1. Of the two kinds of knowledge. 2. Truth and evidence necessary to
knowledge. 3. Evidence defined. 4. Science defined. 5.
Supposition defined. 6. Opinion defined. 7. Belief defined. 8.
Conscience defined. 9. Belief, in some cases, no less from doubt
than knowledge.
[Sidenote: Of the two kinds of knowledge.]
1. There is a story somewhere, of one that pretends to have been
miraculously cured of blindness, wherewith he was born, by St. Alban
or other Saints, at the town of St. Alban’s; and that the Duke of
Gloucester being there, to be satisfied of the truth of the miracle,
asked the man, What colour is this? who, by answering, it was green,
discovered himself, and was punished for a counterfeit: for though
by his sight newly received he might distinguish between green, and
red, and all other colours, as well as any that should interrogate
him, yet he could not possibly know at first sight which of them was
called green, or red, or by any other name. By this we may
understand, there be _two kinds_ of knowledge, whereof the _one_ is
nothing else but _sense_, or knowledge _original_, as I have said in
the beginning of the second chapter, and _remembrance_ of the same;
the _other_ is called _science_ or knowledge of the _truth of
propositions_, and how things are called, and is derived from
_understanding_. Both of these sorts are but _experience_; the
former being the experience of the effects of things that work upon
us from _without_; and the latter experience men have from the
proper use of _names_ in language: and all experience being, as I
have said, but remembrance, all knowledge is remembrance: and of the
_former_, the register we keep in books, is called _history_; but
the registers of the _latter_ are called the _sciences_.
[Sidenote: Truth and evidence necessary to knowledge.]
2. There are _two things_ necessarily implied in this word
_knowledge_; the one is _truth_, the other _evidence_; for what is
not truth, can never be known. For, let a man say he knoweth a thing
never so well, if the same shall afterwards appear false, he is
driven to confession, that it was not knowledge, but opinion.
Likewise, if the truth be not evident, though a man holdeth it, yet
is his knowledge thereof no more than theirs who hold the contrary:
for if truth were enough to make it knowledge, all truth were known;
which is not so.
[Sidenote: Evidence defined.]
3. What _truth_ is, hath been defined in the precedent chapter; what
_evidence_ is, I _now_ set down: and it is the concomitance of a
man’s _conception_ with the _words_ that signify such conception in
the act of ratiocination: for when a man reasoneth with his lips
only, to which the mind suggesteth only the beginning, and followeth
not the words of his mouth with the conceptions of his mind, out of
custom of so speaking; though he begin his ratiocination with true
propositions, and proceed with certain syllogisms, and thereby make
always true conclusions; yet are not his conclusions _evident_ to
him, for want of the _concomitance of conception_ with his words:
for if the words alone were sufficient, a _parrot_ might be taught
as well to know truth, as to speak it. Evidence is to truth, as the
sap to the tree, which, so far as it creepeth along with the body
and branches, keepeth them alive; where it forsaketh them, they die:
for this evidence, which is meaning with our words, is the life of
truth.
[Sidenote: Science defined.]
4. Knowledge thereof, which we call _science_, I define to be
_evidence of truth_, from some beginning or principle of _sense_:
for the truth of a proposition is never evident, until we conceive
the meaning of the words or terms whereof it consisteth, which are
always conceptions of the mind: nor can we remember those
conceptions, without the thing that produced the same by our senses.
The _first_ principle of knowledge is, that we have such and such
_conceptions_; the _second_, that we have thus and thus _named_ the
things whereof they are conceptions; the _third_ is, that we have
_joined_ those _names_ in such manner as to make true propositions;
the _fourth_ and last is, that we have _joined_ those _propositions_
in such manner as they be concluding, and the truth of the
conclusion said to be known. And of these two kinds of knowledge,
whereof the former is _experience of fact_, and the latter _evidence
of truth_; as the _former_, if it be great, is called _prudence_; so
the _latter_, if it be much, hath usually been called, both by
ancient and modern writers, _sapience_ or wisdom: and of this
_latter_, _man_ only is capable; of the _former_, _brute beasts_
also participate.
[Sidenote: Supposition defined.]
5. A proposition is said to be _supposed_, when, being _not
evident_, it is nevertheless _admitted for a time_, to the end,
that, joining to it other propositions, we may _conclude_ something;
and to _proceed_ from conclusion to conclusion, for a _trial_
whether the same will lead us into any _absurd_ or impossible
conclusion; which if it _do_, then we know such supposition to have
been false.
[Sidenote: Opinion defined.]
6. But if running through _many_ conclusions, we come to _none_ that
are _absurd_, then we think the proposition _probable_; likewise we
think probable whatsoever proposition we _admit_ for truth by error
of reasoning, or from trusting to other men: and all such
propositions as are admitted by _trust_ or error, we are not said to
_know_, but to _think_ them to be true; and the admittance of them
is called _opinion_.
[Sidenote: Belief defined.]
7. And particularly, when the opinion is admitted out of _trust_ to
_other_ men, they are said to _believe_ it; and their admittance of
it is called _belief_, and sometimes _faith_.
[Sidenote: Conscience defined.]
8. It is either _science_ or _opinion_ which we commonly mean by the
word _conscience_: for men say that such and such a thing is true in
or upon their conscience; which they _never_ do, when they think it
_doubtful_; and therefore they _know_, or _think_ they know it to be
true. But men, when they say things upon their conscience, are not
therefore presumed certainly to know the truth of what they say; it
remaineth then, that that word is used by them that have an
_opinion_, _not_ only of the _truth_ of the thing, _but_ also of
their _knowledge_ of it, to which the _truth_ of the proposition is
consequent. _Conscience_ I therefore define to be _opinion of
evidence_.
[Sidenote: Belief, in some cases, no less from doubt than
knowledge.]
9. _Belief_, which is the admitting of propositions upon _trust_, in
many cases is no less free from _doubt_, than perfect and manifest
_knowledge_: for as there is nothing whereof there is not some
cause; so, when there is doubt, there must be some cause thereof
conceived. Now there be many things which we receive from _report of
others_, of which it is impossible to imagine any cause of _doubt_:
for what can be opposed against the consent of all men, in things
they can know, and have no cause to report otherwise than they are,
such as is a great part of our _histories_, unless a man would say
that all the world had _conspired_ to deceive him.
And thus much of _sense_, _imagination_, _discursion_,
_ratiocination_, and _knowledge_, which are the acts of our _power
cognitive_, or _conceptive_. That power of the _mind_ which we call
_motive_, differeth from the power _motive_ of the _body_; for the
power _motive_ of the _body_ is that by which it _moveth other_
bodies, and we call _strength_: but the power motive of the _mind_,
is that by which the mind giveth _animal motion_ to that _body_
wherein it existeth; the acts hereof are our _affections_ and
_passions_, of which I am to speak in general.
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