COMPLEX IDEAS OF SIMPLE MODES:—AND FIRST, OF THE SIMPLE MODES OF IDEA
OF SPACE.
1. Simple modes of simple ideas.
Though in the foregoing part I have often mentioned simple ideas, which
are truly the materials of all our knowledge; yet having treated of
them there, rather in the way that they come into the mind, than as
distinguished from others more compounded, it will not be perhaps amiss
to take a view of some of them again under this consideration, and
examine those different modifications of the SAME idea; which the mind
either finds in things existing, or is able to make within itself
without the help of any extrinsical object, or any foreign suggestion.
Those modifications of any ONE simple idea (which, as has been said, I
call SIMPLE MODES) are as perfectly different and distinct ideas in the
mind as those of the greatest distance or contrariety. For the idea of
two is as distinct from that of one, as blueness from heat, or either
of them from any number: and yet it is made up only of that simple idea
of an unit repeated; and repetitions of this kind joined together make
those distinct simple modes, of a dozen, a gross, a million. Simple
Modes of Idea of Space.
2. Idea of Space.
I shall begin with the simple idea of SPACE. I have showed above, chap.
4, that we get the idea of space, both by our sight and touch; which, I
think, is so evident, that it would be as needless to go to prove that
men perceive, by their sight, a distance between bodies of different
colours, or between the parts of the same body, as that they see
colours themselves: nor is it less obvious, that they can do so in the
dark by feeling and touch.
3. Space and Extension.
This space, considered barely in length between any two beings, without
considering anything else between them, is called DISTANCE: if
considered in length, breadth, and thickness, I think it may be called
CAPACITY. When considered between the extremities of matter, which
fills the capacity of space with something solid, tangible, and
moveable, it is properly called EXTENSION. And so extension is an idea
belonging to body only; but space may, as is evident, be considered
without it. At least I think it most intelligible, and the best way to
avoid confusion, if we use the word extension for an affection of
matter or the distance of the extremities of particular solid bodies;
and space in the more general signification, for distance, with or
without solid matter possessing it.
4. Immensity.
Each different distance is a different modification of space; and each
idea of any different distance, or space, is a SIMPLE MODE of this
idea. Men having, by accustoming themselves to stated lengths of space,
which they use for measuring other distances—as a foot, a yard or a
fathom, a league, or diameter of the earth—made those ideas familiar to
their thoughts, can, in their minds, repeat them as often as they will,
without mixing or joining to them the idea of body, or anything else;
and frame to themselves the ideas of long, square, or cubic feet, yards
or fathoms, here amongst the bodies of the universe, or else beyond the
utmost bounds of all bodies; and, by adding these still one to another,
enlarge their ideas of space as much as they please. The power of
repeating or doubling any idea we have of any distance, and adding it
to the former as often as we will, without being ever able to come to
any stop or stint, let us enlarge it as much as we will, is that which
gives us the idea of IMMENSITY.
5. Figure.
There is another modification of this idea, which is nothing but the
relation which the parts of the termination of extension, or
circumscribed space, have amongst themselves. This the touch discovers
in sensible bodies, whose extremities come within our reach; and the
eye takes both from bodies and colours, whose boundaries are within its
view: where, observing how the extremities terminate,—either in
straight lines which meet at discernible angles, or in crooked lines
wherein no angles can be perceived; by considering these as they relate
to one another, in all parts of the extremities of any body or space,
it has that idea we call FIGURE, which affords to the mind infinite
variety. For, besides the vast number of different figures that do
really exist in the coherent masses of matter, the stock that the mind
has in its power, by varying the idea of space, and thereby making
still new compositions, by repeating its own ideas, and joining them as
it pleases, is perfectly inexhaustible. And so it can multiply figures
IN INFINITUM.
6. Endless variety of figures.
For the mind having a power to repeat the idea of any length directly
stretched out, and join it to another in the same direction, which is
to double the length of that straight line; or else join another with
what inclination it thinks fit, and so make what sort of angle it
pleases: and being able also to shorten any line it imagines, by taking
from it one half, one fourth, or what part it pleases, without being
able to come to an end of any such divisions, it can make an angle of
any bigness. So also the lines that are its sides, of what length it
pleases, which joining again to other lines, of different lengths, and
at different angles, till it has wholly enclosed any space, it is
evident that it can multiply figures, both in their shape and capacity,
IN INFINITUM; all which are but so many different simple modes of
space.
The same that it can do with straight lines, it can also do with
crooked, or crooked and straight together; and the same it can do in
lines, it can also in superficies; by which we may be led into farther
thoughts of the endless variety of figures that the mind has a power to
make, and thereby to multiply the simple modes of space.
7. Place.
Another idea coming under this head, and belonging to this tribe, is
that we call PLACE. As in simple space, we consider the relation of
distance between any two bodies or points; so in our idea of place, we
consider the relation of distance betwixt anything, and any two or more
points, which are considered as keeping the same distance one with
another, and so considered as at rest. For when we find anything at the
same distance now which it was yesterday, from any two or more points,
which have not since changed their distance one with another, and with
which we then compared it, we say it hath kept the same place: but if
it hath sensibly altered its distance with either of those points, we
say it hath changed its place: though, vulgarly speaking, in the common
notion of place, we do not always exactly observe the distance from
these precise points, but from larger portions of sensible objects, to
which we consider the thing placed to bear relation, and its distance
from which we have some reason to observe.
8. Place relative to particular bodies.
Thus, a company of chess-men, standing on the same squares of the
chess-board where we left them, we say they are all in the SAME place,
or unmoved, though perhaps the chessboard hath been in the mean time
carried out of one room into another; because we compared them only to
the parts of the chess-board, which keep the same distance one with
another. The chess-board, we also say, is in the same place it was, if
it remain in the same part of the cabin, though perhaps the ship which
it is in sails all the while. And the ship is said to be in the same
place, supposing it kept the same distance with the parts of the
neighbouring land; though perhaps the earth hath turned round, and so
both chess-men, and board, and ship, have every one changed place, in
respect of remoter bodies, which have kept the same distance one with
another. But yet the distance from certain parts of the board being
that which determines the place of the chess-men; and the distance from
the fixed parts of the cabin (with which we made the comparison) being
that which determined the place of the chess-board; and the fixed parts
of the earth that by which we determined the place of the ship,—these
things may be said to be in the same place in those respects: though
their distance from some other things, which in this matter we did not
consider, being varied, they have undoubtedly changed place in that
respect; and we ourselves shall think so, when we have occasion to
compare them with those other.
9. Place relative to a present purpose.
But this modification of distance we call place, being made by men for
their common use, that by it they might be able to design the
particular position of things, where they had occasion for such
designation; men consider and determine of this place by reference to
those adjacent things which best served to their present purpose,
without considering other things which, to another purpose, would
better determine the place of the same thing. Thus in the chess-board,
the use of the designation of the place of each chess-man being
determined only within that chequered piece of wood, it would cross
that purpose to measure it by anything else; but when these very
chess-men are put up in a bag, if any one should ask where the black
king is, it would be proper to determine the place by the part of the
room it was in, and not by the chessboard; there being another use of
designing the place it is now in, than when in play it was on the
chessboard, and so must be determined by other bodies. So if any one
should ask, in what place are the verses which report the story of
Nisus and Euryalus, it would be very improper to determine this place,
by saying, they were in such a part of the earth, or in Bodley’s
library: but the right designation of the place would be by the parts
of Virgil’s works; and the proper answer would be, that these verses
were about the middle of the ninth book of his AEneids, and that they
have been always constantly in the same place ever since Virgil was
printed: which is true, though the book itself hath moved a thousand
times, the use of the idea of place here being, to know in what part of
the book that story is, that so, upon occasion, we may know where to
find it, and have recourse to it for use.
10. Place of the universe.
That our idea of place is nothing else but such a relative position of
anything as I have before mentioned, I think is plain, and will be
easily admitted, when we consider that we can have no idea of the place
of the universe, though we can of all the parts of it; because beyond
that we have not the idea of any fixed, distinct, particular beings, in
reference to which we can imagine it to have any relation of distance;
but all beyond it is one uniform space or expansion, wherein the mind
finds no variety, no marks. For to say that the world is somewhere,
means no more than that it does exist; this, though a phrase borrowed
from place, signifying only its existence, not location: and when one
can find out, and frame in his mind, clearly and distinctly the place
of the universe, he will be able to tell us whether it moves or stands
still in the undistinguishable inane of infinite space: though it be
true that the word place has sometimes a more confused sense, and
stands for that space which anybody takes up; and so the universe is in
a place. The idea, therefore, of place we have by the same means that
we get the idea of space, (whereof this is but a particular limited
consideration,) viz. by our sight and touch; by either of which we
receive into our minds the ideas of extension or distance.
11. Extension and Body not the same.
There are some that would persuade us, that body and extension are the
same thing, who either change the signification of words, which I would
not suspect them of,—they having so severely condemned the philosophy
of others, because it hath been too much placed in the uncertain
meaning, or deceitful obscurity of doubtful or insignificant terms. If,
therefore, they mean by body and extension the same that other people
do, viz. by BODY something that is solid and extended, whose parts are
separable and movable different ways; and by EXTENSION, only the space
that lies between the extremities of those solid coherent parts, and
which is possessed by them,—they confound very different ideas one with
another; for I appeal to every man’s own thoughts, whether the idea of
space be not as distinct from that of solidity, as it is from the idea
of scarlet colour? It is true, solidity cannot exist without extension,
neither can scarlet colour exist without extension, but this hinders
not, but that they are distinct ideas. Many ideas require others, as
necessary to their existence or conception, which yet are very distinct
ideas. Motion can neither be, nor be conceived, without space; and yet
motion is not space, nor space motion; space can exist without it, and
they are very distinct ideas; and so, I think, are those of space and
solidity. Solidity is so inseparable an idea from body, that upon that
depends its filling of space, its contact, impulse, and communication
of motion upon impulse. And if it be a reason to prove that spirit is
different from body, because thinking includes not the idea of
extension in it; the same reason will be as valid, I suppose, to prove
that space is not body, because it includes not the idea of solidity in
it; SPACE and SOLIDITY being as distinct ideas as THINKING and
EXTENSION, and as wholly separable in the mind one from another. Body
then and extension, it is evident, are two distinct ideas. For,
12. Extension not solidity.
First, Extension includes no solidity, nor resistance to the motion of
body, as body does.
13. The parts of space inseparable, both really and mentally.
Secondly, The parts of pure space are inseparable one from the other;
so that the continuity cannot be separated, both neither really nor
mentally. For I demand of any one to remove any part of it from
another, with which it is continued, even so much as in thought. To
divide and separate actually is, as I think, by removing the parts one
from another, to make two superficies, where before there was a
continuity: and to divide mentally is, to make in the mind two
superficies, where before there was a continuity, and consider them as
removed one from the other; which can only be done in things considered
by the mind as capable of being separated; and by separation, of
acquiring new distinct superficies, which they then have not, but are
capable of. But neither of these ways of separation, whether real or
mental, is, as I think, compatible to pure space.
It is true, a man may consider so much of such a space as is answerable
or commensurate to a foot, without considering the rest, which is,
indeed, a partial consideration, but not so much as mental separation
or division; since a man can no more mentally divide, without
considering two superficies separate one from the other, than he can
actually divide, without making two superficies disjoined one from the
other: but a partial consideration is not separating. A man may
consider light in the sun without its heat, or mobility in body without
its extension, without thinking of their separation. One is only a
partial consideration, terminating in one alone; and the other is a
consideration of both, as existing separately.
14. The parts of space immovable.
Thirdly, The parts of pure space are immovable, which follows from
their inseparability; motion being nothing but change of distance
between any two things; but this cannot be between parts that are
inseparable, which, therefore, must needs be at perpetual rest one
amongst another.
Thus the determined idea of simple space distinguishes it plainly and
sufficiently from body; since its parts are inseparable, immovable, and
without resistance to the motion of body.
15. The Definition of Extension explains it not.
If any one ask me WHAT this space I speak of IS, I will tell him when
he tells me what his extension is. For to say, as is usually done, that
extension is to have partes extra partes, is to say only, that
extension is extension. For what am I the better informed in the nature
of extension, when I am told that extension is to have parts that are
extended, exterior to parts that are extended, i. e. extension consists
of extended parts? As if one, asking what a fibre was, I should answer
him,—that it was a thing made up of several fibres. Would he thereby be
enabled to understand what a fibre was better than he did before? Or
rather, would he not have reason to think that my design was to make
sport with him, rather than seriously to instruct him?
16. Division of Beings into Bodies and Spirits proves not Space and
Body the same.
Those who contend that space and body are the same, bring this
dilemma:—either this space is something or nothing; if nothing be
between two bodies, they must necessarily touch; if it be allowed to be
something, they ask, Whether it be body or spirit? To which I answer by
another question, Who told them that there was, or could be, nothing;
but SOLID BEINGS, WHICH COULD NOT THINK, and THINKING BEINGS THAT WERE
NOT EXTENDED?—which is all they mean by the terms BODY and SPIRIT.
17. Substance, which we know not, no Proof against Space without Body.
If it be demanded (as usually it is) whether this space, void of body,
be SUBSTANCE or ACCIDENT, I shall readily answer I know not; nor shall
be ashamed to own my ignorance, till they that ask show me a clear
distinct idea of substance.
18. Different meanings of substance.
I endeavour as much as I can to deliver myself from those fallacies
which we are apt to put upon ourselves, by taking words for things. It
helps not our ignorance to feign a knowledge where we have none, by
making a noise with sounds, without clear and distinct significations.
Names made at pleasure, neither alter the nature of things, nor make us
understand them, but as they are signs of and stand for determined
ideas. And I desire those who lay so much stress on the sound of these
two syllables, SUBSTANCE, to consider whether applying it, as they do,
to the infinite, incomprehensible God, to finite spirits, and to body,
it be in the same sense; and whether it stands for the same idea, when
each of those three so different beings are called substances. If so,
whether it will thence follow—that God, spirits, and body, agreeing in
the same common nature of substance, differ not any otherwise than in a
bare different MODIFICATION of that substance; as a tree and a pebble,
being in the same sense body, and agreeing in the common nature of
body, differ only in a bare modification of that common matter, which
will be a very harsh doctrine. If they say, that they apply it to God,
finite spirit, and matter, in three different significations and that
it stands for one idea when God is said to be a substance; for another
when the soul is called substance; and for a third when body is called
so;—if the name substance stands for three several distinct ideas, they
would do well to make known those distinct ideas, or at least to give
three distinct names to them, to prevent in so important a notion the
confusion and errors that will naturally follow from the promiscuous
use of so doubtful a term; which is so far from being suspected to have
three distinct, that in ordinary use it has scarce one clear distinct
signification. And if they can thus make three distinct ideas of
substance, what hinders why another may not make a fourth?
19. Substance and accidents of little use in Philosophy.
They who first ran into the notion of ACCIDENTS, as a sort of real
beings that needed something to inhere in, were forced to find out the
word SUBSTANCE to support them. Had the poor Indian philosopher (who
imagined that the earth also wanted something to bear it up) but
thought of this word substance, he needed not to have been at the
trouble to find an elephant to support it, and a tortoise to support
his elephant: the word substance would have done it effectually. And he
that inquired might have taken it for as good an answer from an Indian
philosopher,—that substance, without knowing what it is, is that which
supports the earth, as take it for a sufficient answer and good
doctrine from our European philosophers,—that substance, without
knowing what it is, is that which supports accidents. So that of
substance, we have no idea of what it is, but only a confused obscure
one of what it does.
20. Sticking on and under-propping.
Whatever a learned man may do here, an intelligent American, who
inquired into the nature of things, would scarce take it for a
satisfactory account, if, desiring to learn our architecture, he should
be told that a pillar is a thing supported by a basis, and a basis
something that supported a pillar. Would he not think himself mocked,
instead of taught, with such an account as this? And a stranger to them
would be very liberally instructed in the nature of books, and the
things they contained, if he should be told that all learned books
consisted of paper and letters, and that letters were things inhering
in paper, and paper a thing that held forth letters: a notable way of
having clear ideas of letters and paper. But were the Latin words,
inhaerentia and substantio, put into the plain English ones that answer
them, and were called STICKING ON and UNDER-PROPPING, they would better
discover to us the very great clearness there is in the doctrine of
substance and accidents, and show of what use they are in deciding of
questions in philosophy.
21. A Vacuum beyond the utmost Bounds of Body.
But to return to our idea of space. If body be not supposed infinite,
(which I think no one will affirm,) I would ask, whether, if God placed
a man at the extremity of corporeal beings, he could not stretch his
hand beyond his body? If he could, then he would put his arm where
there was before space without body; and if there he spread his
fingers, there would still be space between them without body. If he
could not stretch out his hand, it must be because of some external
hindrance; (for we suppose him alive, with such a power of moving the
parts of his body that he hath now, which is not in itself impossible,
if God so pleased to have it; or at least it is not impossible for God
so to move him:) and then I ask,—whether that which hinders his hand
from moving outwards be substance or accident, something or nothing?
And when they have resolved that, they will be able to resolve
themselves,—what that is, which is or may be between two bodies at a
distance, that is not body, and has no solidity. In the mean time, the
argument is at least as good, that, where nothing hinders, (as beyond
the utmost bounds of all bodies,) a body put in motion may move on, as
where there is nothing between, there two bodies must necessarily
touch. For pure space between is sufficient to take away the necessity
of mutual contact; but bare space in the way is not sufficient to stop
motion. The truth is, these men must either own that they think body
infinite, though they are loth to speak it out, or else affirm that
space is not body. For I would fain meet with that thinking man that
can in his thoughts set any bounds to space, more than he can to
duration; or by thinking hope to arrive at the end of either. And
therefore, if his idea of eternity be infinite, so is his idea of
immensity; they are both finite or infinite alike.
22. The Power of Annihilation proves a Vacuum.
Farther, those who assert the impossibility of space existing without
matter, must not only make body infinite, but must also deny a power in
God to annihilate any part of matter. No one, I suppose, will deny that
God can put an end to all motion that is in matter, and fix all the
bodies of the universe in a perfect quiet and rest, and continue them
so long as he pleases. Whoever then will allow that God can, during
such a general rest, ANNIHILATE either this book or the body of him
that reads it, must necessarily admit the possibility of a vacuum. For,
it is evident that the space that was filled by the parts of the
annihilated body will still remain, and be a space without body. For
the circumambient bodies being in perfect rest, are a wall of adamant,
and in that state make it a perfect impossibility for any other body to
get into that space. And indeed the necessary motion of one particle of
matter into the place from whence another particle of matter is
removed, is but a consequence from the supposition of plenitude; which
will therefore need some better proof than a supposed matter of fact,
which experiment can never make out;—our own clear and distinct ideas
plainly satisfying that there is no necessary connexion between space
and solidity, since we can conceive the one without the other. And
those who dispute for or against a vacuum, do thereby confess they have
distinct IDEAS of vacuum and plenum, i. e. that they have an idea of
extension void of solidity, though they deny its EXISTENCE; or else
they dispute about nothing at all. For they who so much alter the
signification of words, as to call extension body, and consequently
make the whole essence of body to be nothing but pure extension without
solidity, must talk absurdly whenever they speak of vacuum; since it is
impossible for extension to be without extension. For vacuum, whether
we affirm or deny its existence, signifies space without body; whose
very existence no one can deny to be possible, who will not make matter
infinite, and take from God a power to annihilate any particle of it.
23. Motion proves a Vacuum.
But not to go so far as beyond the utmost bounds of body in the
universe, nor appeal to God’s omnipotency to find a vacuum, the motion
of bodies that are in our view and neighbourhood seems to me plainly to
evince it. For I desire any one so to divide a solid body, of any
dimension he pleases, as to make it possible for the solid parts to
move up and down freely every way within the bounds of that
superficies, if there be not left in it a void space as big as the
least part into which he has divided the said solid body. And if, where
the least particle of the body divided is as big as a mustard-seed, a
void space equal to the bulk of a mustard-seed be requisite to make
room for the free motion of the parts of the divided body within the
bounds of its superficies, where the particles of matter are
100,000,000 less than a mustard-seed, there must also be a space void
of solid matter as big as 100,000,000 part of a mustard-seed; for if it
hold in the one it will hold in the other, and so on IN INFINITUM. And
let this void space be as little as it will, it destroys the hypothesis
of plenitude. For if there can be a space void of body equal to the
smallest separate particle of matter now existing in nature, it is
still space without body; and makes as great a difference between space
and body as if it were mega chasma, a distance as wide as any in
nature. And therefore, if we suppose not the void space necessary to
motion equal to the least parcel of the divided solid matter, but to
1/10 or 1/1000 of it, the same consequence will always follow of space
without matter.
24. The Ideas of Space and Body distinct.
But the question being here,—Whether the idea of space or extension be
the same with the idea of body? it is not necessary to prove the real
existence of a VACUUM, but the idea of it; which it is plain men have
when they inquire and dispute whether there be a VACUUM or no. For if
they had not the idea of space without body, they could not make a
question about its existence: and if their idea of body did not include
in it something more than the bare idea of space, they could have no
doubt about the plenitude of the world; and it would be as absurd to
demand, whether there were space without body, as whether there were
space without space, or body without body, since these were but
different names of the same idea.
25. Extension being inseparable from Body, proves it not the same.
It is true, the idea of extension joins itself so inseparably with all
visible, and most tangible qualities, that it suffers us to SEE no one,
or FEEL very few external objects, without taking in impressions of
extension too. This readiness of extension to make itself be taken
notice of so constantly with other ideas, has been the occasion, I
guess, that some have made the whole essence of body to consist in
extension; which is not much to be wondered at, since some have had
their minds, by their eyes and touch, (the busiest of all our senses,)
so filled with the idea of extension, and, as it were, wholly possessed
with it, that they allowed no existence to anything that had not
extension. I shall not now argue with those men, who take the measure
and possibility of all being only from their narrow and gross
imaginations: but having here to do only with those who conclude the
essence of body to be extension, because they say they cannot imagine
any sensible quality of any body without extension,—I shall desire them
to consider, that, had they reflected on their ideas of tastes and
smells as much as on those of sight and touch; nay, had they examined
their ideas of hunger and thirst, and several other pains, they would
have found that THEY included in them no idea of extension at all,
which is but an affection of body, as well as the rest, discoverable by
our senses, which are scarce acute enough to look into the pure
essences of things.
26. Essences of Things.
If those ideas which are constantly joined to all others, must
therefore be concluded to be the essence of those things which have
constantly those ideas joined to them, and are inseparable from them;
then unity is without doubt the essence of everything. For there is not
any object of sensation or reflection which does not carry with it the
idea of one: but the weakness of this kind of argument we have already
shown sufficiently.
27. Ideas of Space and Solidity distinct.
To conclude: whatever men shall think concerning the existence of a
VACUUM, this is plain to me—that we have as clear an idea of space
distinct from solidity, as we have of solidity distinct from motion, or
motion from space. We have not any two more distinct ideas; and we can
as easily conceive space without solidity, as we can conceive body or
space without motion, though it be never so certain that neither body
nor motion can exist without space. But whether any one will take space
to be only a RELATION resulting from the existence of other beings at a
distance; or whether they will think the words of the most knowing King
Solomon, ‘The heaven, and the heaven of heavens, cannot contain thee;’
or those more emphatical ones of the inspired philosopher St. Paul, ‘In
him we live, move, and have our being,’ are to be understood in a
literal sense, I leave every one to consider: only our idea of space
is, I think, such as I have mentioned, and distinct from that of body.
For, whether we consider, in matter itself, the distance of its
coherent solid parts, and call it, in respect of those solid parts,
extension; or whether, considering it as lying between the extremities
of any body in its several dimensions, we call it length, breadth, and
thickness; or else, considering it as lying between any two bodies or
positive beings, without any consideration whether there be any matter
or not between, we call it distance;—however named or considered, it is
always the same uniform simple idea of space, taken from objects about
which our senses have been conversant; whereof, having settled ideas in
our minds, we can revive, repeat, and add them one to another as often
as we will, and consider the space or distance so imagined, either as
filled with solid parts, so that another body cannot come there without
displacing and thrusting out the body that was there before; or else as
void of solidity, so that a body of equal dimensions to that empty or
pure space may be placed in it, without the removing or expulsion of
anything that was there.
28. Men differ little in clear, simple ideas.
The knowing precisely what our words stand for, would, I imagine, in
this as well as a great many other cases, quickly end the dispute. For
I am apt to think that men, when they come to examine them, find their
simple ideas all generally to agree, though in discourse with one
another they perhaps confound one another with different names. I
imagine that men who abstract their thoughts, and do well examine the
ideas of their own minds, cannot much differ in thinking; however they
may perplex themselves with words, according to the way of speaking of
the several schools or sects they have been bred up in: though amongst
unthinking men, who examine not scrupulously and carefully their own
ideas, and strip them not from the marks men use for them, but confound
them with words, there must be endless dispute, wrangling, and jargon;
especially if they be learned, bookish men, devoted to some sect, and
accustomed to the language of it, and have learned to talk after
others. But if it should happen that any two thinking men should really
have different ideas, I do not see how they could discourse or argue
one with another. Here I must not be mistaken, to think that every
floating imagination in men’s brains is presently of that sort of ideas
I speak of. It is not easy for the mind to put off those confused
notions and prejudices it has imbibed from custom, inadvertency, and
common conversation. It requires pains and assiduity to examine its
ideas, till it resolves them into those clear and distinct simple ones,
out of which they are compounded; and to see which, amongst its simple
ones, have or have not a NECESSARY connexion and dependence one upon
another. Till a man doth this in the primary and original notions of
things, he builds upon floating and uncertain principles, and will
often find himself at a loss.