification of the Word Esse yet it may at least consist with good Sense and may mean that the Thing was before or while it was not yet produced within the Power of those Causes or in the State of Potentiality and that Existence is that Formality or most formal Conception by which the Thing is put out of that imperfect State of having only A Power to be and is reduced to the perfecter State of Actuality or Actual Being 3. As it is impossible to misconceive this self-evident Notion so 't is equally impossible to mistake the meaning of the word Existence which properly expresses that Notion for if they take the word is to have any meaning relating any way to the Line of Ens or any Signification at all that is of its Nature purely Potential they quite destroy it's Notion And if they take it in any Sense for an Actuality not belonging to the Line of Ens they must necessarily take it to mean is not there being no Third or other such Notion to take it for in the same manner as if one takes not Ens to mean A Thing he must take it to mean Nothing Now tho' the Goodness
of Humane Nature which abhors Contradiction reclaims vehemently against such an unnatural Depravation of Common Sense as to take is while thus express'd for is not yet taking the meaning of the Word Existence as it is disguised by another Word which is by consequence Equivalent to it those Deserters of Humane Nature the Scepticks do take occasion from the altering the Expression to misapprehend even what is Self-evident For 't is the same Sense when we speak affirmatively to say a thing is True or Certain as to say it is since nothing can be True or Certain that is not and therefore when these Men talk of Moral and Probable Truth and Probable or Moral Certainty which mincing Expressions mean possible not to be so they in effect say that what is may whilst it is possibly not be Which manners of Expression tho' they may seem to some but a meer Unconcerning School-Speculation and Unreflecting Men may think it deserves no other Note but that of being Ridiculous yet I judge my self obliged to declare that it is moreover most enormously Mischievous and that it quite perverts and destroys by a very immediate Consequence the Nature and Notion of all Certainty and Truth whatsoever and of Being too and quite overthrows all possibility of Knowing any thing at all Had they said I think it true or certain none would blame them rather 't is a Credit for such Men even to think heartily there is any Truth or Certainty at all in Philosophy but to joyn as they do Moral or Probable to Truth and Certainty as a kind of Mode affecting them is to clap these most unconsociable Things Light and Darkness into one Dusky Compound to abet Nonsense and palliate Ignorance 4. The Notion immediately next in order to Existence as that which has the very least Potentiality that can be in the Line of Being is that of Ens or Thing Wherefore the meaning of that word can be no other but that of Capable to be for no Created Thing has Actual Being or Existence in its Essential-Notion but of its own Nature may be or not be as besides what 's proved in my Method is seen in the very Notion of Creature which signifies That which has its Being from Another which therefore can of its self be only Capable of Being That the Notion of Ens is distinct from that of Existence is demonstrated elsewhere and is farther evident hence that the Notion of what has Existence must be different from what 's had by it or from Existence it self All Mankind has this Notion of Thing in them for they experience that every Thing can exist by seeing it does so and they know also they are not of themselves whether they hold a first Being or no because they do generally see that Causes produced them Wherefore all that can be said or thought of the word Ens is that it signifies the Thing precisely as 't is Capable of Being 5. Whence follows that the Abstract Terms Entity or Essence do properly signify A Capacity of Being which is the Abstract Term of Capable of Being Tho' Entity is often us'd as a Concrete for the Thing it self Moreover Essence is the Total Form of Ens its Suppositum or Subject which adequately and intirely constitutes it such as Humanitas is the Total Form of Homo I call it the Total Form to distinguish it from the Partial Form of Body which with the Matter its compart do compound the entire Notion or Total Form of Corporeity 6. To understand which more clearly we are to Note that the Notion and Signification of the word Matter signifies the Thing or Body precisely as it is a Power to be a Thing and Form signifies the same Thing according to that in it which determins it to be a Thing Actually We are to reflect too that Power and Act considered in the Line of Being are the same as Matter and Form only the Former words are purely Metaphysical because they express the parts of Ens as Ens in regard no other conceptions in the Line of Being can possibly be framed of a Body but as it is Determinable or Determinative which are the very Notions of Power and Act whereas Matter and Form tho' in Bodies they signify the same as the former seem rather to incline to the parts of such an Ens or Body Physically consider'd 7. To show literally what 's meant by this saying that Matter and Form constitute the compleat Ens or make the Subject capable of Existing I discourse thus Nothing as 't is Indeterminate or Common to more can be ultimately Capable to be v. g neither a Man in Common nor a Horse in Common can possibly exist but This Man or This Horse Whatever therefore does determin the Potentiality or Indifferency of the Subject as it is Matter or which is the same a Power to be of such or such a Nature which is what we call to have such a Form in it does make it This or That and consequently disposes it for Existence Wherefore since the particular Complexion of the several Modes and Accidents do determin the Power or Matter so as to make it Distinct from all others it does by Consequence determin it to be This and so makes it Capable of Existing that is an Ens or Thing I enlarge not upon this Point because I have treated it so amply in the Appendix to my Method to Science 8. Hence is seen what is or can with good Sense be meant by that Metaphysical or Entitative part called by the Schools the Substantial or Essential Form which they say does with the Matter make up that compound Ens call'd Body and that in Literal Truth it can be nothing else but that Complexion of the Modes or Accidents which conspire to make that peculiar or primigenial Constitution of every Body at the first Instant of its being thus ultimately Determin'd to be This. For this Original Temperature of the Mixt or Animal being once settled by the Steady Concurrence of its Causes whatever Particles or Effluviums or how many soever which are Agreeable to it do afterwards accrue to it are so digested into or assimilated to its Nature that they conserve nourish and dilate and not destroy it Whereas if they be of an opposit Nature they alter it from its own temperature and in time quite destroy and corrupt it To explicate which more fully let us consider how the Causes in Nature which are many times of a Different sometimes of a Contrary Temper to the Compound do work upon a Body and how they make as they needs must preternatural Dispositions in it till when those Disagreeable Alterations arrive to such a pitch as quite to pervert the former Complexion of Accidents which we call its Form a new Form or new Complexion succeeds determining the Matter to be Another Thing till it self also wrought upon in the same Manner comes to be Corrupted and so makes
supports its Modes in their Being Nor will it do us any Harm loqui cum vulgo to speak as vulgar Philosophers use provided we do Sentire cum doctis or make wiser Judgments of the Literal Sense of those Words than they perhaps ever meant 12. The word Suppositum is another Name of Ens or Thing in a manner tho' not altogether the same with Substance For Substance is I conceive meant for the Essential Notion of the Thing as it is contradistinguisht from Accidental or Unessential ones and Suppositum does over and above relate also to the very Nature of the Thing or to the Complexion of Accidents which constitutes its Essence and not only to the Modes as each of them singly is a meer Accident and had Being by it or in it Whence the Notion of Suppositum is the most Confused of any other and signifies that which has all the Forms in it Whatever whether they be Essential ones or Accidental and not only those Modes or Accidents which naturally belong'd to it at first as Properties or inseparable Accidents but those also which accru'd to it since and are meerly Accidental to it 13. Hence there can be no difficulty in the meaning of the word Suppositality which is the Abstract of the Suppositum For it signifies manifestly the Thing according to the precise Notion of the Suppositum or of what has all the aforesaid Forms in it How agreeable this discourse is to Christian Language and Principles will easily appear to Solid Divines 14. The word Individuum which is another name of Ens us'd by the Learned and as is seen in those usual words the same Individual thing is got into our vulgar Language is a Logical Expression distinguishing the Notion of a Particular only which is properly a Thing from the Generical and Specifical Notions in regard both these latter do bear a Division of their Notions into more Inferiour ones and so that each of the Inferior ones contains the whole Superiour Natures in it which the others do signify as the whole Definiton Notion or Nature of an Animal or of a Sensitive Living Thing is found in Man and also in Brutes and the whole Definition or Notion of Man is found in Socrates and Plato But the particular Natures of Socrates and Plato which are signify'd by those words and their Definitions could they bear any cannot be divided into more which have the particular Natures of Socrates and Plato in them And therefore they are called Individuums that is such as cannot be divided into more which have the Natures signified by those words in them as could the Generical and Specifical Notions of Animal and Homo whence Individuums are the Lowest and Narrowest Notion that can possibly be in the Line of Ens. 15. The Individuum is call'd by the Latin Schools Substantia prima and the Superiour Notions in the Line of Ens. Substantiae Secundae which signifies that only Individuums are in propriety of Speech Entia or Capable of Existing For since as was shown above nothing that is Common or Undetermined can exist none of the others can have any Actual being at all but in the Individuum as a kind of Metaphysical Part of its Intire Notion and a Part in what Sense soever that word be taken can not possibly be but in the whole If this then be their meaning as I believe it is nothing can be more true and Solid Only I must note that it is less properly and less Logically exprest and that Aristotle speaks more exactly when he calls the Former 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or primò Substantia and the latter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Secundò Substantia which words denote that the former is Ens in its Primary and Proper signification of that word and the latter only Analogically that is in a Secondary and improper Sense which prima and Secunda Substantia do not express For both these may be properly Entia still for any thing those words tell us tho' one of them may have an Order of Priority to the other as Prima and Secunda in some such Sense as we call God the Primum Ens considering him in order to Creatures 16. From Words used by Philosophers which belong to the Line of Ens we come to those which are made use of to express the Modes or Manners how a Thing is which in a generall Appellation the Schools have call'd Accidents This Word is certainly very improper For who can think that Quantity or as they will needs call it Extension is Accidental to Body or as some may take that Equivocal Word that 't is but by Chance or by Accident that Bodies have any Bigness in them at all The best Sense I can give it in pursuance to my own Grounds is this that Accidental which is the Denominative from Accident may mean such Notions as are Not Essential or which is the same they may mean the Thing consider'd as to that in it which has no ways any Order to Being nor expresses any such Order by the Word which signifies its Notion And were this Sense universally accepted and attributed to the Word Accidents it would be a True and Solid one For 't is evident that none of the Words that signifie any of those Accidents does in the least import in its Signification either Being or any Respect or Order to it as does Ens and all those Words which do formally and properly express it or belong to it Whence the Notions signify'd by such Words are not Essential ones or relating properly and precisely to the Essence but Modish as we may term it or expressing some Manner How the Thing is which is a quite different Notion from that of Ens or Thing or of what formally is found in that Line I do believe that divers of the Wisest and most Learned School-men did take the Word Accidents in this Sense tho' the Propriety of that Word fetch'd from its Radix did not invite much less oblige them to do so I doubt also that the Usage of that Word in that warrantable Sense I have now assign'd was not so Common and universally Current even among the School-men as to force it to bear that Sense as appears by their thinking that Accidents were certain kinds of little Adventitious Entities much less among the Modern Ideists who through their Shortness in Logick and Metaphysicks do make Quantity or Extension the Essential Form of Body which is to put Bigness in the Line of Being or to make Bigness and Being or the Mode and the Thing to be in the same Line of Notions and Intrinsecal to one another Whereas a Thing must first be conceiv'd to be e'er it can be after such a Mode or Manner 17. For the Reason lately given I cannot but judge that the Word Mode or as some call it Modification is far more proper than the Word Accidents to signifie those last Nine Common Heads
be prov'd that what we maintain is Agreeable to the Course of Natural Causes e'er we ought to think or imagin that God will have any hand in it And if we can prove this we need no Immediate or particular Recourse to God's favouring us by doing This or That to make good our Argument 4. I must deny too consequently to my former Doctrine that Sensible Qualities are nothing in the Objects but Powers to produce various Sensations in us unless it be meant that they have Powers to send out such Effluviums into the Brain by the Senses as imprint their very Natures in our Mind and not barely to produce Motions in our Nerves Nor can I conceive why the Ideas of the Secondary Qualities should have nothing like them existing in the Bodies themselves nor be Resemblances of them If this be true why are they call'd Ideas which either signifies Resemblances or Nothing Again since the Bodies are put to cause them how can we think they are nothing like them Can any Man think the Effect is nothing like the Cause when every Effect can be nothing but a Participation of the Cause or something coming into the Subject from the Efficient which was in it some way or other before Lastly If these Secondary Qualities be compounded of the Primary ones viz. of Solidity Extension Figure and Mobility in our Understanding why should not those Primary Qualities in re as well compound those Secondary ones in the Thing or out of our Understanding And if they do as 't is evident they must since they are all there then why are not those Secondary Ideas full as like those Secondary or Compounded Qualities found in the Thing as the Primary Ideas were like the Primary Qualities in the same Thing and consequently resemble them as well as the others did their proper Originals I much doubt that the Author rather consulted his Fancy in this particular than his good Reason And because those Effluviums or the Figures of Parts which cause our Sensations are too Subtile and Indiscernable to cause Distinct Phantasms of themselves as the Primary ones did but are of a Confus'd Uniformness in Appearance he judges hence they are Nothing like the others Whereas Reason will inform Reflecters that since Colour is nothing but the Surface of a Body as 't is apt to reflect Light the manner of Reflexion found in the Surface of a White Thing which is apt to reflect much Light is to our Reason and in our Notion such as it was in the Thing imprinting it and consequently every thing Acting as it is such as came from it Whence those who by Reflex Thoughts and using their Reason do go about to explain or define the Nature or Notion of Whiteness do make it consist in such a Reflexion of Light bringing Effluviums with it from a Surface so advantagiously Figur'd And so the Notion of Whiteness is the same in the Thing and in the Understanding viz. those Effluviums thus Figur'd or Modified however the Appearance of it in the Fancy reaches not the true Nature of the Thing as 't is White which indeed Fancy never does 5. The Reason why the Pain which we feel is not in the Thing that Caus'd it and Sensible Qualities are so is because these last are Proper Univocal and Immediate Effects of Bodies sending out Effluviums of their own Natures but Pain being an Affection of the Soul springing from a Perception that its dear Compart is hurt and disorder'd is an Improper Remoter and Equivocal Production The Altering Disordering or Spoiling the Temperature or Continuity of the Bodily Parts due to their Nature is as was shewn the Immediate and Proper Effect of those Offensive Agents but 't is Accidental to their manner of Operating that they cause Pain or Pleasure even remotely and it lights only that sometimes they do this because the Subject or the Body in which they produce these their proper Effects haps to be Identified with a Knowing Nature only which is properly capable to Grieve or be Delighted when a Harmful or Pleasing Impression is made on the Body which is Part of the Man and in some sort himself The like is to be said of Manna and other such Instances The Alterations or Disorder made in the Guts and Stomach are Natural Proper and Immediate Effects of it but the Pain ensuing thence which is a Spiritual Disposition of the Mind is a Remote Accidental and Improper Effect of it 6. By this Time Mr. Locke sees that I agree with him that the Bodies in Nature have a Power in them to cause our several Sensations and that this Power is that which we call such a Quality of it But I disagree with him that they are only Powers to cause such a Motion and affirm it is a Power when duly Circumstanced with other Requisites as with Light to convey Visible Qualities Moisture Gustable ones c. to send out Effluviums of their own Nature to the Brain which therefore are Inherent in and Proper Parts of those Objects whether they cause Actual Sensation or no. The Sun sends out his Beams which scatter'd thinly at this remote distance from the Fountain are therefore one of Mr. Locke's Secondary Qualities which we call Light yet contracted by a Burning-Glass they perform the Proper Effect of Fire Burning whence we ought to conclude they are of the Nature of Fire Can we then deny or doubt but that the Body of the Sun which communicates or sends them out is it self Fire or that being such those Rays and the Sun have no Similitude with one another Or that when they strike the Eye they stop there and are not carry'd into the Brain Hippocrates tells us that Omnes partes corporis sunt permeabiles meaning that they are pervious to the Humours which are gross Things in comparison of the Sun-Beams How can it then be doubted but that they reach the Fancy and thence the Soul and imprint their Notions or Natures there And tho' some may deny they are the same in the Mind as they are in Nature yet can it with any Shew of Reason be deny'd they are at all like the Cause that produced them The like Discourse holds in all other Sensible Qualities to what Sense soever they belong 7. To close this Discourse I am apt to think that Mr. Locke intended to oppose those who hold that the Sensible Qualities are a little kind of Distinct Entities Next I declare that tho' the Thing has accidentally a Power in it to make it self perceiv'd yet taking the Thing as an Object as he does it is but Improperly called a Power and not Properly as are our Powers or Faculties of Seeing Hearing Knowing c. are For the Act being the End for which the Power was given the Faculties or Powers are better'd and perfected by being reduced to Act and so there is a real Ground for their being Related to the Object Whereas neither the Object or Thing nor
think be better elucidated than by reflecting on what those who write of the Excellency of Poesie and Poets use to say in Commendation of those Daedalean Artists They tell us that a Poet has that Name from the Greek Noun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies A Maker The Reason they give for this Appellation is that whereas other Artists have their Materials given to their Hands to work upon by shaping it into an Artificial Form the Poet alone is the Maker as well of his Matter as the Contriver of its Form So that the Ideas he has in his Head of his Heroes his Lovers his Ladies and of Virtuous Persons are indeed as Mr. Locke calls his Archetypes and regard not whether such Incomparable Patterns he has invented did ever exist in Nature or no nor is it to his purpose Yet still as Mr. Locke says well that his Complex Ideas are made of Simple ones so by the leave of those Self-magnifiers the Poet could never have had those Excellent Ideas of his Heroes or their great Actions had he not been pre-imbu'd with Natural Notions which he joins together ingeniously and exalts them to a high Pitch so to make them Exemplars for others to imitate Rather he only adds Superlative or Extraordinary Degrees to what he finds in Nature Whence 't is manifest he regards not what is but what should be quite contrary to the Duty of a Philosopher who is to take his Complex Notions from Things just as he finds them complicated in Nature and then discourse upon them by his Reason and not to stand coining new Complex Ideas which Nature never gave him What therefore I most dislike here in Mr. Locke is that he seems not to reflect on what it is which makes some Ideas or Notions more Simple than others viz. Their being more Abstracted or Universal for this frees them from the Partnership of more-compounded Differences and the Complexion of Multitudes of Accidents which still as they descend lower are requisit to distinguish the Kinds of Things by which means they become more Simple or less compounded whence the Supreme Heads of the Ten Predicaments are the Simplest Notions of all others except that of Existence Did Mr. Locke rate the Simplicity and Complexion of his Ideas from this certain and well-grounded Rule there might an easie Accomodation be made between his Doctrin and mine as to this Particular But his Zeal against the Cobweb Schemes some Modern School-men had woven transported him to ravel that Excellent Frame of Notions which both Nature and Art had given us and as Cartesius and others have done to model all Philosophy upon a new tho' less Solid or rather far from Solid Foundation 9. That I may say as much as I can in behalf of the Ideists it may be alledg'd that they find by Experience Things are as their Ideas do represent them and that they Succeed as we by means of our Ideas do Forecast them Therefore Real Knowledge may be had by means of Ideas I answer First That this Agreement they have between what 's in the Mind and out of it would equally nay better be explicated were the Things themselves in the Mind and not the Ideas and therefore it can be no Argument for the Reality of their Knowledge by Ideas only Besides I deny that when their Ideas are not true Natural Notions but Fancies they experience them or any Effect of them as in Vacuum or Duration before or after the World Secondly I answer That Experience only helps them by giving them Knowledge and Knowledge according to them can only be had by means of Ideas wherefore they must either prove by other Grounds that Similitudes can give us Knowledge of the Things or they do petere Principium beg the Question and prove idem per idem For if meer Representations can give us no true Knowledge Experience which only assists us by giving us Ideas is quite thrown out of doors and may all be Fantastical All is wrong and falls short if the First Ground of our Knowledge be Incompetent and Insignificant Besides Experience gives us both Phantasms which are Material Representations and our Notions too which are Spiritual but Experience is not duely qualify'd to tell us which is the one and which is the other tho' this be of the highest Concern in our Case All it can do is to inform us that we are affected by some Agent working on our Senses Nay of the two it more inclines us to embrace Phantasms for Notions for those do make upon us the more Sensible Impression and cause a more lively Representation To distinguish perfectly between this False and True Ground of Knowledge is of the most weighty Importance of all other Points of Philosophy whatsoever and yet I must complain that not the least Care as far as I have observ'd is taken any where in this Treatise to distinguish them and particularly not in this Chapter which had been the proper Place to treat of that Subject But on the contrary as I have shewn above they are carelesly Confounded And I must declare that without settling this Point well we can never have any Certainty what Knowledge is Real what Fantastick Or when we do truly know when onely seem to know But there is not a Word here to that purpose 10. As for the Monsters and Changelings here spoken of I think Philosophers should have nothing to do with Lusus Naturae or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which are besides the ordinary Course of Nature but with the Common Course of Causes or Nature it self My Judgment is too that People should be very wary in Killing any Monsters that approach to Humane shape and that it were fitter there should be Hospitalls to breed them till perfect Observations were made concerning them The Novelty of the sight would invite Spectators and bear their Charges Unless perhaps there may be danger lest the Imaginations of the Apprehensive Sex who see such Uncouth Shapes or hear frequent Talk of them should by that occasion breed more of them What concerns us is to look to our Principles and not to be misled from them by reflecting on such odd preternatural Productions as I must think Mr. Locke is when he thinks Changelings to be something between a Man and a Beast The Division of Animal into Rational and Irrational is made by such Differences as are perfectly Contradictory to one another between which there can no more be any Third or Middle than there can be a Medium between is and is not If then that odd Birth be Rational let the shape be as Distorted as it will it is truly a Man if it be not let it look never so like a Man 't is a Brute When 't is the one when the other may hap in some odd cases to be Doubtful and then it belongs to the Prudence of Intelligent Men to decide it or if they cannot it becomes us in Christian Prudence to act
warily Indeed if the Definition of Man viz. Rational Animal be questionable we shall as I said above be at a great Loss to know our own Kind which would be but a melancholy Business And if we forego our Principles distinguishing between Corporeal and Spiritual Natures we may perhaps grow in time no wiser than the Common People amongst the Portugueses in Brazil who conceit the Apes and Monkies there have as much Wit as themselves have and could speak well enough too if they would but that out of a deep Reach of Policy they counterfeit themselves dumb and not to understand the Language lest they should be forced to work Corollary I. From this Discourse and the Evident Grounds of it all possibility of Vacuum is clearly confuted For if the Idea or Notion of Space be only an Inadequate Conception of Body whence 't is evidently taken or Body conceived according to such a Mode of it then to put Space without Body or where there is no Body is a perfect Contradiction Corallery II. Hence also tho' the Cartesians could demonstrate there are Innate Ideas which I judge impossible yet unless they declare and prove by their Principles that those Ideas are the things themselves in our Understanding and not Resemblances onely the same Arguments I have used against others will have equal or rather a far greater Force against them and conclude that they cannot by their Principles have Knowledge of any Thing but that they know Nothing And how they should pretend they are the Things themselves if they do not so much as allow them to be taken from the Things is altogether Inconceivable 11. Concerning Truth in General of which Mr. Locke treats in his 5th Chapter no more can be said speaking of Natural Truths but that it is the Things Existing such in our Minds as they exist in themselves For this put our Minds will be conformable to the Things whose Metaphysical Verity fixes them to be what they are or if we speak of them as affected with any Mode as they are Whence our Judgments concerning them being thus grounded cannot but be True What Mr. L.'s Joining or Separating of Signs c. has to do with Truth is beyond my Skill to comprehend for Signs are no more Truth than the Bush at the Door is the Wine in the Cellar I have demonstrated over and over that Ideas which he makes here one sort of Signs and are meer Similitudes can never give us Knowledge of Things much less can Truth which is the Object of Knowledge consist in conjoining or separating them and least of all can Truth consist in the Joining or Separating the other sorts of Signs viz. of Words without the Ideas or Notions for thus consider'd they are no more but Sounds or Characters To discourse this Point from its Fundamental Ground and declare it Literally The Metaphysical Verity of the Thing which put into a Proposition predicates the whole Thing or Mode of it self and affirms that the Thing is what it is gives us our First Truths or First Principles And all other Truths consists in this that Inadequate or Partial Notions or Conceptions of the Thing either as to what is Intrinsecal or Extrinsecal to it are predicated either of the Thing as in it self that is according to the Line of Substance which are call'd Essential Predicates as when we say Petrus est Animal or as it is affected with some Mode consistent in the same Subject as when we say Petrus est Albus Pater Locatus Galeatus Album est Dulce c. and it is impossible there can be any more sorts of Formal Truths but these two For all Predication is made by some kind of Identification as is plainly signify'd by the Copula is and there cannot possibly be any other sorts of Identification but either in the whole or not in the whole that is in part or according to Partial Conceptions of the same Thing nor can there be any Identification at all of Ideas Mr. Locke confessing that each of them is what it self is and no other 12. I take it to be a strange kind of Catechresis to make two sorts of Truth Montal and Verbal and we may with as good Sense say that a Tavern has two sorts of Wine one in the Cellar the other in the Bush at the Door for Words are good for nothing in the World but meerly and purely to Signifie So that when we say a Man speaks True the Sense of those Words can be only This that the Proposition he speaks does signifie such a Thought or Judgment in his Mind as is really Conformable to the Thing he thought or spoke of And I wonder this Great Man can imagin that in our more Complex Ideas we put the Name for the Idea it self for then that Name would signifie Nothing at all if neither the Thing nor the Idea be signified by it as he seems to hold Again Words differ from meer Sounds in this that they have some Sense or Meaning in them and Meanings are the very Notions we have in our Minds Wherefore the Parts of this Distinction of his would be coincident because all Verbal Truths were the Expression proper would necessarily be Mental ones and Mr. Locke seems to say the same § 8. where he makes those Truths which are barely Nominal to be Chimerical I grant too that Truths may be distinguish'd according to their several Subjects into Moral Physical Metaphysical c. But I must severely reflect on his describing Moral Truths § 11. to be the Speaking Things according to the Perswasion of our own Minds tho' the Proposition we speak does not agree to the Reality of Things For since it is most Evidently known that the Perswasions of Men's Minds not onely may but do frequently contradict one another by this Definition of Moral Truth both Sides of the Contradiction may be True which destroys Truth by confounding it with Falshood and makes the Art of Distinguishing ridiculous by making Truth a Genus to some sort of Falshood or not-Truth to be one kind of Truth 'T is a very dangerous thing in Philosophy to bring Distinctions unless each Member of the Notion divided includes the Notion of the Genus They were invented for clearing Truth but if ill made or ill-manag'd nothing in the World breeds greater Error and Confusion Corruptio optimi pessima REFLEXION Nineteenth ON The 6th 7th and 8th CHAPTERS 1. BY what has been deliver'd in my foregoing Reflexion my Notes upon his 6th Chapter Of Universal Propositions their Truth and Certainty will be easily understood But I am to premise First That the Question is not here what proves the Truth of such Propositions which is the work of Logick but whether there can be any Truth in them or Certainty of them at all or no. Secondly That the Formal Truth of Propositions can onely be in the Mind or that Mental Propositions onely are capable of Truth or Falslhood
tho' Words be needful to signify them And therefore I must deny that The Consideration of Words is a necessary part of the Treatise of Knowledge meaning by that word Philosophical Knowledge as our Circumstance determin us Let Logicians but take care that the Words be Univocal and not Equivocal or double sensed and all else that can be consider'd to belong to Truth is to be look'd for in the Mind and can be no where else Hence I cannot admit his Distinction of Certainty of Truth and Certainty of Knowledge in any other sense than that Knowledge is the Act and Truth the onely Object of that Act since nothing can be known to be what is not nor known to be True which is not True The Generical Notion Certainty should first have been explicated ere those two sorts of it had been defin'd otherwise both those Definitions must necessarily remain Unintelligible I shall presume that I have in my METHOD shown from its Grounds what Certainty is viz. The Determination of our Understanding or Judging Power by the Object 's actuating it or being actually in it as it is in its self With which what his putting together of Words in Verbal Propositions has to do surpasses my understanding And 't is as hard to conceive that General Truths can never be well made known and are very Seldom apprehended but as conceiv'd and express'd in Words That General Truths cannot be made known to others without Words is in a manner as Evident as 't is that we cannot see one anothers Thoughts nor is this peculiar to General Truths for scarcely can Particular ones be made known any other way But that they cannot be known or apprehended by our selves which seems here to be his meaning but as conceiv'd and express'd in Words is so far from Evident that the Contrary is such for it is impossible to express them in Words unless we do first apprehend and conceive them in our Thoughts and were not this so all the while we use Words in speaking of General Truths we should do nothing but talk of we know not what For our Thoughts and Apprehensions are ex Natura rei presupposed to the Words by which we express them and to do otherwise is to let our Tongue run before our Wit Whence we account them silly and Senseless people and Perverters of Nature who make use of Words before they know their Meaning 2. I have shown above that it is not necessary to our being Certain of any Proposition that we know the precise bounds and Extent of the Species it stands for but that 't is sufficient to know it in part Distinctly and the rest of it or the whole Confusedly provided that part of it which we know is sufficient to distinguish it from all other Species And were not this so it would follow that we never could know the Truth of any Universal Proposition whatever especially when we discourse of the Species Infima which requires a Complexion of very many Accidents whose precise Number and Bounds are utterly unknowable by us A Position which makes Logick useless scarce any Conclusion being deducible from Premisses unless one of them be an Universal and quite destroyes all Science which is employ'd about Universal or General Truths He instances in Man and Gold and judges that for want of knowing the Extent of their Species it is impossible with any Certainty to affirm that all Men are Rational or all Gold yellow We cannot indeed know this by considering every Individual Man by the poll But if by the word Man we mean no more but a Rational Animal it is so far from Impossible to know and affirm that All Men are Rational that 't is Impossible not to know it And were it a proper place to make good that Definition here I could demonstrate that it does agree to Man and can agree to nothing else and therefore that Definition is True and Adequate Nor can the contrary be sustaind any other way but by unacquainting us with our selves and our own Kind and by jumbling together these Species which are distinguisht by Contradictory Differences and Confounding the vastly-Distinct Natures and Properties of Corporeal and Spiritual Beings As for the Species of Gold Yellowness which he instances in is not Essential to it as Rationality is to Man as being but one of those Accidents by which we distinguish it from other Species of Minerals and I have hinted some other formerly which are more Intrinsecal and Essential to it than its Colour Again we are moreover Certain by manifest and daily experience and by the constant and Common Practise of the World that Mankind is acquainted with enow of those Accidents to distinguish it One bespeaks a Golden Cup and the Goldsmith makes it for him Nor was it ever heard that any of this Trade did hope to Cozen a Sensible Man by obtruding upon the Buyer Brass or any other Mettal for Gold or if he did that Goldsmith's-Hall could not distinguish it Nay if it be but a little alloyd there are ways to find it out which shows that Mankind is furnisht with means enow to distinguish Gold from other Mettals and for the same reason other things also tho' the Extent of all the Species and their precise bounds be not exactly known to those Speculaters who will needs forgo their Natural Knowledge of Things to pursue Scrupulous Fancies which let loose to fly at rovers are too hard for their Reason Unestablish'd by Principles 3. Hence an Answer is given to Mr. Locke's Acute Difficulty viz. That 't is impossible for us to know that this or that Quality or Idea has a necessary Connexion with a Real Essence of which we have no Idea at all that is according to his Principles no Knowledge For since a Real Essence is that which constitutes such a kind of Ens or Species and what distinguishes an Entity or Species from all others does also make it this or that Species that is does constitute it it follows that since by my Discourse here we have such a Degree of Knowledge of that kind of Ens called Gold as to distinguish it from all others we have a Sufficient and True tho' not an Adequate and Distinct Knowledge of its Essence too that constitutes it such a kind of Ens. Indeed if nothing will content us but Superfluous Knowledge for Curiosity sake of each particular Mode that belongs to that Essence 't is no wonder if we labour in vain and by over-straining to go beyond our selves in this State fall short of our Aim I must confess that it would concern us much as we are to know whether there be any Quality which we do not yet know in the Thing inconsistent with those we do know for this would blunder our Notion of it and make it Chimerical But as it is impossible Creative Wisdom should lay Grounds for Contradiction so in case those Qualities be all Consistent where is the harm not to know
above of the Word Ideas that we can build no Degree of Certainty nor Improvement of Knowledge upon it especially since Mr. Locke himself according to his usual Candour and Modesty declares here he does but think it true But which is the hardest Case of all to embrace this Principle we must be oblig'd to quit all our Self-evident Maxims as of little Use upon which our selves and all the Learned part of the World have proceeded hitherto 12. 'T is a great Truth that it is a right Method of advancing Knowledge to Consider our Abstract Notions But if these be not the Things nor as Mr. Locke's Complex Ideas are so much as like them I see not but that let us Consider them as much as we will we shall be never the nearer attaining any Real Knowledge by such a Consideration I add that it is also as necessary to find out Middle Terms that are Proper without which no Science can be had of any New Conclusion nor consequently can we without this advance one Step in Exact Knowledge 'T is a certain Truth also that Morality is capable of Demonstration tho' I do not remember that any Author but Mr. Locke and my self have been so bold as openly to profess it The Current of Slight Speculaters having long endeavour'd to make it pass for a kind of Maxim that there is no perfect Certainty to be had but only in Lines and Numbers Whereas the Principles of Morality are as Evident and the Notions belonging to such Subjects as Clear as those in Natural Philosophy perhaps Clearer as this worthy Author has shewn most manifestly 'T is also True that Knowledge may be better'd by Experience But if he means Scientifical Knowledge which is the Effect of Demonstration I must deny it unless Common Principles of Nature do guide Experience and give it Light of the True and Proper Causes of what Experience inform'd our Senses for without their Assistance as I have shewn in the Preface to my my Method Experimental Knowledge can never produce any one Scientifical Conclusion I add that True Science would be a Thousand times more advanc'd did Learned Men bend their Endeavours to begin with the Primary Affections of Body and thence proceed gradually to Secondary or more Compounded ones For this Method would furnish Studious Men with good Store of Proper Middle Terms to deduce their Demonstrations Lastly 'T is true that we must beware of Hypotheses and Wrong Principles But where shall we find any Sect. of Philosophers who for want of Exact Skill in Logick and Metaphysicks are not forc'd to build upon Hypotheses and those generally False ones too but our Anti-Ideists whom I take to be true Followers of Aristotle in his main Principles and the only true Understanders of his Doctrine It being indeed scarce possible that those who are not well qualify'd with those two Sciences should be capable to Comprehend his True Sense 13. Mr. Locke judges that a Man may pore long enough on those Maxims us'd by Euclid without seeing one jot the more of Mathematical Truths Self-evident Truths need not be por'd upon at all nor were they ever meant for the attaining New Knowledges by poring on those Propositions singly consider'd Yet these Maxims must be pre-supposed to be True and admitted or the Arguments would very often want their best Cement that gives them an evident and necessary Coherence They are prefix'd by Euclid at first both because they may often come in play afterwards as also because it would throw off the Tenour of the Discourse to mention them still expresly every time there needs Recourse to them Whence it was judg'd fit by him and others like him to premise them at first and then refer to them Let Men but observe how and in what Occasions Euclid makes use of them and it will then be best seen what they are good for But if they are good for nothing at all I am sure it must be concluded that both Euclid himself and such Writers and Users of Maxims were all of them a Company of vain idle Fops to amuse their Readers by proposing so solemnly such Ridiculous Trifles and dubbing those Insignificant Baubles with the Honourable Titles of Maxims and Principles To fix which Dis-repute upon him and his Imitaters will I doubt much Scandalize every True Member of the Commonwealth of Learning REFLEXION 21th ON The Fourteenth Fifteenth and Sixteenth CHAPTERS 1. I Am sorry I must declare that in Mr. Locke's 14th Chapter which treats Of Judgment there is scarce one Line that I can yield to I discourse thus Judgment does most evidently import the Fixure of our Understanding in its Assent to the Truth or Falshood of any Proposition For to say I judge a thing to be so is the same as to say I am fully and firmly persuaded it is so Now this Fixure of the Mind may arise from two Causes Reason and Passion Under the Word Reason taken at large I comprehend all kind of Evident Knowledge whatever that can belong to a Rational Creature To Passion belongs all Precipitancy of Assent from what Motive or Cause soever it springs The Former makes us adhere to what we judge upon such Motives as by their Evidence do determine the Understanding to Assent and fix it in that Assent which Motives therefore can be only such as are purely Intellectual or such as by our Proceeding upon them we see clearly the Thing must be so or not so as we apprehend The Later springs from the Will corrupted and byassed by some Interest or Pleasure which inveigles our Understanding to adhere to it as a Truth because the Will would have it so Again there are two sorts of Objects Man as having two Natures in him may be employ'd about viz. Outward Action and Inward Assent The former does generally concern the External Conveniences or Necessities of our Temporal Life here the Later the Interiour and Natural Perfection of our Soul which is the Adhering to Truth and rejecting of Errour In the Former of these we can have no Clear Evidence or very seldom both because Outward Actions are employ'd about Particulars of which we can have no Science as also because those Particulars about which we are to Act are surrounded with almost Innumerable Circumstances which we cannot Comprehend and way-laid by the Undiscoverable Ambushes of Fortune so that we can seldom or never with absolute Certainty know whether they may or may not prove Successful Notwithstanding which Dangers when there is Necessity or great Conveniency to Act Outwardly we may without disparaging our Reason fall to acting upon a Probability the Necessity obliging us to do so and the Impossibility of perfect Assurance acquitting us of Imprudence But of Assenting or of Judging Inwardly that a Proposition is True or False there can be no Necessity unless Evidence forces us to it in regard God's Goodness has furnish'd us with a Faculty of Suspending our Judgment in such Cases lest we
Ens adequately divided into Body and Spirit 8. Vacuum must either be Res or Modus Rei otherwise we can have no Notion of it 9. The Extravagant Arguments for Vacuum refuted 10. VVe can set Bounds to Space Time and to all Durations but God's 11. Annihilation implies a Contradiction and is not an Act of Omnipotency but of Impotency 12. The Cartesians can hardly avoid Vacuum 13. The having an Idea of Vacuum distinct from that of Plenum no Argument to prove it Reflexion Eighth § 1. THE plain Sense of the Vulgar gives us the true Notion of Time 2. Duration is not Succession but rather Opposite to it 3. 'T is a strange Paradox to say the Notion of Succession or Duration is to be taken from the Train of Ideas in our Mind 4. Our not perceiving Duration when we Sleep no Argument for it 5. This Tenet is against Experience 6. And against the Nature of Things and of Resemblances too 7. One Motion if Known and Regular may and must be a Measure to another 8. There is no Shew of Reason that the Equality of the Periods of Duration can possibly be taken from the Train of our Ideas 9. This odd Tenet not positively asserted by Mr. Locke Reflexion Ninth § 1. IMaginary Time before the VVorld a meer Illusion of Fancy 2. They who advance Tenets against Nature must alter the Meaning of those VVords that express our Natural Notions 3. God's Immensity not Commensurate to an Infinitely Expanded Space 4. VVe can have no Notion of a Vacuum but a Fancy onely 5. Scripture-Texts the worst sort of Arguments for Philosophers unless they be most Plain and Literally meant 6. Onely Self-Existence and what flows from that Notion is peculiar to God 7. Our Natural Notions assure us that 't is meer Fancy to explicate God's Attributes by respect to Corporeal Natures Reflexion Tenth § 1. ENdless Addition of Numbers can never give us the Notion of Infinity 2. How we come to have that Notion 3. And with what Ease 4. The Notion of Infinite is most perfectly Positive 5. Duration easily conceivable without Succession Reflexion Eleventh § 1. THoughts are not to be called Sensations § 2. Thinking is the Action and not the Essence of the Soul § 3. Mr. Locke's Position that Things are Good or Evil onely in reference to Pleasure or Pain is True and Solid Reflexion Twelfth § 1. THE due Commendation of Mr. Locke's Doctrine in this Chapter of Power 2. That some Spiritual Agent is the First Mover of Bodies The VVill cannot move our Bodies 3. The Understanding and VVill not Distinct Powers 4. Man's Freedom or Self-Determination deduced from Principles 5. The Difference between Men and Brutes in their Determination to Action 6. Man naturally pursues what is according to Reason or Virtuous Therefore his Nature has been perverted since his Creation 7. Therefore Supernatural Motives are added to strengthen Man's Weaken'd Nature or Reason 8. Supernatural Motives being the Stronger would always prevail were they duely apply'd to a Subject disposed 9. Why the Understanding and VVill must be the same Power Substantially 10. How to Conquer in our Spiritual Warfare 11. 'T is evident that Man Determins himself to Action 12. Yet as Pre-determin'd by God 13. Determination to Virtuous Action does perfect and not destroy Freedom 14. Good if evidently appearing such does certainly Determin the VVill. 15. How Wrong Judgments come § 16. Sin generally springs from True but Disproportionate Judgments 17. Of Uneasiness and Mr. Locke's Discourse concerning it 18. Good is the onely Determiner of the Will and not Uneasiness 19. Prov'd from our Natural Defire of Happiness 20. The Appearance of Good is of Greatest Weight but in a manner disregarded by Mr. Locke 21. Putting this Appearance his Reasons do not conclude 22. Prov'd because Ease is not the Perfection of a Soul 23. The Truth of this Point stated 24. Mr. Locke omits here the Idea of Power to be a Thing tho' Nature suggests and forces it Reflexion Thirteenth § 1. OUR Mixture of our Notions is Regular Mr. Locke's Irregular and Disorderly 2. Without knowing what Substance or Thing is we cannot pretend to Philosophy 3. All our Notions and amongst them that of Substance or Res is taken from the Thing 4. We cannot be Ignorant of the Notion of Substance or Thing 5. We know the more Inferiour Notions of Things less perfectly And Individual Essence the least of all 6. To gain a Distinct Notion of Substance or Thing we must consider it abstractedly from its Modes singly Consider'd 7. The Literal Truth how Substance and its Accidents or the Thing and its Modes are exactly known § 8. 'T is impossible not to know Extension it being in a manner Self-evident 9. The Cohesion of Extended Parts is above Physical Proofs and can onely be known by Metaphysicks 10. Whence 't is in vain to seek for Natural Efficient Causes for those Effects that depend on Formal Causes 11. We may have Clear Knowledge of Spiritual Natures by Reflexion 12. The Reason why and the Manner how Reflexion Fourteenth § 1. THE Mind alone does not collect Notions or compare them 2. Verbal Relations come not from Defect in our Language but for want of a Real Ground 3. What Causality is and what Grounds the Relations of Cause and Effect 4. The Knowing the Principle of Individuation must antecede the Knowledge of Identity and Diversity 5. What gives the Ground to specifie all Notions 6. What gives the Ground to our Notions of the Individuum 7. How Individual Men are constituted 8. Existence cannot possibly be the Principle of Individuation 9. The Outward Circumstances of Time and Place cannot conduce to constitute the Individual Essence 10. An Individual Man is formally an Individual Thing of that Kind and an Individual Person too § 11. The Essence of Things not to be taken from the Judgment of the Vulgar nor from Extravagant Suppositions 12. Consciousness cannot constitute Personal Identity 13. That Consciousness is Inseparable from every Individual Man 14. Yet Angels who are pure Acts are Constituted in part by the Act of Knowing themselves 15. No Soul is Indifferent to any Matter The Notion of the Individuum is Essential The Substance is the same tho' some Quantity of the Matter does come and go Reflexion Fifteenth § 1. THat is onely True Virtue which is according to Right Reason 2. How we come to have Confus'd Ideas or Notions 3. The VVhole Thing as it needs not so it cannot be known clearly 4. The Metaphysical Reason why this Complexion of Accidents which constitutes Individuums should be almost infinitely Various 5. VVe can Sufficiently know Things without Comprehending fully this Complexion 6. No Formal Truth or Falshood in Ideas or Notions Reflexion Sixteenth § 1. WHence Proper and Metaphorical Notions and VVords have their Origin 2. The General Rules to know the Right Sense of VVords § 3. Words of Art most liable to be mistaken 4. The Way how to avoid being
nice respect The Common Explication of Extension defended Ens adequately divided into Body and Spirit Vacuum must either be Res or Modus Rei otherwise we can have no Notion of it * Preliminary 4. §. 39. The Extravagant Arguments for Vacuum refuted Psal. 103. v. 24. We can set Bounds to Space Time and to all Duration but GOD's Annihilation implies a Contradiction and is not an Act of Omnipotency but of Impotency The Cartesians can hardly avoid Vacuum The having an Idea of Vacuum distinct from that of Plenum no Argument to prove it The plain Sense of the Vulgar gives us the true Notion of Time Duration is not Succession but rather opposit to it 'T is a strange Paradox to say the Notion of Succession or Duration is to be taken from the Train of Ideas in our Head Our not Perceiving Duration when we Sleep no Argument for it This Tenet is against Experience And against the Nature of Things and of Resemblances too One Motion if Known and Regular may and must be a Measure to another There is no shew of Reason that the Equality of the Periods of Duration can possibly be taken from the Train of our Ideas This odd Tenet not positively asserted by Mr. L. ImaginaryTime before the World a meer Illusion of Fancy They who advance Tenets against Nature must alter the Meaning of those Words that express our Natural Notions God's Immensity not Commensurate to an Infinitely Expanded Space We can have no Notion of a Vacuum but a Fancy only Scripture-Texts the worst sort of Arguments for Philosophers unless they be most Plain and Literally meant Only Self Existence and what flows from that Notion is Peculiar to GOD. Our Natural Notions assure us that 't is meer Fancy to explicate GOD's Attributes by respect to Corporeal Natures Endless Addition of Numbers can never give us the Notion of Infinity How we come to have that Notion * Prelim. 4. § 31 32. And with what Ease The Notion of Infinite is most perfectly Positive Duration easily conceivable without Succession * James 1. 17. * Apocal. cap. 1. v. 7. Thoughts are not to be call'd Sensations Thinking is the Action and not the Essence of the Soul Mr. L.'s Position that Things are Good or Evil only in reference to Pleasure or Pain is True and Solid The due Commendation of Mr. L's Doctrine in this Chapter of Power That some Spiritual Agent is the First Mover of Bodies The Will cannot move our Bodies * Preliminary 4. §. 25. 26. Refl 5. §. 1. The Understanding and Will not Distinct Powers Man's Freedom or Self determination deduced from Principles The Difference between Man and Brutes in their Determination to Action Man naturally pursues what is according to Reason or Virtuous Therefore his Nature has been perverted since his Creation Therefore Supernatural Motives are added to strengthen Man's weaken'd Nature or Reason Supernatural Motives being the stronger would always prevail were they duly Apply'd to a Subject dispos'd Why the Understanding and Will must be the same Power substantially How to conquer in our Spiritual Warfare 'T is evident that Man determines himself to Action Yet as Predetermin'd by GOD. Determination to Virtuous Action does perfect and not destroy Freedom Good if evidently Appearing such does certainly determine the Will How Wrong Judgments come Sin generally springs from True but Disproportionate Judgments Of Uneasiness and Mr. L's discourse concerning it Good is the only Determiner of the Will and not Uneasiness Prov'd from our Natural Desire of Happiness The Appearance of the Good is of greatest weight but in a manner disregarded by Mr. Locke Putting this Appearance his Reasons do not conclude Prov'd because Ease is not the Perfection of a Soul The Truth of this Point stated Mr. L. omits here the Idea of Power to be a Thing tho' Nature suggests iâ— Our Mixture of our Notions is Regular Mr. L.'s Irregular and Disorderly Without knowing what Substance or Thing is we cannos pretend to Philosophy All our Notions and amongst them that of Substance or Res is taken from the Thing We cannot be Ignorant of the Notion of Substance or Thing We know the more Inferiour Notions of Things less perfectly And the Individual Essence least of all To gain a Distinct Notion of Substance or Thing me must consider it abstractedly from its Modes singly consider'd The Literal Truth how Substance and its Accidents or the Thing and its Modes are distinctly known 'T is impossible not to know Extension is being in a manner Self-evident The Cohesion of Extended Parts is above Physical Proofs and can only be known by Metaphysicks Whence 't is in vain to seek for Natural Efficient Causes for those Effects that depend on Formal Causes We may have Clear Knowledge of Spiritual Natures by Reflexion The Reason Why and the Manner How * Reflex 9. §. 7. * See Method to Science B. 4. C. 6. §. 18. The Mind alone does not collect Notions or compare them Verbal Relations come not from Defect in our Language but for want of a Real Ground What Causality is and what grounds the Relations of Cause and Effect The Knowing the Principle of Individuation must anteceede the Knowledge of Identity and Diversity What gives the Ground to Specify all Notions What gives the Ground to our Notions of the Individuum How Individual Men are constituted * Method to Science B. 2. L. 1. §. 10. Existence cannot possibly be the Principle of Individuation The Outward Circumstances of Time and Place cannot conduce to constitute the Individual Essences An Individual Man is formally an Individual Thing of that Kind and an Individual Person too The Essence of Things not to be taken from the Judgment of the Vulgar nor from Extravagant Suppositions Consciousness cannot constitute Personal Identity * Reflex 2. § 2 3 4 5. That Consciousnes is Inseparable from every Individual Man Yet Angels who are Pure Acts are constituted in part by the Act of Knowing themselves No Soul is Indifferent to any Matter The Notion of the Individuum is Essential The Substance is the same tho' some Quantity of the Matter does come and go That is only true Virtue which is according to Right Reason How we come to have Confused Ideas or Notions The whole Thing as it needs not so it cannot be known clearly The Metaphysical Reason why this Complexion of Accidents which constitutes Individuums should be almost infinitely various * Job 36. 26. We can sufficiently know Things without comprehending fully this Câ—mplexion No Formal Truth or Falshood in Ideas or Notions Whence Proper and Metaphorical Notions and Words have their Origin The General Rules to know the right Sense of Words Words of Art most liable to be mistaken The way how to avoid being mistaken in Words of Art Even in Terms of Art the Thing is chiefly signify'd Metaphysical Words not Unintelligible but most Clear This Third Book concerning Words seems Unnecessary Whence J. S. is not much concern'd to