that God should continue to them their Vertue he endow'd them with in their Creation And since this Opinion is exactly agreeable with Prejudice because of the insensible Operation of God in Second Causes it is commonly embrac'd by the vulgar sort of Men and such as have more studied Ancient Naturalists and Physicians than Theology and Truth Most are of Opinion that God created all things at first and gave them all the Qualities and Faculties that were necessary to their preservation that he has for example given the first Motion of Matter and left it afterwards to it self to produce by the Communication of its Motions that admirable variety of Forms we see 'T is Ordinarily suppos'd that Bodies can move one another and this is said to be Mr. des Cartes's Opinion though he speaks expresly against it in the Thirty Sixth and Seventh Articles of the Second Part of his Philosophical Principles Since Men must unavoidably acknowledge that the Creatures depend on God they lessen and abridge as much as possible that dependance whether out of a secret Aversion to God or a strange and wretched stupidity and insensibility to his Operation But whereas this Opinion is receiv'd but by those who have not much studied Religion and have preferr'd their Senses to their Reason and Aristotle's Authority to that of Holy Writ we have no reason to fear its making way into the Mind of those who have any Love for Truth and Religion for provided a Man seriously examin'd it he must needs discover its falsity But the Opinion of God's Immediate Concourse to every Action of Second Causes seems to accord with those Passages of Scripture which often attribute the same Effect both to GOD and the Creature We must consider then that there are places in Scripture where 't is said that God is the only Agent I am the Lord that maketh all things that stretcheth forth the Heavens alone that spreadeth abroad the Earth by my self Ego sum Dominus says Isaiah faciens OMNIA Extendens coelos SOLVS stabiliens Terram NVLLVS Mecum A Mother Animated with the Spirit of God tells her Children it was not her that form'd them I cannot tell how you came into my Womb For I neither gave you Breath nor Life neither was it I that form'd the Members of every one of you But doubtless the Creator of the World c. Nescio qualiter in utero meo apparuistis singulorum membra NON EGO IPSA COMPEGI sed mundi Creator She does not say with Aristotle and the School of the Peripateticks that to her and the Sun they ow'd their Birth but to the Creator of the Universe Which Opinion that God only Works and forms Children in their Mothers Womb not being conformable to Prejudice and Common Opinion These Sentences according to the pre-establish'd Principle must be explain'd in the Literal Sense But on the contrary the Notion of Second Causes falling in with the vulgar Opinion and being Suited to the sensible impression the Passages which expresly make for the separate Efficacy of Second Causes must be reckon'd invalid when compar'd with the former Concourse therefore is insufficient to reconcile the different Texts of Scripture and all Force Power and Efficacy must be ascrib'd to God But though the immediate concurrence of God with Second Causes were fit to accommodate the disagreeing passages of Holy Writ yet after all it is a question whether it ought to be admitted For the Sacred Books were not compos'd for the Theologists of these times but for the People of the Jews So that if this People had not understanding or Subtilty enough to imagine a Concourse such as is admitted in School-Divinity and to agree to a thing which the greatest Divines are hard put to to explain it follows if I mistake not that the Holy Scripture which Attributes to God and even to God alone the production and preservation of all things would have betray'd them into Error And the Holy Pen-Men had stood chargeable with writing not only in an unintelligible but deceitful Language For in saying that God Work'd all they would have design'd no more than that God assisted to all things with his concourse which was not probably so much as thought on by the Jews Those amongst them who were not very great Philosophers believing that God Work'd all and not that he concurr'd to all But that we may pass a more certain judgement about this Concourse it would be requisite to explain with care the different Hypotheses of the School-Men upon it For besides those impenetrable Clouds and Obscurities which involve all the Opinions that cannot be explain'd and defended without loose and indefinite Terms there are upon this Matter so great a variety of Opinions that it would be no hard Matter to discover the cause of them But I design not to engage in a discussion that would be so wearisom to my self as well as the greatest part of Readers On the contrary I had rather try to show that my Opinions may in some thing accord with those of the greater number of Scholastick Divines though I cannot but say their Language looks very Ambiguous and confus'd To explain my self I am of Opinion as I have said elsewhere that Bodies for example have no Force to move themselves and that therefore their moving force is nothing but the Action of God or not to make use of a Term which has no distinct import their moving force is nothing but the Will of God always necessarily Efficacious which successively preserves them in different Places For I believe not that God Creates any particular Beings to make the moving force of Bodies not only because I have no Idea of such a kind of Being nor see how they could move Bodies But also because these Beings themselves would have need of others to move them and so in infinitum For none but God is truely Immoveable and Mover altogether Which being so when a Body strikes and moves another I may say that it Acts by the Concurrence of God and that this Concurrence is not distinct from its own Action For a Body meeting another moves it by its Action or its moving force which at bottom is nothing but the Will of God preserving the Body successively in different Places the translation of a Body being not it's Action or moving force but the Effect of it Almost all Divines say too that the Action of Second Causes is not different from that of God's Concurrence with them For though they have a various Meaning yet they suppose that God Acts in the Creatures by the same Action as the Creatures And they are oblig'd if I mistake not thus to speak For if the Creatures Acted by an Action which God Work'd not in them their Action consider'd as such would no doubt be independent But they acknowledge as it becomes them that the Creatures depend immediately on God not only as to their Being but likewise as to
since it rather respects Morals and Politicks than our Subject And whereas this Inclination is always accompany'd with the Passions it might perhaps be more appositly treated of in the next Book But 't is not of so great concern to be so nicely methodical in this Case That we may rightly comprehend the Cause and Effects of this Natural Inclination it is requisite to know that GOD loves all his Works and that he strictly unites them to one another for their mutual Preservation For Loving incessantly the Works he produces it being his Love that produces them he also continually impresses on our Heart a Love for his Works that is he produces constantly in our Heart a Love like his own And to the intent the Natural Love we have for our selves might not swallow up or too much infringe upon that which we have for exteriour things but on the contrary that these two Loves which GOD puts in us might cherish and strengthen each other he has so artfully united us with all things about us and especially with those Beings of the same Species as our selves that their Evils naturally afflict us their Joy rejoyces us their Rise their Fall or Diminution seem to augment or diminish respectively our own Being The new Honours of our Relations or Friends the fresh Atchievements of those who have the nearest Engagements to us The Conquests and Victories of our Prince and even the late Discoveries of the New World give as it were an additional growth to our Substance Belonging to all these things we rejoyce at their Grandure and Extent We gladly would that even the World was without Bounds and that Notion of some Philosophers that the Works of GOD are infinite not only seems worthy of GOD but most agreeable to Man who can conceive nothing nobler than the being a part of Infinity whilst as inconsiderable as he is in himself he fancies he feels himself infinitely enlarg'd by an expansion of Thought into the infinite Beings that surround him 'T is true the Union we have with all those Bodies that rowl in the vast spaces is not very binding and consequently insensible to the greatest part of Men and there are some who interess themselves so little in the Discoveries made in the Heavens that one would think they had no natural Union to them did we not know that it was for want of Knowledge or for their too applicative Adherencies to other things The Soul though united to the Body which she animates is not always sensible of the Motions that occur in it or if she be yet she does not always actually consider them The Passion whereby she 's acted being often greater than the Sensation wherewith she 's affected makes her seem to have a stricter Adherence to the Object of her Passion than to her own Body For 't is chiefly by the Passions that the Soul expands her self abroad and finds she is actually related to all surrounding Beings as it is especially by Sensation that she expands through her own Body and finds she is united to all the Parts that compose it But as we are not to conclude that the Soul of a Man in a Passion is not united to his Body because he exposes himself to Death and is unconcern'd for his own Preservation so it ought not to be imagin'd we are not naturally engag'd to all things because there are some we are not at all concern'd for Would you know for instance whether Men have any Adhesions to their Prince or their Country Enquire out such as are acquainted with the Interests of them and have no particular Engagements of their own to take them up and you will then see how earnest they are for News how impatient to hear of Battels how joyful for a Victory and how melancholy upon a Defeat And this will convince you how strictly Men are united to their Prince and their Country In like manner would you know whether Men are united to China Japan the Planets or Fix'd Stars Enquire out or only imagine to your self some whose Country or Family enjoy a settl'd Peace who have no particular Passions and that are not actually sensible of the Union that binds them to nearer Objects than the Heavens and you will find if they have any Knowledge of the Magnitude and Nature of these Stars they will rejoyce at the Discovery of any of them will consider them with Pleasure and if they have Art enough will willingly be at the pains of observing and calculating their Motions Such as are in the hurry of Business have little Curiosity for the Appearance of a Comet or the Incidence of an Eclipse but Men that have no such Dependencies to nearer things find themselves considerable Employment about such Events because indeed there is nothing but what we are united to though we have not always the Sense of this Union as a Man does not always feel the Soul united I don't say to his Arm or Hand but to his Heart and Brain The strongest Natural Union which GOD has establish'd between us and his Works is that which cements and binds us to our Fellow-Brethren Men. GOD has commanded us to love them as our Second-selves and to the end that Elective Love with which we prosecute them might be resolute and constant he supports and strengthens it continually with a Natural Love which he impresses on us and for that purpose has given us some invisible Bonds which bind and oblige us necessarily to love them to be watchful for their as our own Preservation to regard them as parts necessary to the whole which we constitute together with them and without which we could not subsist There is nothing more admirably contriv'd than those Natural Correspondencies observable between the Inclinations of Men's Minds between the Motions of their Bodies and again between these Inclinations and these Motions All this secret Chain-work is a Miracle which can never be sufficiently admir'd nor can ever be understood Upon the Sense of some sudden surprizing Evil or which a Man finds as it were too strong for him to overcome by his own Strength he raises suppose a loud Cry This Cry forc'd out frequently without thinking on it by the disposition of the Machine strikes infallibly into the Ears of those who are near enough to afford the Assistance that is wanted It pierces them and makes them understand it let them be of what Nation or Quality soever for 't is a Cry of all Nations and all Conditions as indeed it ought to be It makes a Commotion in the Brain and instantly changes the whole Disposition of Body in those that are struck with it and makes them run to give succour without so much as knowing it But it is not long before it acts upon their Mind and obliges their Will to desire and their Understanding to contrive means of assisting him who made that Natural Petition provided always that urgent Petition or rather Command be just and according
that account we judge it is equally distant from us And thus upon the same grounds we conclude the Stars with the Azure which appears in the Heaven are rang'd in the same just distance in a vault perfectly convex since our Mind ever supposes Equality where it discovers no Inequality which yet it ought not positively to admit unless there be evident conviction for it I shall not here insist longer on the Errors of our Sight in respect of the Figures of Bodies since a Man may be sufficiently instructed in any Book of Opticks That Science in effect does only instruct us how to put fallacies on our Eyes and its whole drift and artifice consists meerly in finding means of making us form those Natural Judgments I have been speaking of at a time when they are most impertinent and unseasonable And this cheat may be acted in so many different ways that of all the Figures that are in the World there is not any single one but may be painted in a thousand different fashions so that the Sight must unavoidably be deceiv'd But this is not the proper place of explaining these things more throughly What I have said is sufficient to let us see we should not give over-much credit to the Testimony of our Eyes even in their Representations of the Figures of Bodies though in point of Figures their reports are much more faithful than in any other occasion CHAP. VIII I. That our Eyes are incapable of informing us of the Quantity or Swiftness of Motion considered in it self II. That Duration which is necessary to our Knowledge of the Quantity of Motion is unknown to us III. An Instance of the Errors of Sight about Motion and Rest. HAVING already discover'd the most Fundamental and General Errors of our Sight touching Extension and its Figures I come now to correct those in which this same Sight ingages us about the Motion of Matter And this has no great difficulty in it after what I have already said of Extension For there is so necessary a relation and dependence betwixt these two things that if we are deceiv'd in the Magnitude of Bodies we must as certainly be deceiv'd in their Motion too But that I may advance nothing but what is clear and distinct it is necessary to take off whatever is equivocal from the word Motion For this Term has generally two significations The first denotes a certain Power or Force which we imagine in the Body mov'd and which we suppose the cause of its Motion The second is the Translation or continued Conveyance of a Body either in its removal from or approaching to another which we consider as at rest When I say for Instance That a Boul has communicated its Motion to another the word Motion is to be understood in its first signification But if I say simply that I see a Boul in a great Motion it is to be taken in the second In a word the Term Motion signifies at once both Cause and Effect which are yet two things altogether different I am perswaded that Men are under most palpaple and most dangerous mistakes concerning the Force that gives this Motion and Translation to the Bodies mov'd Those fine Terms Nature and Impress'd Qualities are good for nothing but to shelter the Ignorance of the Falsly Learned and the Impieties of the Libertine as I could easily demonstrate But this is not a place proper to discourse of the Power that moves Bodies since that is not of a visible Nature and I am only speaking here of the Errors of our Eyes I defer it till a time when it will be more â—easonable Motion taken in the second sense that is for the Translation of a Body in its removal from another is something of a visible kind and the Subject of this Chapter I have I think sufficiently demonstrated in the sixth Chapter that our Sight does not acquaint us with the Quantity or Magnitude of Bodies in themselves but only with the mutual relation they stand in to each other and especially to our own From whence I infer that we are incapable of knowing the true and absolute Magnitude of their Motion that is of their swiftness or slowness but only the relation these Motions have to one another and more especially to the Motion ordinarily incident to our own Body Which I thus prove It is certain that we know not how to judge how great the Motion of a Body is but by the Length of the Space the Body has ran over Thus our Eyes not informing us of the true Length of the Space describ'd by the Motion it follows that 't is impossible for us to know the true Quantity of the Motion This Argument is only a Corollary of that which I have said of Extension and all the force it has proceeds from its being a necessary Conclusion of what I have there Demonstrated I shall now give one which depends on no Supposition I say then that supposing we were able clearly to discover the true Quantity of the Space describ'd it would no way follow that we could know the Quantity of Motion also The Greatness or the Swiftness of Motion includes two things The first is the Translation or Conveyance of a Body from one place to another as from Paris to St. Germains The second is the Time that necessarily goes to the making this Conveyance Now it is not enough to know exactly how far Paris is distant from St. Germains to know whether a Man has gone it with a Quick or a Slow Motion But it must moreover be known how much time he has imploy'd in his Journey Granting then that the Length of the Journey may be truly known I utterly deny we can have an exact knowledge by our Sight or indeed any other way whatever of the Time that is spent in the passage and of the true Quantity of Duration This is sufficiently evident in that at certain times one Hour seems to us as long as four and on the contrary at other times four Hours slip insensibly away When for Instance a Man's Mind is fill'd with Joy Hours seem no longer than a Moment because then the time passes away without thinking of it But when a Man is dejected with Grief and lies under some sensible Pain or Affliction every day is thought an entire Year The reason of which difference is That in this case the Mind is weary of its Duration because it is Painful The more it applies it self to the thought of it the more it discovers it and thereby finds it longer than in the season of Mirth and Joy or some diverting Imployment which as it were carries the Soul out of it self to fix her closer to the Object of her Joy or her Diversion For as a Man finds a piece of Painting so much larger by how much he stands to consider all the little things represented in it with greater attention or as he finds the head of a Fly considerably
is perpendicularly over our Heads and 't is upon that account her Diameter grows greater in her Ascent above the Horizon because then she 's approaching nearest us The reason then that we see her Greater when she rises is not the Refraction of her Rays meeting with the Vapours which proceed from the Earth since the Image which is at that time form'd from those Rays is lesser but 't is the Natural Judgment we make of her Remoteness occasion'd by her appearing beyond those Lands which we see at a vast Distance from us as has been before explain'd and I am amaz'd to find Philosophers asserting that the reason of this Appearance and Delusion of our Sences is harder to be discover'd than the greatest Aequations of Algebra This Medium whereby we judge of the Remoteness of any Object by knowing the Distance of the things betwixt us and it is often of considerable use when the other means I have spoke of are wholly insignificant for by this last Medium we can judge that certain objects are many Leagues distant which we cannot do by any of the other And yet if we strictly survey it it will be found in several things deficient For first we can only make use of it about things upon the Earth since it can be but very rarely and then very unprofitably imploy'd upon those in the Air or in the Heavens Secondly it cannot be made use of on the Earth but about things a few Leagues distant In the third place we ought to be certain that there are neither Mountains nor Valleys nor any thing of the like nature betwixt us and the Object that hinders us from applying the afore-said Medium Lastly I am perswaded there is no body but has made sufficient Tryals upon the Subject to be convinc'd that it is a thing extreamly difficult to judge with any certainty of the Remoteness of Objects by a sensible View of the things lying betwixt us and them and we perhaps have dwelt two long upon it These then are all the Means we have to judge of the Distance of Objects in which since we have found considerable Imperfections we cannot but conclude that the Judgments that are grounded upon them must needs be very Precarious and Uncertain Hence it is easy to manifest the truth of the Propositions I have advanc'd The Object C was suppos'd considerably remote from A Therefore in many Instances it may be advanc'd on towards D or may have approach'd towards B and no one can discover it because there is no infallible Means whereby to judge of its Distance Nay it may recede towards D when it is thought to approach towards B because the Image of the Object is sometimes augmented and inlarged upon the Retina whether it be because the Air betwixt the Object and the Eye occasions a greater Refraction at one time than at another whether it proceeds from some little Tremlings which happen in the Optick Nerve or lastly that the Impression which is caus'd by an unexact Union of the Rays upon the Retina is diffus'd and communicated to the parts which ought to receive no Agitation from it which may proceed from any different causes Thus the Image of the same Objects being larger on these occasions gives the Soul reason to believe the Object approaches nearer The like may be said of the other Propositions Before I conclude this Chapter I would have it observ'd That it is of great concern to us in order to the Preservation of our Life to have a nicer Knowledge of the Motion or Rest of Bodies in Proportion to their Nighness to us and that it is a thing useless and insignificant to know exactly the truth of these things when happening in places very remote For this evidently shews that what I have generally advanc'd concerning all the Sences how they never Discover things to us as they are absolutely and in their own Nature but only in Relation to the Preservation of our Body is found exactly True in this particular since we know the Motion or Rests of Objects proportionably better as they approach nearer to us and are incapable of judging of them by the Sences when they are so remote as to seem to have no Relation at all or very little to our Body as for instance when they are five or six hundred Paces distant if they be of a Moderate Bigness or even Nearer than this when they are Lesser or somewhat farther off when they are proportionably Greater CHAP. X. Of our Errors about sensible Qualities I. The Distinction of the Soul and Body II. An Explication of the Organs of the Senses III. To what part of the Body the Soul is immediately united IV. An Instance to explain the Effect which Objects have upon our Bodies V. What it is they produce in the Soul and the Reasons why the Soul perceives not the Motions of the Fibres of the Body VI. Four things which are generally confounded in every Sensation WE have seen in the fore-going Chapters that the Judgments we form upon the Testimony of our Eyes concerning Extension Figure and Motion are never exactly true And yet it must not be allow'd that they are altogether false they contain so much Truth at least as this amounts to that there are Extension Figures and Motions whatever they be which are extrinsical or without our selves I confess we often see things that have no Existence nor ever had and it ought not to be concluded that a thing is Actually without us from our Seeing it without us There is no necessary Connexion between the Presence of an Idea to the Mind of a Man and the Existence of the Thing represented by the Idea Which is manifest enough from the Consideration of what happens to Men in a Dream or a Delirium And yet we may safely affirm that ordinarily Extension Figures and Motions are without us when we see them so These things are not in the Imagination only but are Real And we are not deceiv'd in believing them to have a Real Existence and wholly independent on our Mind tho' it be a very hard thing to prove it It is certain then that the Judgments we form concerning the Extension the Figures and Motions of Bodies contain some Truth But 't is another case in point of those Judgments we make concerning Light Colours Tasts Smells and all other Sensible Qualities For Truth has nothing to do with them as shall be made manifest in the remainder of this First Book We make not here any Distinction between Light and Colours because we suppose them to have no great Difference and that they cannot be separately Explain'd We shall likewise be oblig'd to speak of other Sensible Qualities in general at the same time we shall treat of these Two in particular because they may be accounted for upon the same Principles The things which follow demand the greatest Attention imaginable as being of the highest Importance and very different as to their
Foundation of his System from which may ever be deduc'd all the profit that could be expected from the true to make all necessary advances in the knowledge of Man Since then the Imagination consists only in the Power the Soul has of Forming the Images of Objects by imprinting them as I may so say in the Fibres of the Brain the greater and more distinct the Impresses of the Animal Spirits are which are the strokes of these Images the more strongly and distinctly the Soul will imagine Objects Now as the Largeness and Depth and Cleaverness of the strokes of any Sculpture depend upon the Forcible Acting of the Graving Instrument and the plyable yielding of the Plate so the Depth and the Distinctness of the Impresses of the Imagination depend on the Force of the Animal Spirits and the Constitution of the Fibres of the Brain And 't is the Variety that is found in these two things which is almost the universal Cause of that great Diversity we observe in the Minds of different Men. For 't is no hard thing to account for all the different Characters to be met with in the Minds of Men On the one hand by the Abundance and Scarcity by the Rapidness and Slowness by the Grossness and the Littleness of the Animal Spirits and on the other hand by the Fineness and Courseness by the Moisture and Driness by the Facility and Difficulty of the yielding of the Fibres of the Brain and lastly by the Relation the Animal Spirits may possibly have with these Fibres And it would be very expedient for every one forthwith to try to Imagine to himself all the different Combinations of these things and to apply himself seriously to the Consideration of all the Differences we have observ'd between the Minds of Men. Because it is ever more Useful and also more Pleasant for a Man to employ his own Mind and to accustom it to the finding out Truth by its own Industry than to suffer it to gather Rust by a careless Laziness in applying it only to things wholly digested and explain'd to his hands Besides that there are some things so delicately nice and fine in the different Character of Minds that a Man may easily sometimes discover them and be sensible of them himself but is unable to represent them or make them sensible to others But that we may explain as far as possibly we can all the Differences that are found in different Minds and that every Man may more easily observe in his own the Cause of all the Changes he sensibly perceives in it at different times it seems convenient to make a general Enquiry into the Causes of the Changes which happen in the Animal Spirits and in the Fibres of the Brain Since this will make way for the Discovery of all those which happen in the Imagination Man never continues long like himself all Mankind have sufficient Internal Convictions of their own Inconstancy A Man judges one while in one manner and another while in another concerning the same Subject In a word the Life of a Man consists only in the Circulation of the Blood and in another Circulation of Thoughts and Desires And I am of Opinion a Man can't employ his Time much better than in Searching for the Causes of these Changes we are subject to and entring into the Knowledge of our Selves CHAP. II. I. Of the Animal Spirits and the Changes they are subject to in general II. That the Chyle entering the Heart occasions a Change in the Spirits III. That Wine does the same thing 'T IS confess'd by all the World that the Animal Spirits are nothing but the more subtil and agitated parts of the Blood which Subtilty and Agitation is principally owing to the Fermentation it receives in the Heart and the violent Motion of the Muscles which constitute that part That these Spirits together with the rest of the Blood are conducted through the Arteries to the Brain And that there they are separated from it by some parts appropriated to that purpose but which they are it has not been yet agreed upon From whence we ought to conclude that in case the Blood be very subtil it will have abundance of Animal Spirits but if it be gross the Animal Spirits will be few That if the Blood be compos'd of parts easie to be inflam'd in the Heart or very fit for Motion the Spirits in the Brain will be extreamly heated and agitated And on the contrary if the Blood admits little Fermentation in the Heart the Animal Spirits will be languid unactive and without force And lastly according to the Solidity which is found in the parts of the Blood the Animal Spirits will have more or less solidity and consequently greater or lesser force in their Motion But these things ought to be explain'd more at large and the Truth of them made more sensibly apparent by Examples and uncontroverted Experiments that prove them The Authority of the Ancients has not only blinded some Mens Understandings but we may say has seal'd up their Eyes For there are still a sort of Men that pay so submissive a deference to Ancient Opinions or possibly are so stiff and obstinate that they will not see those things which they could not contradict would they but please to open once their Eyes We daily see Men in good Reputation and Esteem for their Study Write and Dispute publickly against the Visible and Sensible Experiments of the Circulation of the Blood against that of the Gravitation and Elastick force of the Air and others of the like Nature The Discovery Mr. Pacquet has made in our Time and which we have here occasion for is of the number of those that are mis-fortunate meerly for want of being Born Old and as a Man may say with a Venerable Beard I shall not however omit to make use of it and am under no Apprehension of being blam'd by Judicious Men for doing so According to that Discovery it is manifest that the Chyle does not immediately pass from the Viscera to the Liver through the Mesaraick Veins as was believ'd by the Ancients but that it passes out of the Bowels into the Lacteal Veins and from thence into several Receptacles where these Veins coterminate That from thence it ascends through the Ductus Thoracicus along the Vertebrae of the Back and proceeds to mix with the Blood in the Axillary Vein which enters into the Superiour Trunck of Vena Cava and thus being mingled with the Blood it discharges it self into the Heart It ought to be concluded from this Experiment that the Blood thus mingled with the Chyle being very different from that which has already circulated several times through the Heart the Animal Spirits that are only the more fine and subtil parts of it ought to be very different in Persons that are fasting and others after they have eaten Again because in the Meats and Drinks that are us'd there is an infinite Variety
soon as we have given some Idea of the Memory and Habits that is to say of that facility we have of thinking upon things which we have already thought upon and doing the same things we have already done The Methodical Order of our Discourse will have it so In order to give an Explication of the Memory it should be call'd to Mind what has been several times already inculcated that all our different Preceptions are affix'd to the Changes which happen to the Fibres of the Principal part of the Brain wherein the Soul more particularly resides This one Supposition being laid down the Nature of the Memory is Explain'd for as the Branches of a Tree which have continued for some time bent after a particular manner preserve a readiness and facility of being bent afresh in the same manner so the Fibres of the Brain having once receiv'd certain Impressions from the current of the Animal Spirits and from the Action of Objects upon them retain for a considerable time some Facility of receiving the same Dispositions Now the Memory consists only in that Promptness or Facility since a Man thinks upon the same things whenever the Brain receives the same Impressions And whereas the Animal Spirits act sometimes more and sometimes less strongly upon the Substance of the Brain and External Objects make far greater Impressions than the Imagination singly it is from hence easie to discover why a Man does not equally remember all the things he has formerly perceiv'd how for instance it comes to pass that what a Man has often perceived is generally represented livelier to the Soul than what a Man has had but now and then a Preception of why he more distinctly remembers the things he has seen than those he has only imagin'd and so why for example a Man shall know better the distribution of the Veins in the Liver by once seeing the Dissection of that part than by often reading it in a Book of Anatomy and so of other things of like nature But if a Man would make reflection upon what has been formerly said concerning the Imagination and upon the little which has just now been spoken concerning the Memory and if he be rid of that prejudice that our Brain is too little for the hoarding up and preserving such abundance of Traces and Impressions he will take pleasure in discovering the cause of all those wonderful Effects of the Memory St. Austin with so much admiration speaks of in the Tenth Book of his Confessions But I shall not explain these things more at large as believing it more expedient for every Man to explain them to himself by some Essay of Thought for as much as the things that way discover'd are always more grateful and agreeable and make greater Impression on us than those we learn from other Men. It is necessary to the Explication of the Habits to know the manner whereby we have reason to think the Soul moves the parts of the Body to which she is united and that is this According to all appearances in the World there are always in some places of the Brain whatever they be a very great Quantity of Animal Spirits very rapidly mov'd by the Heat of the Heart from whence they proceeded and most readily dispos'd to glide into those places where they find an easie and an open passage All the Nerves terminate in the Receptacle of those Spirits and the Soul has the Power of determining their Motion and conducting them through the Nerves into all the Muscles of the Body These Spirits entering therein swell them up and consequently contract them And thus they move the parts to which the Muscles are affix'd We shall readily be perswaded that the Soul moves the Body in the manner thus explain'd if it be observ'd that when a Man has been a long time fasting let him try how he will to give certain motions to his Body he will be unable to effect them and even will be at some pains to stand upon his Legs But if so be he find a way of conveying into his Heart something very Spirituous as Wine or any like nutriment he forthwith perceives that his Body obeys his Desires with far greater facility and that he is able to move it how he pleases For this single Experiment makes it one would think sufficiently manifest that the Soul is incapable of giving Motion to her Body for want of Animal Spirits and that by their means she re-assumes her Sovereignity and Dominion over it Now these Inflations of the Muscles are so plain and palpable in the Motions of our Arms and other parts of our Body and 't is so reasonable to believe these Muscles cannot receive any Inflation without the admission of some body into them as a Bladder cannot be blown and extended without the entrance of the Air or something else that it seems not to be doubted but the Animal Spirits are driven from the Brain through the Nerves into the Muscles to dilate them and to produce in them all the Motions we desire For a Muscles being full is necessarily shorter than when it is empty and so attracts and moves the part to which it is conjoin'd as may be seen explain'd more at large in Mr. Des Cartes Treatise of the Passions and in that Concerning Man I do not however deliver that Explication as perfectly demonstrated in all its parts To render it entirely evident there are many things farther requisite to be demanded without which it is next to impossible to explain ones self But the Knowledge of them is not so useful for our Subject for let the Explication be true or false it will not fail to be of equal use to acquaint us with the Nature of the Habits Since if the Soul moves not the Body in that manner it necessarily moves it in some other that comes up near enough to it to deduce those consequences from it which we shall infer But to the intent we may pursue our Explication it is necessary to observe that the Spirits find not the paths through which they ought to pass always so free and open as they should be which is the occasion for example of the Difficulty we meet with in moving the Fingers with that Nimbleness as is necessary to play on Musical Instruments or the Muscles imploy'd in Pronunciation to pronounce the Words of a strange Language but that the Animal Spirits by little and little so open and plain the Ways by their continued succession as to take away in time all manner of Resistance Now the Habits consist in that Facility the Animal Spirits have of passing into the Members of our Body 'T is the easiest thing imaginable according to this Explication to resolve a multitude of Questions relating to the Habits As why for instance Children are more capable of acquiring new Habits than Persons of a more consummate Age. Why it is a thing of such Difficulty to lay aside an inveterate
great Precipice which a Man sees under him and from which there is danger of falling or the Traces of some bulky Body imminent over his Head and ready to fall and crush him is naturally Connected with that which represents Death and with a Commotion of the Spirits which disposes him to flight or the desire of flying it This Connection admits no alteration because 't is necessary it should always be the same and it consists in a disposition of the Fibres of the Brain which we bring with us into the World All the Connections which are not Natural may and ought to break because the different Circumstances of times and places ought to change to the end they may be useful to the Preservation of Life 'T is convenient the Partridge for instance should fly the Sports-man with his Gun at the season and the places of his pursuing the Game But there 's no necessity it should fly him in other places or at other times Thus 't is necessary all Animals for their Preservation should have certain Connections of Traces easily made and easily broken and that they should have others very difficult to be sever'd and lastly others incapable of Dissolution 'T is of very great use to make diligent enquiry into the different Effects these different Connections are able to produce For there are Effects which as they are very numerous so they are no less important to the Knowledge of Man and all things relating to him We shall see hereafter that these things are the principal Causes of our Errors But 't is time to return to the Subject we have promis'd to Discourse on and to explain the different Changes which happen to the Imagination of Men by reason of their different ways and purposes of Life CHAP. IV. I. That Men of Learning are the most subject to Error II. The Causes why Men had rather be guided by Authority than make use of their own Reason THE Differences observable in Men as to their Ways and Purposes of Life are almost infinite Their different Conditions different Employments different Posts and Offices and different Communities are innumerable These Differences are the Reason of Men's acting upon quite different Designs and Reasoning upon different Principles Even in the same Community wherein there should be but one Character of Mind and all the same Designs you shall rarely meet with several Persons whose Aims and Views are not different Their various Employments and their many Adhesions necessarily diversifie the Method and Manner they would take to accomplish those various things wherein they agree Whereby 't is manifest that it would be an impossible Undertaking to go about to explain in particular the Moral Causes of Error nor would it turn to any great Account should we do it in this place I design therefore only to speak of those Ways of Living that lead us into great multitudes of Errors and Errors of most dangerous Importance When these shall be explain'd we shall have open'd the way for the Mind to proceed farther and every one may discover at a single View and with the greatest ease imaginable the most hidden Causes of many particular Errors the Explication whereof would cost a world of Pains and Trouble When once the Mind sees clearly it delights to run to Truth and it runs to it with an inexpressible swiftness The Imployment that seems most necessary to be treated of at present by Reason of its producing most considerable Changes in the Imagination of Men and its conducting them into Errors most is that of Men of Books and Learning who make greater use of their Memory than Thought For Experience has ever manifested that those who have applied themselves the most fervently to the Reading of Books and to the Search of Truth are the Men that have led us into a very great part of our Errors 'T is much the same with those that Study as with those that Travel When a Traveller has unfortunately mistaken his way the farther he goes at the greater distance he is from his Journey 's end and he stâ—ll deviates so much more as he is industrious and in haste to arrive at the place design'd So the vehement pursuits Men make after Truth cause them to betake themselves to the Reading of Books wherein they think to find it or put them upon framing some Phantastical System of the things they desire to know wherewith when their Heads are full and heated they try by some fruitless Sallies and Attempts of Thought to recommend them to the taste of others with hopes to receive the Honours that are usually pay'd to the first Founders of Systems These two Imperfections are now to be consider'd 'T is not easie to be understood how it comes to pass that Men of Wit and Parts choose rather to trust to the Conduct of other Men's Understanding in the Search of Truth than to their own which GOD has given them There is doubtless infinitely more Pleasure as well as Honour to be conducted by a Man 's own Eyes than those of others And a Man who has good Eyes in his Head will never think of shutting them or plucking them out under the hopes of having a Guide And yet the use of the Understanding is to the use of the Eyes as the Understanding is to the Eyes and as the Understanding is infinitely superiour to the Eyes so the use of the Understanding is accompany'd with more solid Satisfactions and gives another sort of Content than Light and Colours give the Sight Notwithstanding Men employ their Eyes in Guiding and Conducting themselves but rarely make use of their Reason in Discovery of Truth But there are many Causes which contribute to this overthrow of Reason First Men's Natural Carelessness and Oscitation that will not let them be at the Pains of Thinking Secondly Their Incapacity to Meditate which they have contracted for want of applying themselves to it from their Youth as has been explain'd in the Ninth Chapter Thirdly The inconcernedness and little Love they have for Abstract Truths which are the Foundation of all that can be known in this World The Fourth Reason is the Satisfaction which accrues from the knowledge of Probabilities which are very agreeable and extreamly moving as being founded upon sensible Notions The Fifth Cause is that ridiculous Vanity which makes us affect the seeming Learned For those go by the Name of Learned who have read most Books The Knowledge of Opinions is of greater use in Conversation and serves better to catch the Admiration of the Vulgar than the Knowledge of True Philosophy which is learned by Meditation In the sixth place we may reckon that unreasonable Fancy which supposes the Ancients were more enlightned than we can be and that there is nothing left for us but what they have succeeded in The Seventh is a Disingenuous Respect mix'd with an absurd Curiosity which makes Men admire things that are most Remote and Ancient such as are far fetch'd or
speak at random and without foundation I am oblig'd to transcribe a Passage here of La Cerda somewhat long and tedious wherein that Author has amass'd together the different Authorities upon that Subject as upon a Question of greatest Importance These are his words upon the Second Chapter of Tertullian De Resurrectione carnis Quaestio haec in scholis utrinque validis suspicionibus agitatur num animam immortalem mortalemve fecerit Aristoteles Et quidem Philosophi haud ignobiles asseveraverunt Aristotelem posuisse nostros animos ab interitu alienos Hi sunt è Graecis Latinis interpretibus Ammonius uterque Olympiodorus Philoponus Simplicius Avicenna uti memorat Mirandula l. 4. De examine vanitatis Cap. 9. Theodorus Metochytes Themistius S. Thomas 2 Contrà gentes Cap 79. Phys. Lect. 12. praetereà 12. Metaph. Lect. 3. Quodlib 10. Qu. 5. Art 1. Albertus Tract 2. De Anima Cap. 20. Tract 3. Cap. 13. Aegidius Lib. 3. De Anima ad Cap. 4. Durandus in 2 Dist. 18. Qu 3. Ferrarius loco citato contra gentes latè Eugubinus L. 9. De perenni Philosophia Cap. 18. quod pluris est discipulus Aristotelis Theophrastus magistri mentem ore calamo novisse penitus qui poterat In contrariam factionem abiere nonnulli Patres nec infirmi Philosophi Justinus in sua paraenesi Origines in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ut fertur Nazianzenus in Disp. contrà Eunom Nyssenus Lib. 2. de Anima Cap. 4. Theodoretus de Curandis Graecorum Affectibus Lib. 3. Galenus in Historia Philosophica Pomponatius L. de Immortalitate Animae Simon Portius L. de Mente Humana Cajetanus 3. de Anima Cap. 2. In eum sensum ut caducum Animum nostrum putaret Aristoteles sunt partim adducti ab Alexandro Aphodis de Auditore qui sic solitus erat interpretari Aristotelicam mentem quamvis Eugubinus Cap. 21. 22 eum excuset Et quidem unde collegisse videtur Alexander mortalitatem nempe ex 12. Metapâ— inde S. Thomas Theodorus Metochytes immortalitatem collegerunt Porrò Tertullianum neutram hanc opinionem amplexum credo sed putasse in hac parte ambiguum Aristotelem Itaque ita citat illum pro utraque Nam cum hic adscribat Aristoteli mortalitatem animae tamen L. de Anima C. 6. pro contraria opinione immortalitatis citat Eadem mente fuit Plutarchus pro utraque opinione advocans eundem Philosophum in L. 5. de placitis Philosoph Nam Cap. 1. mortalitatem tribuit Cap. 25. immortalitatem Ex Scholasticis etiam qui in neutram partem Aristotelem constantem judicant sed dubium ancipitem sunt Scotus in 4. Dist. 43. Qu. 2. Art 2. Harveus quodlib 1. Q. 11. 1. Sent. Dist. 1. Q. 1. Niphus in opusculo de Immortalitate Animae Cap. 1. recentes alii Interpretes quam mediam existimationem credo veriorem sed Scholii lex vetat ut authoritatum pondere librato illud suadeam I deliver all these Quotations as true upon the integrity of the Commentator as thinking it would be loss of time to stand to verifie them Nor have I all those curious Books by me from which they were taken I add no new ones of my own as not envying him the Glory of having made a good Collection And it would still be a greater loss of time to do it though a Man should only turn over the Indices of Aristotle's Commentators We see then in this Passage of La Creda that Men of Books and Study that have pass'd for the Ingenious of their Times have taken abundant Pains to know whether Aristotle believed the Immortality of the Soul and there have been some of them who are able to write Books peculiarly on the Subject as Pomponatius For that Author 's chief Design in his Book is to shew that Aristotle believ'd the Soul was Mortal And possibly there are others who not only are solicitous to know what were Aristotle's thoughts upon this Subject but who moreover look upon it as a very important Question to know for instance whether Tertullian Plutarch or others believ'd or not whether it was Aristotle's Opinion that the Soul was Mortal As there is great Reason to suppose from La Cerda himself if we reflect only on the latter part of the Passage we have quoted Porrò Tertullianum c. Though it be an useless thing to know what Aristotle believ'd concerning the Immortality of the Soul and what were Tertullian's and Plutarch's thoughts concerning Aristotle's belief yet the foundation of the Question The Immortality of the Soul is at least a Truth very necessary to be known But there are infinite things the Knowledge whereof is very impertinent and useless and consequently more useless still to know what were the Ancient thoughts about them and yet there are Men very anxious and inquisitive in conjecturing the Opinions of Philosophers on such sort of Subjects There are found whole Books full of these ridiculous Inquiries and 't is these noisâ—e trifles that have been the occasion of so many Wars among the Learned These vain and impertinent Questions these ridiculous Genealogies of fruitless Opinions are the important Subjects for the Criticisms of the Learned They think they have the Right and Privilege of dispising those who dispise these Fooleries and of treating as ignorant Persons such as glory in being ignorant of them They imagine they are perfect Masters of the History and Genealogy of Substantial Forms and the Age is ungrateful unless it acknowledge their Merit These things manifestly discover the weakness and vanity of the Mind of Man and that when Reason does not govern his Study his Studies are so far from perfecting his Reason that they darken corrupt and totally pervert it 'T is worth while here to observe that in Questions of Faith 't is no fault to search into the Belief of St. Austin for instance or any other Father of the Church nor even to make Inquiry whether St. Austin's Belief was the same as his Predecessors Because matters of Faith are only learn'd by Tradition and Reason is unable to discover them The most Ancient Faith being the most true we must endeavour to know what was the Faith of the Ancients which cannot be done but by Examining the Opinion of several Persons who have succeeded one another in several times But things which depend on Reason are quite of another Nature and we ought not to be solicitous about the Opinion of the Ancients to know what we ought to hold concerning them Yet I know not by what strange subversion of Reason some Men are angered if we speak otherwise in Philosophy than Aristotle has done and yet take it very patiently to hear a Man talk in Divinity contrary to the Gospel the Fathers and Councils I am of Opinion that those who make the greatest out-cry against the Novelties of Philosophy which ought to be had in Esteem are the most obstinate and
dispositio cùm in uno homine reperitur dignus est esse Divinus magìs quam humanus And in other places he still bestows more pompous and magnificent praises on him As Lib. 1. de Generatione Animalium Laudemus Deum qui separavit hunc virum ab aliis in perfectione appropriavitque ei ultimam dignitatem humanam quam non omnis homo potest in quacunque aetate attingere The same he says of him Lib. 1. Dest Disp. 3. Aristotelis doctrina est SVMMA VERITAS quoniam ejus intellectus fuit finis humani intellectûs quare bené dicitur de illo quód ipse fuit creatus datus nobis Divinâ providentiâ ut non ignoremus possâ—bilia sciri Must not a Man be mad in good earnest that will talk at this rate And must not his Bigottry for this Author be degenerated into Extravagance and Folly Aristotle 's Doctrine is the SOVEREIGN TRUTH 'T is impossible for any man to equal him or come near him in Science This is the Man that was sent us from Heaven to teach us all that is possible to be known This is he upon whom all the wise Men are form'd and they are so much more learn'd as they better understand him As he says in another place Aristoteles fuit Princeps per quem perficiuntur omnes Sapientes qui fuerunt post eum licèt differant inter se in intelligendo verba ejus in eo quod sequitur ex eis And yet the Works of this Commentator have been dispersed over all Europe and into Countries farther remote They have been translated out of Arabick into Hebrew out of Hebrew into Latin and it may be into many other Languages Which Manifestly shews what Esteem the Learned have had for them So that a more sensible instance than this cannot be given of the Prepossession of Men of Study For it evidently shews that they are not only Opinionated with an Author themselves but also communicate their Bigottry to others proportionably to the Esteem the World conceives of them And thus these false Praises Commentators load him with are often the cause that Men of no very brightned Parts who betake themselves to the Reading of them are prepossessed and thereby led into infinite Error See here another instance A Man renowned among the Learned who Founded the Geometry and Astronomy Lectures in the Vniversity of Oxford begins a Book which he wrote upon the Eight first Propositions of Euclid with these Words Consilium meum est Auditores si vires valetudo suffecerint explicare Definitiones Petitiones communes Sententias octo priores Propositiones primi libri Elementorum caetera post me venientibus relinquere And he concludes with these words Exolvi per Dei gratiam Domini Auditores promissum liberavi fidem meam explicavi pro modulo meo Definitiones Petitiones communes Sententias octo priores Propositiones Elementorum Euclidis Hîc annis fessus cyclos artemque repono Succedent in hoc munus alii fortasse magis vegeto corpore vivido ingenio c. A Man of a competent Sense would not require more than an hour's time to learn of himself or with the help of the meanest Geometrician the Definitions Postulates Axioms and the Eight first Propositions of Euclid they have very little need of any Explication and yet here is an Author that talks of his Enterprize as of some very difficult and mighty Undertaking He is apprehensive least his strenth should fail him Si vires valetudo suffecerint He leaves the Prosecution of them to his Successors Caetera post me venientibus relinquere He thanks GOD for having through his particular Mercy accomplish'd and made good what he promis'd Exolvi per Dei gratiam promissum liberavi fidem meam Explicavi pro modulo meo What the Quadrature of the Circle the Duplication of the Cube This Great Man has explain'd pro modulo suo the Definitions Postulates Axioms and the Eight first Propositions of the first Book of Euclid ' s Elementâ— Possibly amongst those who shall succeed him there may some be found of a stronger and healthier Constitution than himself to carry on so great a Work Succedent in hoc munus alii FORTASSE magis vegeto corpore vivido ingenio But as for his part he has done enough to sit down and rest Hêc annis fessus cyclos artémque reponit Euclid never thought of being so obscure or of saying such extraordinary things when he compos'd his Elements as should necessarily demand a Book of near three hundred pages to explain his Definitions Axioms Postulates and Eight first Propositions But this Learned Englishman knew how to enhance the Science of Euclid and if Age would have permitted him and he had but continued in the same Vigour we should at present have had a dozen or fifteen mighty Volumes upon Euclid's Elements only which doubtless would have been very beneficial to Novice Pretenders to Geometry and had made much for the Honour of Euclid See what whimsical designs a falsly term'd Learning can put Men upon This Gentleman was vers'd in the Greek Tongue for we are oblig'd to him for a Greek Edition of St. Chrysostom's Works He possibly had read the Ancient Geometricians He could give an Historical Account of their Propositions no less than their Descent and Genealogy He had all the respect for Antiquity that ought to be had for Truth and what is it such a Disposition of Mind produces A Commentary upon the Definitions of Terms the Demands Axioms and the Eight first Propositions of Euclid much harder to be understood and remembred I do not say than the Propositions he commented on but than all that ever Euclid wrote on Geometry There are many Men that out of Vanity talk in Greek and even sometimes in a strange Language they don't themselves understand For Dictionaries no less than Indices and Common Places are very great helps to some sorts of Authors But there are very few of Prudence enough to keep in their Greek upon a Subject where it is needless and impertinent to make use of it And this makes me believe it was Prepossession and an inordinate Esteem for Euclid that form'd in our Author's Imagination the first Design of his Book If this Gentleman had made as much use of his Reason as his Memory in a Matter where Reason should have only been imploy'd or if he had had as great a Respect and Love for Truth as Veneration for the Author he went to expound there is great Probability that having mispent so much time upon so frivolous a Subject he would have acknowledg'd Euclid's Definitions of a Plane Angle and Parallel Lines to be Vicious and Defective and inexpressive of the Nature of them and that the Second Proposition is impertinent since the Proof of it depends upon the Third Postulate which is harder to be granted than that Second Proposition since in granting that Third Postulate which
is That we may describe from any Point a Circle at what interval we please we not only grant that a Line may be drawn from a Point equal to another Line which Euclid effects in that Proposition after a very round-about manner But we allow that from any Point may be drawn an infinite number of Lines of what length we please But the Design of most Commentators is not to Illuminate their Authors and to find out Truth 't is to make Ostentation of their Learning and implicitly to defend the Authors which they Comment on even to their Vices 'T is not so much to make themselves or their Authors understood they talk as to make him admir'd and themselves together with him If the Gentleman before-mention'd had not stuff'd his Book with Sentences of Greek with a great many Names of unheard of Authors and such other useless Observations for the understanding Common Notions Verbal Definitions and Geometrical Postulates who would have read his Book who would have admir'd him or who would have conferr'd on its Author the Honorary Title of Learned or of a Man of Sense I presume it can't be doubted after what I have said but the Indiscrete Reading of Books often prepossesses the Mind But as soon as Prepossession enters in that which we call Common Sense is banish'd out of it 'T is incapable of Judging soberly of any thing any way relative to the Subject of its Prepossession It stains and tinctures with it every Thought nay it cannot apply it self to Subjects quite remote from those it is prejudic'd for Thus a Man opinionated with Aristotle can relish nothing but Aristotle He must judge of every thing with relation to Aristotle What does not accord with that Philosopher seems false he has constantly some Saying of Aristotle in his Mouth he is citing him upon all occasions and all sorts of Subjects both to prove things so obscure as no Man can comprehend and to prove things so self-evident as Children cannot doubt of because Aristotle is to him what Reason and Evidence are to others So if a Man be possess'd with the conceit of Euclid and Geometry he will be for reducing every thing you shall say to him to the Lines and Propositions of his darling Author and shall talk nothing but with reference to his Science The whole would not be bigger than its part but because Eulid has said it nor will he be asham'd to quote him for the Proof of it as I have sometimes observ'd But this is still more customary with those who are devoted to other Authors than those of Geometry in whose Books nothing is more frequent than Greek Hebrew Arabick Citations to prove things as evident as the Sun at Mid-day All this is occasion'd by Reason that the Traces imprinted on the Fibres of the Brain by the Objects of their Prepossession are so deep as always to remain gaping and half open And the Animal Spirits continually passing through them preserve them so without permitting them to close again So that the Soul having always of necessity the Thoughts that are connected with these Traces becomes as it were enslav'd to them and she is ever troubled and disquieted even when knowing she is wrong she is willing to be Righted Thus she is in constant danger of falling into a great number of Errors unless she stands always upon her guard with an inviolable Resolution of observing the Rule given in the beginning of this Work that is of Denying an entire Consent except to things entirely evident I pass over the evil Choice that is generally made of the kind of Study Men apply themselves to as properly belonging to Moral Philosophy to treat of though it may likewise be reduc'd here to what has been said of Prepossession For when a Man is fallen beyond retrival into the Reading of the Rabbins and Books of all sorts of most unknown and consequently most useless Languages and spends his whole Life therein he does it doubtless out of Prepossession and the Imaginary hopes of becoming Learned though it is impossible by that Method to acquire any true Sience But because this Application to unprofitable Studies does not so much subject us to Error as waste our Time to possess us with a foolish Vanity I shall not speak here of those who fondly think of becoming Learned in all these sorts of sordid and unprofitable Sciences the number whereof is very great and the Study usually too passionate and earnest CHAP. VIII I. Of the Inventors of new Systems II. The last Error of Men of Learning WE have been manifesting the state of the Imagination of Men of Books and Study who resign up all to the Authority of some certain particular Authors There are others still very opposite to these who have no respect at all for Authors let their Esteem be what it will among the Learned If they esteem'd them formerly they are now of a contrary Mind and set themselves up for Authors They love to be thought Inventors of some new Opinions thereby to procure Reputation in the World and are well satisfy'd that by saying something that was never said before they shall not fail to have their Admirers This sort of People are generally of a strong Imagination the Fibres of their Brain are in such a disposition as to preserve for a long time the Traces of what has been imprinted on them Thus when once they have imagin'd a System that has in it any thing of probability 't is impossible to beat them out of it Whatever any way makes for its confirmation is most heartily embrac'd and retain'd And on the contrary all the Objections that are made to it are over-look'd at least are eluded by some frivolous Distinction They are inwardly pleas'd with the sight of their own Workmanship and of the Esteem they hope will redound to them from it They only apply themselves to consider the Image of Truth deduc'd from their probable Opinions They fix this Image stedfastly before their Eyes but never behold with a steddy View the other sides of their Sentiments which would betray their Falshood There must go great Qualifications to capacitate a Man to be the Inventor of any true System For 't is not enough to have a quickness of Parts there must besides be a certain Capaciousness of Thoughts and Reach of Mind which can at one View take in a clear prospect of a great many things Little and narrow Minds with all their Vivacity and Delicacy are too short-sighted to survey all that is necessary to be seen for the establishing a System They are check'd and even stop'd with some little Difficulties that discourage them or with some glimmering Lights which dazzle and carry them away their Sight is too narrow to survey at once the whole body of a capacious Subject But however Capacious and Penetrating the Mind is unless it be withal exempt from Passion and Prejudice there is no Good to be hoped from it Prejudices
I mistake not said enough to discover in general what are the Faults of Imagination and the Errors whereunto Men of Books and Study are most obnoxious Now whereas there are few besides who trouble their heads with Searching after Truth and the rest of the World take up with their Opinion it seems we might put an end here to this Second Part. However 't is not amiss to add something concerning the Errors of other Men as being no unuseful thing to take notice of them Whatever flatters the Senses extreamly affect us and whatever affects us makes us mind it in proportion to its affecting us Thus those who resign themselves up to all sorts of most Sensible and Pleasing Diversions are incapable of Penetrating into Truths ever so little abstruse and difficult because the Capacity of the Mind which is not infinite is fill'd up with their Pleasures or at least is very much divided by them The generality of Great Men of Courtiers of Rich and Young and of those we call the fine Wits giving themselves to perpetual Diversions and studying only the Art of Pleasing by all that gratifie the Concupiscence and the Senses by degrees obtain such a Niceness in these things or such a Softness that it may be often said they are rather the Effeminate than the fine Wits which they would fain be thought There is a great deal of difference betwixt a true Fineness and Softness of Mind Though these two things are ordinarily confounded The Fine or the Curious Wits are those whose Reason descend to the least Differences of things Who fore-see Effects which depend on hidden un-usual and invisible Causes In brief they are those who dive farthest into the Subjects they consider But the soft Minds have only a counterfeit Delicacy and Niceness They are neither Lively nor Piercing They cannot see the Effects of even the most gross and palpable Causes In short they are unable to comprehend or penetrate any thing but are wonderfully nice as to Modes and Fashions An ungentile Word a Rustick Accent or a little Grimace shall provoke them infinitely more than a confus'd mass of lame and inconcluding Reasons They cannot discover the Defect of an Argument but can critically discern a false Step or an incompos'd Gesture In a word they have a perfect Understanding of Sensible things as having made continual use of their Senses but have no true Knowledge of things depending on Reason because they have scarce ever imploy'd their own Yet these are the Men that flourish most in the Esteem of the World and who most easily advance to the Reputation of the Fine Wits For when a Man talks with a free and easie Air when his Expressions are pure and well chosen when he serves himself with Figures that please the Senses and excite the Passions in an imperceptible manner though what he says be nothing but Impertinence and Folly though there be nothing good or true in his Discourse yet he shall be voted by the common Opinion the Fine the Curious the Acute Wit 'T is not perceiv'd that this is only a Soft and Effeminate Mind that glitters with false Lights but never shines out with a genuine Brightness that only perswades because we have Eyes and not because we have Reason For what remains I do not deny but that all Men have a Tincture of this Infirmity we have now remark'd in some part of them There is no Man whose Mind is not touch'd with the Impressions of his Senses and Passions and consequently who has not some Adherences to Sensible Manners All Men differ in this but in degree of more or less But the Reason of charging this Fault upon some particular Men is because there are those who acknowledge it to be a Fault and labour to correct it Whereas the Men we have been speaking of look upon it as a very advantagious Quality They are so far from owning this false Delicacy as the Effect of an Effeminate Softness and the Original of infinite Distempers to the Mind as to imagine it the Product and Sign of the Beauty and Excellency of their Genius To these may be added a vast number of Superficial Minds who never go to the bottom of things and have but a confus'd Perception of the Differences between them but they are not in the Fault as are those before-mention'd for 't is not their Divertisements that straiten their Souls and make them little-minded but they are naturally so This Littleness of Mind proceeds not from the Nature of the Soul as may perhaps be imagin'd 'T is effected sometimes by the paucity or dulness of the Animal Spirits sometimes by an immoderate plenty of the Blood and Spirits by the inflexibility of the Fibres of the Brain or by some other Cause not necessary to be known There are then two sorts of Minds The one easily observes the differences of things and this is the solid Mind The other imagines and supposes a resemblance between them which is the superficial Character The first has a Brain fitly dispos'd for the Reception of the clear and distinct Traces of the Objects it considers and because 't is very attentive to the Idea's of these Traces it sees the Objects at hand and surveys every part of them But the Superficial Mind receives only the faint and confus'd Traces thereof and that by the by very remotely and obscurely insomuch that they appear alike as the Faces of those we behold at too great a distance because the Mind ever supposes Similitude and Equality where 't is not oblig'd to acknowledge Difference and Inequality for the Reasons I shall give in the Third Book In this Class may be reckon'd all your Publick Haranguers and great Talkers and many of those who have a great Facility at delivering themselves though they speak but seldom For 't is extreamly rare for Men of serious Meditation to be able to express themselves clearly upon the things they have thought They generally hesitate when they come to Discourse about them as being scrupulous and fearful of using such Terms as may excite a false Idea in the Hearers Being asham'd to talk purely for Talking sake as is the way with a great many who talk peremptorily on all adventures They are at a loss at finding words expressive of their un-obvious and not common Thoughts Though I have the greatest Deference and Esteem imaginable for Pious Men Divines and Aged Persons and in general for all those who have deservedly a great Sway and Authority over others yet I think my self oblig'd to say thus much of them That it is usual for them to think themselves infallible because the World hears them with Respect that they exercise their Mind but little in discovering Speculative Truths that they are too liberal in condemning whatever their Pleasure and Humour suggests before they have attentively consider'd it Not that they are to be blam'd for not applying themselves to the Study of many Sciences not very
they are communicated to others with greater Facility The Study of Nature is undoubtedly more Noble than of Books Visible and Sensible Experiments afford us much more certain Proofs of things than the Reasonings of Men and no Objection can be made to those Men whose Circumstances of Life have engag'd them in the Study of Natural Philosophy for endeavouring to excel in it by making continual Experiments provided their greatest Application be made to the more necessary Sciences We find no fault with Experimental Philosophy nor the Improvers of it but only with their Defects The first of which is that usually 't is not the Light of Reason which conducts them in the Method of their Experiments but only Chance Which is the reason that they grow little more Learned or Skilful after having wasted much of their Time and Fortune therein The second is their insisting rather upon Curious and Extraordinary Experiments than on those that are more Common when 't is plain that the Commoner being the more simple they ought first to be dwelt upon before a Man applies himself to the more Compounded and to those which depend upon a multitude of Causes The third is their earnest and diligent Search after Profitable Experiments and their neglect of those which only serve to illuminate the Mind The fourth that they are too un-exact in their Observations of all the particular Circumstances of Time Place the Quality of the Drugs made use of though the least of these Circumstances is capable of frustrating the desir'd Effect For 't is observable that the Terms the Virtuoâ—i use are Equivocal The Word Wine for instance signifies so many different things as there are different Soils various Seasons and several ways of making and preserving it So that it may be said in general there are no where two Vessels of it altogether alike And when a Chymist says To make such an Experiment take wine we have but a very confus'd Idea of his meaning For which Reason they should use a most exact Circumspection in Experiments and not descend to the Compound sort till they are very well acquainted with the more Simple and Ordinary The fifth is That they make too many Deductions from a single Experiment when on the contrary to the Establishing any one good Conclusion there should go generally many Experiments Though a single Experiment may be assistant to the inferring many Conclusions Lastly The most part of Naturalists and Chymists consider only the particular Effects of Nature They never ascend up to the first Notions of the Things Bodies are compos'd of When yet it is most certain we can have no clear and distinct knowledge of any particular Phaenomena unless we are first masters of the most general Principles and run them up as high as Metaphysicks To conclude they commonly want Courage and Constancy and are tir'd and discourag'd with the Toil and Expence There are many other Faults these Gentlemen are subject to but I design not to reckon them all up The Causes of these Faults which I have remark'd are the want of Application the Properties of the Imagination explain'd in the Tenth and Eleventh Chapters and Men's judging of the Difference of Bodies and the Changes they undergo only from the Sensations they have of them according to the Explication given in the First Book The THIRD PART Concerning The CONTAGIOUS COMMUNICATION Of Strong IMAGINATIONS CHAP I. I. Of the Disposition we have to imitate others in all things which is the Original of the Communication of those Errors that depend on the Power of Imagination II. Two things that more especially increase this Disposition III. What that strong Imagination is IV. That there are several kinds of it Of Fools and of those that have a Srong Imagination in the Sense 't is here taken V. Two considerable Imperfections of Men of a Strong Imagination VI. Of the Power they have to perswade and impose on others HAVING already explain'd the Nature of the Imagination the Failings it is subject to and shewn how our own Imagination engages us in Error all that remains in this Second Book is to speak to the Contagious Communication of Strong Imaginations I mean that Sway and Power some Minds have of drawing others into their Errors Strong Imaginations are wondrously contagious They domineer over the weaker fashion them by degrees after their own Image and imprint the same Characters upon them And therefore since Men of Conceit and of a Vigorous and Strong Imagination are the least reasonable of any there are very few Causes of the Errors of Men more â—niversal than this dangerous Communication of the Imagination In order to conceive what this Contagion is and how it 's transmitted from one to another we must know that Men are under a mutual necessity of one another's Assistance and are so fram'd as out of many Bodies to compound one whereof all the Parts have a muâ—ual Correspondence For the preserving and cherishing of which Union GOD commanded them to have Charity for each other But whereas Self-love might by little and little extinguish Charity and break the Bond of Civil Society GOD thought fit for the Preservation of it to unite Men more firmly still by Natural Ties which might subsist in case Charity should fail and also defend it against the attacks of Self-love These Natural Ties which we have in common with Beasts consist in a certain Disposition of Brain which makes all Men prone to imitate the Actions of those they converse with to frame the same Judgments with them and to be acted with like Passions they see them possess'd with Which Disposition is a much straiter Obligation to bind them to each other than Charity founded upon Reason this Charity being rarely to be met with Now when a Man wants this Disposition of Brain whereby he may be affected with our Sentiments and Passions he is Naturally incapable of uniting and making up one Body with us He may be compar'd to those Irregular Stones that cannot be plac'd in a Building because they cannot be joyn'd with the others Oderunt hilarem tristes tristemque jocosi Sedatum celeres agilem gnavúmque remissi 'T is a more considerable Vertue than is imagin'd to keep fair with those who are untouch'd with our Passions and whose Notions are contrary to our own And we shall have Reason to think so if we consider that 't is a kind of Insulting when we see a Man that has just cause of Sorrow or Joy not to take part with him in his Sentiments When a Man is in Sorrow one should not come before him with a Gay and Airy look which bespeaks Joy and violently imprints the Motions thereof in his Imagination This being to disturb him from the state that is most convenient and pleasant to him for sorrow is the pleasantest of all the Passions to a Man under any Affliction There is then a certain Disposition of Brain in all Men whatever which naturally inclines
stand chargeable however with being more irrational In short they bear the Character of an Age still more corrupt in which nothing is found sufficient to qualifie the Disorders of Imagination What has been said of Courtiers ought likewise to be understood of the most part of Servants in respect of their Masters Maids in respect of their Mistresses and not to make an impertinent Induction of particulars of all Inferiors in respect of their Superiors and especially of Children in respect of their Parents Forasmuch as they have a very peculiar Dependance on them are cherish'd and brought up tenderly by them which is not done in the rest and lastly because Reason inclines Children to such Submission and Respect as Reason it self cannot always regulate 'T is not absolutely necessary for the influencing the Imagination of others to have some Authority over them and that they have some kind of Dependance on us the sole strength of Imagination is sometimes sufficient to do it 'T is common for strangers for Men of no Reputation for such as we are not prepossess'd with any Esteem of to have such force of Imagination and consequently so lively and charming Expressions as to perswade us without our knowing either for what end or by what means we were perswaded I confess it seems strange it should be so but yet there is nothing commoner Now this imaginative Perswasion must proceed from the force of a Visionary Wit who has a lively way of Talking without knowing what he says and who thus brings over the Minds of Hearers to give a strong assent without knowing what 't is they assent to For the generality of Men give way to the force of the sensible Impression and so dazles and confounds them and makes them passionately judge of what they confusedly conceiv'd We desire such as shall read this Work to consider this thing to observe the Instances of it in the Companies they light upon and to make Reflection on what happens in their own Breast on such occasions which will be a thing of greater use to them than they can imagine But it should be well consider'd that there are two things which wonderfully contribute to the Power of other's Imagination over us The first is a grave and pious Deportment the second a Presumptuous and Libertine Behaviour For accordingly as we are dispos'd to Piety or Libertinism we shall find an Air of Gravity and Piety in Discourse or a Presumptuous and Libertine strain shall act very differently upon us 'T is true the one is of more dangerous contagion than the other but yet we should equally resist the sensible Manners of either side and only submit to the force of the Reasons they are attended with for ridiculous Nonsence and Impertinence may be spoke in a grave and sober way and Blasphemy and Profaneness with an Air of Devotion Wherefore we should following the Advice of St. John examine Whether the Spirits be of GOD and not trust all sorts of Spirits We know the Devils sometimes transform themselves into Angels of Light and there are Men who have as it were naturally the Mein of Piety and Look of Religion and consequently a well-establish'd Reputation in the World who yet exempt Men from their Essential Obligations even from the loving GOD and their Neighbour to enslave them to some foolish Practices or Pharisaick Ceremony But the Strong Imaginations whose Impression and Contagion should more industriously be avoided are of Men abroad in the World who affect the being reputed the Bold Wits which is a Reputation easily acquir'd For 't is but denying with a particular Grace Original Sin the Immortality of the Soul or ridiculing some receiv'd Opinion of the Church to set up for such an accomplish'd Wit among the Vulgar These little Minds are generally full of Life and Fire of a forward and haughty Carriage which sways and disposes Weak Imaginations to yield to the vivid and plausible Discourse which to any thinking Man will appear to have nothing in it For as happy as they are at Expressing they have but very ill luck at Reasoning And yet whilst Men though never so Rational had rather be mov'd and affected with sensible Pleasure that attends the way of Delivery and the specious Expressions than to enter into an irksome Disquisition of the Reasons 't is visible these Minds must have the ascendant over others and so propagate their Contagion and their Errors by the Authority they have over the Imagination of other Men. CHAP. III. I. Of the Force of some Authors Imagination II. Of Tertullian ONE of the greatest and most notorious Proofs of the Power some Imaginations have over others is the Prevalency some Authors have of perswading without Reasons For instance The Turn Tertullian Seneca Montagne and some others give their Discourse has those Charms and Lustre which dazle the Minds of most Men though it be only a faint Draught of Fancy and as it were the Shadows of those Authors Imagination Their Words as dead and inanimate as they are have greater Vigour than the Reasons of others They enter they penetrate they domineer in the Soul at so imperious a rate as to challenge Obedience without being understood and make their Orders submitted to before they are known A Man has a Mind to believe but he knows not what When he would know what 't is he would believe and approaches as I may say those fleeting Phantoms to take a View of them they dissipate into smoak with all their gaudy Drapery and Lustre But though these Authors I have nam'd are the most proper Instances that can be given to shew the Power of some Men's Imaginations over others and I propose them for that purpose yet I pretend not to condemn them in every thing For I cannot forbear having an Esteem for those particular Beauties that are in them and a Deference to that universal Approbation they have had for many Ages I must declare I have a great Veneration for some of Tertullian's Works and especially for his Apology against the Gentiles and his Book of Prescriptions against Hereticks and for some parts of the Books of Seneca though I have very little Esteem for any thing of Montagne Tertullian was indeed a Man of profound Learning but of a better Memory than Judgment and had a greater Penetration and Extent of Imagination than of Intellect There is no doubt but he was a Visionist in the Sense I have before explain'd and was fraught with most of the Qualities I have attributed to the Visionary Wits And the Veneration he had for Montanus's Visions and his Prophetesses are an undoubted Demonstration of the Weakness of his Judgment His fervent Zeal and Transports and Enthusiasms upon trifling Subjects are a sensible Indication of a distemper'd Imagination What irregular Motions are there in his Hyperboles and Figures How many pompous and magnificent Arguments that owe all their force to their sensible Lustre and perswade meerly by giddying and dazling the
Sensibility of Men the Corruption of the Senses and the Passions dispose them to the desire of being struck with it and provokes them to strike others with it also I am then of Opinion that there is no Author more fit than Seneca to exemplifie that contagious Communication of a great many Men who go by the Name of the Fine and Bold Wits and to shew how these strong and vigorous Imaginations domineer over the Weak and Unenlightened Minds not by the force and evidence of their Reasons which are the Productions of the Mind but by the Turn and lively way of Expression which depend on the Strength of Imagination I know well enough that this Author's Reputation is considerable in the World and ' will be look'd upon as a rash attempt to have treated him as a very Imaginative and Injudicious Author But 't was chiefly upon the Account of his Esteem I have said so much of him here not out of any Envy or ill Humour but because the Estimation he is in will more sensibly touch the Mind of the Reader and more closely apply it to the Consideration of the Errors I have attack'd For we should as far as possible bring the most Eminent Instances when the things we say are important it being sometimes an Honouring a Book to Critizice upon it But yet I am not the only Man that finds fault with the Writings of Seneca for not to mention some Famous Men of our own Age 't is near six hundred Years ago that a most Judicious Author observ'd there was little Exactness in his Philosophy little Judgment and Justice in his Elocution and his Reputation was rather the result of the Heat and indiscreet Inclination of Youth than the Consent of Learned and Judicious Men. Publickly to engage the grossest and most palpable Errors is labour lost there being no contagion in them 'T would be ridiculous to advertise Men that Hypocondriack People are deceiv'd 't is visible to all the World But if those very Men they have the greatest Opinion of should chance to be mistaken 't is a piece of service to admonish them lest they should imitate them in their Errors Now 't is plain that the Spirit of Seneca is a Spirit of Pride and Vanity And whereas Pride according to the Scripture is the Origine of Sin Initium Peccati Superbia The Spirit of Seneca cannot be the Spirit of the Gospel nor his Morals be allied to the Morals of our SAVIOVR the only true and solid Morals True 't is that all the Notions of Seneca are not false nor dangerous And he may be read with profit by such as have an exactness of Thought and are acquainted with the Foundation of Christian Morality Good use has been made of him by Great Men and I have no intent of blaming those who to accommodate themselves to the Weakness of others that had an excessive Esteem for him have drawn Arguments from his Works whereby to defend the Morality of our LORD and oppugn the Enemies of the Gospel with their own Weapons The Alcoran has many good things in it and some true Prophecies are to be found in the Centuries of Nostradamus The Alcoran is made use of to oppose the Religion of Mahomet and Nostradamus's Prophecies may be of use to convince some Fantastick and Visionary People But what is good in the Alcoran can't make it a good Book nor can some true Explications in Nostradamus's Centuries make him ever pass for a Prophet neither can it be said that all who make use of these Authors approve them or have for them any real Esteem A Man ought not to go about to overthrow what I have said about Seneca by alledging abundance of Quotations out of him which contain in them nothing but solid Truths and consonant to the Gospel For I grant many such are met with in that Author and so there are in the Alcoran and other mischievous Books Nor would he be less to blame who should overwhelm me with the Authority of those great Numbers who have made use of Seneca since use may be made of what we think an impertinent Book provided those we speak to judge otherwise of it than our selves But to ruine intirely the Wisdom of the Stoicks we need only know one thing which is sufficiently prov'd by Experience and by what we have already said which is that we are link'd and fasten'd to our Body our Relations our Friends our Prince and our Country by such ties as we neither can break nor could for shame endeavour it Our Soul is united to our Body and by our Body to all things Visible by so potent an Hand that 't is impossible by our own force to loosen the Connection 'T is impossible our Body should be prick'd but we must be prick'd and hurt our selves because the state of Life we are in most necessarily requires this Correspondence between us and the Body which we have In like manner 't is impossible to hear our selves reproach'd and despis'd but we must feel some discontent thereupon because GOD having made us for sociable converse with other Men has given us an Inclination for every thing capable to bind and cement us together which Inclination we have not strength enough of our selves to overcome 'T is Extravagance to say that Pain does not hurt us and that words of Contumely and Contempt are not at all offensive to us as being above such things as these There is no getting above Nature without being assisted by Grace nor was there ever any Stoick who despis'd Glory and the Esteem of Men through the meer Strength of his Mind Men may indeed get the mastery of their Passions by contrary Passions They may vanquish their Fear or their Pain by Vain Glory I mean only that they may abstain from Flying or Complaining when seeing themselves in the midst of a multitude the desire of Glory supports them and stops those motions in their Bodies which put them upon Flight In this manner they may conquer them but this is no Conquest or Deliverance from their slavery 't is possibly to change their Master for some time or rather to put on a longer and an heavier chain 'T is to grow wise happy and free only in appearance but in reality to suffer an hard and cruel bondage The natural union a Man has still with his Body may be resisted by that union he has with Men because Nature may be resisted by the strength of Nature GOD may be resisted by the forces He himself supplies us with but GOD cannot be resisted by the strength of a Man 's own mind Nature can't be perfectly vanquish'd but by Grace because GOD cannot if I may be allow'd so to speak be overcome but by the special auxiliaries of GOD himself And thus that so much celebrated and vaunted Division of all things in such as depend not on us and such as we ought not to depend on is a Division that seems agreeable to Reason
Imagination which are the Ingredients of the Fine Wit 'T is the glittering and not the solid Mind that pleases the generality because they love what touches the Senses above that which instructs their Reason And thus taking the Fineness of Imagination for the Fineness of the Mind we may say that Montagne had a Mind Fine and indeed extraordinary His Idea's are false but handsom His Expressions irregular and bold but taking His discourses ill-season'd but well imagin'd There appears throughout his Book the Character of an Original that is infinitely pleasing As great a Copyer as he is the Copyer is not discern'd his strong and bold Imagination giving always the turn of an Original even to what was the most stol'n To conclude he has every thing necessary either for pleasing us or imposing on us And I think I have sufficiently shewn that 't is not by convincing their Reason he gets into the Favour and Admiration of Men but by turning their Mind by an ever-victorious Vivacity of his imperious Imagination CHAP. VI. I. Of Witches in Imagination and of Wolf-men II. The Conclusion of the two first Books THE strangest effect of the force of Imagination is the immoderate Fear of the Apparition of Spirits Witchcraft Spells and Charms Lycanthropes or Wolf-men and generally of whatever is suppos'd to depend on the Power of the Devil There is nothing more terrible or that frightens the Mind more and makes deeper impressions in the Brain than the Idea of an invisible Power intent upon doing us mischief and to which we can make no resistance Whatever Discourses raise that Idea are attended to with dread and curiosity Now Men affecting all that 's extraordinary take a whimsical delight in relating surprizing and prodigious Stories of the Power and Malice of Witches both to the scaring others and themselves And so we need not wonder that Sorcerers and Witches are so common in some Countries where the belief of the Witches-Sabbath is deeply rooted in the Mind Where all the most extravagant Relations of Witchcrafts are listen'd to as Authentic Histories and where Mad-men and Visionists whose Imagination has been distemper'd through the recital of these Stories and the corruption of their Hearts are burnt for real Sorcerers and Witches I know well enough I shall incur the blame of a great many for attributing the most part of Witchcrafts to the power of Imagination as knowing Men love to be scar'd and frightned that they are angry with such as would disabuse them and are like those imaginary sick People who respectfully harken to and punctually execute the orders of Physicians who prognosticate direful accidents to them For Superstitions are not easily either destroy'd or oppos'd without finding a great number of Patrons and Defenders And that Inclination to a blind-fold Belief of all the Dreams and Illusions of Demonographers is produc'd and upheld by the same Cause which makes the Superstitious stiff and untractable as it were easie to demonstrate However this ought not to discourage me from shewing in a few words how I believe such Opinions as these take footing A Shepherd in his Cottage after Supper gives his Wife and Children a Narrative of the adventures of the Witches-Sabbath And having his Imagination moderately warm'd by the Vapours of strong Liquors and fancying he has been often an Assistant at that imaginary Rendezvous fails not to deliver himself in a manner strong and lively His natural Eloquence together with the Disposition his whole Family is in to hearken to a Subject so new and terrible must doubtless produce prodigious Impressions in weak Imaginations nor is it naturally possible but his Wife and Children must be dismay'd must be affected and convinc'd with what they hear him say 'T is an Husband 't is a Father that speaks of what himself has been an Eye-witness and Agent He is belov'd and respected and why should he not be believ'd The Shepherd repeats the same thing one day after another his Wifâ—'s and Children's Imagination receive deeper and deeper Impressions of it by degrees till at last it grows familiar their Fears vanish but Conviction stays behind and at length Curiosity invites them to go to it themselves They anoint themselves and lay them down to sleep This Disposition of Heart gives an additional heat to their Imagination and the Traces the Shepherd had imprinted on their Brain open so as to make them fancy in their sleep all the Motions of the Ceremony he had describ'd to them present and real They wake and ask each other and give a mutual Relation of what they say And thus they strengthen the Traces of their Vision and he who has the strongest Imagination having the best knack at perswading the rest fails not in a few Nights time to Methodize the Imaginary History of the Sabbath Here now are your finish'd Witches of the Shepherd's making and these in their turn will make many others if having a strong and lively Imagination they be not deterr'd by Fear from telling the like Stories There have been known such hearty down-right Witches as made no scruple to confess to every body their going to the Sabbath and who were so throughly convinc'd of it that though several Persons watch'd them and assur'd them they never stirr'd out of their Bed yet have withstood their Testimony and persisted in their own perswasion We all know that when Children hear Tales of Spirits what frights they are put into and that they have not courage to stay without Light and Company Because at that time their Brain receiving not the Impressions of any present Object opens in those Traces that are form'd in it by the Story and that with so much force as frequently to set before their Eyes the Objects represented to them And yet these Stories are not told them as if they were true nor spoken in a manner denoting the Belief of them in the Speaker and sometimes coldly and without the least concern Which may make it less to be admir'd that a Man who believes he has been present at the Witches-Sabbath and consequently affirms it in a serious tone and with a look of assurance should easily convince his respectful Auditory of all the circumstances he describes to them and thereby transmit into their Imagination Impressions like those he was himself abus'd with Men in speaking engrave in our Brain such Impressions as they have themselves When they are deep they speak in a way that makes a deep Impression upon others For they never speak but they make them like themselves in some thing or other Children in their Mother's Womb have only the Perceptions of their Mothers and when brought into the World imagine little more than what their Parents are the cause of even the wisest Men take their Measures rather from the Imagination of others that is from Opinion and Custom than from the Rules of Reason Thus in the places where Witches are burnt we find great numbers of them it being taken for
procure them which Union engages us in infinite Errors and excessive Miseries though we are not always sensible of these Miseries no more than we are of the Errors that occasion them I give here a remarkable Instance The Union that we had with our Mothers in their Womb which is the strictest possible to be had with Mankind was the Cause of two of the greatest Evils namely Sin and Concupiscence which are the Original of all our Miseries And yet for the forming of our Body it was necessary that Union should be so close and strict as it is This Union which was broken at our Birth was succeeded by another whereby Children are con-sociated to their Parents and their Nurses This second Union was not so strict as the former and therefore did us not so much mischief having only inclin'd us to believe and imitate all that our Parents and Nurses do and say 'T is plain this second Union was farther necessary not as the first for the forming but the preserving of our Body that we might know all the things useful or advantagious to it and might accommodate it to such Motions as are necessary to obtain them Last of all the Union which we have at present with all Men is unavoidably the cause of a great deal of Evil to us though it be not so strait as being less necessary to the Preservation of our Body For 't is upon the score of this Union we live by Opinion that we esteem and love what is esteem'd and lov'd in the World in spight of the Remorse of our Consciences and the true Idea's that we have of things I speak not here of the Union we have with the Mind of other Men in behalf of which it may be said we receive instruction from it I speak only of the sensible Union that is between our Imagination and the Air and Manner of those that speak to us We see then how all the Thoughts we have by the Dependance on the Body are false and so much the more dangerous to the Soul as they are the more useful to the Body Which being so let us try to rid our selves by degrees of the Delusions of our Sense of the Vision and Chimera's of our Imagination and of the Impression made by other Men's Imaginations on our Mind Let us carefully reject all the confus'd Idea's we have contracted through the Dependance we are in to our Body and let us only admit the clear and evident Idea's which the Mind receives through its necessary Union with the Divine Logos or with Eternal Wisdom and Truth as we shall explain in the following Book which treats Of the Vnderstanding or Pure Mind F. MALEBRANCHE'S TREATISE CONCERNING The Search after TRUTH BOOK the THIRD Concerning The UNDERSTANDING OR The Pure Intellect CHAP. I. I. Thought is only essential to the Mind Sensation and Imagination are only the Modifications of it II. We know not all the Modifications our Soul is capable of III. They are different from our Knowledge and our Love nor are they always Consequences of them THE Subject of this Third Book is somewhat dry and barren In which we enquire into the Mind consider'd alone and without any reference to the Body in order to discover the Infirmities peculiar to it and the Errors deriving only from it The Senses and Imagination are exuberant and inexhaustible Sources of Error and Deception But the Mind acting by it self is not so subject to straying and misconduct It was a difficult thing to put an end to the two last Treatises and 't is no less difficult to begin this not that there is not enough to be said on the Nature and Properties of the Mind but because we enquire not here so much into its Properties as its Weaknesses 'T is not therefore to be wonder'd if this Tract is not so large nor discovers so many Errors as the two fore-going nor ought it to be complain'd of for being somewhat Dry Abstract and Applicative For 't is impossible in all Discourses to move the Senses and Imaginations of others nor ought it always to be done A Subject of an abstract Nature in becoming sensible commonly grows obscure and 't is enough to be made intelligible So that nothing is more unjust than the usual Complaints of those who would know every thing and yet take pains for nothing who take pet if you desire them to be attentive who would ever be touch'd and mov'd and have their Senses and their Passions eternally gratify'd But we confess our selves unable to give them Satisfaction Writers of Comedies and Romances are oblig'd to please and to procure Attention but for us it 's sufficient if we can instruct even those that labour to make themselves attentive The Errors of the Senses and Imagination proceed from the Nature and Constitution of the Body and are expos'd to view by considering what Dependency the Soul 's in to it But the Errors of the Pure Understanding cannot be discover'd but by considering the Nature of the Mind it self and of the Idea's that are necessary to its knowing Objects And therefore to penetrate into the Causes of the Errors of the Pure Understanding 't will be necessary to insist in this Book on the consideration of the Nature of the Mind and of Intellectual Idea's In the first place I shall treat of the Mind consider'd in its own Nature without any Relation to the Body to which it is united So that what I shall say on this point will extend to pure Intelligences and by stronger Reason to what we call Pure Understanding For by the Word Pure Vnderstanding I mean only to design that Faculty the Mind has of knowing External Object without forming Corporeal Images of them in the Brain to represent them by After which I shall discourse of Intellectual Idea's by means of which the Pure Vnderstanding perceives Exteriour Objects I am perswaded no Man can doubt after he has seriously thought on it but the Essence of the Mind consists only in Thought as the Essence of Matter consists only in Extension and that according to the different Modifications of Thought the Mind one while Wills and another while Imagines or has many other particular Forms as according to the different Modifications of Extension Matter is sometimes Water sometimes Wood and sometimes Fire or has abundance of other particular Forms I only advertise thus much That by the word Thought I understand not here the particular Modifications of the Soul that is this or that particular Thought but Thought capable of all sorts of Modifications or of all sorts of Thoughts as by Extension is not meant this or that Extension round or square for instance but Extension capable of all sorts of Modifications or of Figures And this Comparison would have no difficulty in it but that we have not so clear an Idea of Thought as we have of Extension for we only know Thought by Internal Sentiment or Conscience as I make
out hereafter I am farther perswaded it is impossible to conceive a Mind without Thought though 't is easie enough to conceive one without Actual Sensation Imagination and even without Volition in like manner as 't is impossible to conceive any Matter without Extension though it be easie to conceive one that 's neither Earth nor Mettle neither square nor round and which likewise is not in Motion Hence we ought to conclude that as there may be a Portion of Matter that is neither Earth nor Mettal neither square nor round nor yet in Motion so there may be a Mind that neither feels Heat nor Cold neither Joy nor Sorrow that Imagines nothing and even Wills nothing so that all these Modifications are not essential to it Thought therefore is only the Essence of the Mind as Extension only is the Essence of Matter But as Matter or Extension were it without Motion would be altogether useless and incapable of that variety of Forms for which it is created and 't is not conceivable that an Intelligent Being design'd to produce it in that manner so were a Mind or Thought without Volition it is plain it would be wholly useless since that Mind would have no tendency towards the Objects of its Perceptions nor would it love Good for which it was created So that 't is impossible to be conceiv'd that an Intelligent Being should have produc'd it in such a condition Notwithstanding as Motion is not the Essence of Matter since it supposes Extension so Volition is not the Essence of the Mind since Volition supposes Perception Thought therefore all alone is what constitutes the Essence of the Mind and the different manners of Thinking as Sensation and Imagination are only the Modifications it is capable of but wherewith it is not always modify'd But Volition is a Property that always accompanies it whether in Conjunction with or Separation from the Body which yet is not Essential to it since it supposes Thought and 't is possible to conceive a Mind without Will as a Body without Motion However the Power of Willing is inseparable from the Mind though it be not essential to it as the Capacity of being mov'd is inseparable from Matter though it be not included in its Essence For as it is impossible to conceive any Matter that cannot be mov'd so 't is impossible to conceive any Mind that has not the Power of Willing or is incapable of any Natural Inclination But again as Matter may be conceiv'd to exist without any Motion so the Mind may be conceiv'd to exist without any Impression of the Author of Nature towards Good and consequently without Will For the Will is nothing but the Impression of the Author of Nature which carries us towards Good in general as we have explain'd more at large in the first Chapter of the First Book What has been said in that Treatise of the Senses and what we have now said of the Nature of the Mind does not suppose we know all the Modifications it is capable of We are far from making such like Suppositions believing on the contrary that the Mind has a Capacity of receiving an infinite succession of diverse Modifications which the same Mind knows nothing of The least portion of Matter is capable of receiving a Figure of three six ten or of ten thousand Sides also a Circular or Elliptic Figure which may be consider'd as Figures of infinite Sides and Angles The different Species of each of these Figures are innumerable Infinite are Triangles of a different Species and more still are the Figures of four six ten or ten thousand Sides and of infinite Polygones For a Circle an Ellipsis and in general every regular or irregular Curvilin'd Figure may be consider'd as an infinite Polygone An Ellipsis for instance as an infinite Polygone but whose Sides or Angles are unequal being greater towards the little Diameter than the great and so of other infinite Polygones more compound and irregular A plain piece of Wax therefore is capable of infinite or rather infinitely infinite different Modifications which no Mind can comprehend What reason is there then to imagine that the Soul which is far more noble than the Body should be capable only of those Modifications she has already receiv'd Had we never Felt Pleasure or Pain had we never Seen Light nor Colour or had we been with respect to all things as the Blind and Deaf are in regard to Sounds and Colours should we have had Reason to conclude we were incapable of all the Sensations we have of Objects For these Sensations are only the Modifications of our Soul as has been prov'd in the Book concerning the Senses It must be granted then that the Capacity the Soul has of Receiving different Modifications is probably greater than the Capacity it has of Conceiving I would say that as the Mind cannot exhaust or comprehend all the Figures Matter can be fashion'd in so it can't comprehend all the different Modifications possible for the Almighty Hand of GOD to Mint the Soul into though it knew as distinctly the Capacity of the Soul as it knows that of Matter which yet it cannot do for the Reasons I shall bring in the Seventh Chapter of the Second Part of this Book If the Soul whilst we are on Earth receives but few Modifications 't is because it is united to the Body and depends upon it All her Sensations have reference to her Body and as she has not the Fruition of GOD so she has none of those Modifications this Fruition should produce The Matter whereof our Body is compos'd is capable but of very few Modifications in our Life-time it cannot be resolv'd into Earth and Vapour till after our Death It cannot at present become Air Fire Diamond or Mettal it cannot grow round square or triangular it must necessarily be Flesh and have the Figure of a Man to the end the Soul may be united to it 'T is the same case with our Soul She must necessarily have the Sensations of Heat Cold Colour Light Sounds Odors Tasts and many other Modifications to the end she may continue united to her Body All her Sensations are subservient to the Preservation of her Machine They trouble her and dismay her if but the least inward Spring chance to break or slaken which necessarily subjects the Soul to her Body as long as her Body is subject to Corruption But when the Body shall be cloath'd with Immortality and we shall no longer fear the Dissolution of it parts 't is reasonable to believe the Soul shall be no longer touch'd with those incommodious Sensations which we feel against our Will but with infinite others of a different kind whereof we have at present no Idea which will exceed all that we can think and will be worthy the Greatness and Goodness of the GOD we shall enjoy 'T is therefore unreasonable for any one to think he so throughly comprehends the Nature of the Soul as
request of those who talk in so decisive a Strain to explain themselves as distinctly as they can without suffering them to change the Subject or make use of obscure and equivocal Terms and if they be truly Learned something may be got by their Discourse But if they be falsly Learned they will quickly be entangled and confounded by their own Words and can thank no body for it but themselves And even from hence we may perhaps receive some Instruction or Diversion if we may be allow'd to divert our selves with others Infirmities when we try to cure them But what is more considerable we shall prevent the weaker sort who hear them with Admiration from engaging in Errour by following their Decisions For it must be observ'd that Fools or such as are Machinally manag'd and follow sensible Impressions being far more numerous than Men of an enlarg'd Thought and governable by Reason one of these Pretenders cannot dictate and determine upon a Point but there always are more who believe him on his Word than others who distrust him But because these falsly Learn'd recede as far as possible from common Thoughts either out of a desire of finding an Opponent whom they roughly handle to elevate and shew themselves or a Subversion of Mind and Spirit of Contradiction their Decisions are for the most part false or obscure and they are seldom attended to without drawing the Contagion of Errour Now the Method of discovering the Corruptness or Solidity of others Opinions is very difficultly put in practice The Reason whereof is That these Pretenders to Science are not the only Persons who would be thought to know every thing 'T is a Failing almost universal but more especially incident to Men of some Reading and Study which makes them always forward to talk and explain their own Notions but negligent and inadvertent as to other mens Such as are most Complaisant and Rational inwardly despising another's Opinion make shew only of an Attentive Meen whilst their Eyes betray their Thoughts and shew that they are busied upon a quite contrary thing not on answering what is said to them but on what they desire to prove which is the thing that frequently renders Conversation so disagreeable For as there is nothing more grateful or wherein a Man could honour us more than the comprehending our Reasons and approving our Opinions so there is nothing so offensive as to see others not take nor care to take our Meaning For 't is no pleasure to talk and converse with Statues especially Statues that are only so to us because they have little Esteem for us are careless to please us and sollicitous only to content themselves by recommending their own Abilities But if Men could hear and answer well at once Discourse would be most useful as well as pleasant whereas whilst every one endeavours to be reputed Learned all that 's got by it is Conceitedness and unintelligible Disputes Charity is sometimes wounded and Truth seldom discovered But the Ramblings which the Falsly Learned are in their Conversation subject to are in some measure excusable It may be said in their behalf that in these Discourses Men use not much Caution and Advertency and that the nicest and most judicious fall frequently into Trifles and Impertinencies and that they don't intend a Collection should be made of their Sayings as was of Scaliger's and Cardinal du Perron's There is Reason in these Excuses and we are easie to believe these Faults deserve some sort of Indulgence We are indeed willing to talk in Company but there are some unfortunate Seasons in which we but ill succeed We are not always in temper to think or to speak justly and the time is so short in some Conjunctures that the Mind never so little clouded or absent miserably falls into extravagant Absurdities even in Persons most accurate and piercing But though the Faults which the Falsly Learned are guilty of in Conversation are excusable yet those they commit in their Books after due Thinking and Consideration are unpardonable especially if frequent and not compensated by some good things For by writing an ill Book a Man occasions loss of time to a multitude of Readers subjects them to the same Errours he himself is guilty of and causes them to deduce still many others from them which is not a little Evil. But though it be a greater Crime than is imagin'd to compose an Evil or only an Useless Book yet the Author is oftner rewarded than punish'd for it For some Crimes there are which escape the Lash either because they are the Fashion or because the Judges are not courageous enough to condemn such Criminals as they think more Ingenious than themselves For Authors are commonly look'd on as rare and extraordinary Persons above the ordinary size of Men and therefore are reverenc'd instead of being despis'd and punish'd So that there is little hopes of having a Tribunal erected for the trying and condemning all the Books that tend only to debauch and corrupt Reason And for this Reason we must never expect to have the Republick of Learning better govern'd than any other as consisting of Men no less than the rest But in order to free our selves from Errour 't is fit that even greater Liberty be permitted in this than other Republicks where Novelty is always dangerous For it would be a means to confirm us in our present Errours to rob the Literate World of its Liberty and indifferently to condemn all sorts of Novelties 'T is hop'd then I shall not be blam'd for speaking against the Government of the Learned Commonwealth and endeavouring to shew that frequently the Great Men of it who for their profound Learning are the Admiration of the rest are at bottom but haughty and vain Creatures void of Judgment and all true Science I am oblig'd to use this freedom of Speech to prevent a blindfold Submission to their Decisions and engaging in their Errours The Proofs of their Vanity their want of Judgment and of their Ignorance are evidently deduc'd from their own Works For if a Man would take the pains to examine them with purpose to judge of them by the Light of common Sense un-forestall'd with an Esteem for these Authors he might find that the Designs of their Studies are mostly such as an injudicious Vanity has formed and their principal End not the perfecting their Reason and much less the regulating the Motions of their Heart but only the puzzling others and seeming Wiser Men than they From this Prospect it is as has been said before that they treat but of rare and unusual Subjects and explain themselves in as rare and unusual Terms and quote only rare and extraordinary Authors They disdain to write in their own Language as being too common or in plain perspicuous and easie Latin since their Design is not to be Understood but only to Write and to be Admir'd They seldom apply themselves to Subjects that are serviceable to the
management of Life that 's too trite and vulgar it not being their purpose to be useful to others or themselves but only to be reputed Learned They either alledge no Reasons of things which they advance or if they do they are so mysterious and incomprehensible as neither themselves nor any body else can evidently conceive Clear Reasons they have none but if they had they would not use them because they surprize not the Mind are thought too simple and common and suited to the Abilities of all Mankind They rather bring Authorities to prove or with pretence to prove their Notions for the Authorities employ'd seldom prove any thing by the Sense they contain but only by being Greek and Arabick But perhaps it will be pertinent to speak something of their Quotations which will acquaint us in part with the disposition of their Mind It is methinks manifest that nothing but a falsly-term'd Learning and a Spirit of Polimathy could bring these Citations into fashion as they have formerly been and are still at this day with some of the Learned For 't is usual with some Authors to be perpetually quoting long Sentences without any Reason for it whether because the things they advance are too clear to be doubted of or that they are too intricate and obscure to be made out by the Authority of their Authors since they could know nothing of them or lastly because the Citations inserted are inserviceable to adorn and beautifie their Discourse 'T is repugnant to common Sense to bring a Greek Passage to prove the Air transparent because 't is evident to all the World to employ the Authority of Aristotle to persuade us that Intelligences move the Heavens because we are certain Aristotle could not know it and lastly to mingle strange Languages Arabian and Persian Proverbs with French English or Latin Books written for every body forasmuch as these Citations cannot be ornamental at least are such fantastical Ornaments as disgust most Persons and can satisfie but very few Nevertheless the greatest part of those who would fain be thought Learned are so extreamly pleas'd with this kind of Giâ—â—rish that they blush not to quote in strange Tongues which they do not understand and tug might and main to draw into their Books an Arabick Passage which they cannot so much as read Thus they puzzle themselves strangely to effect a thing repugnant to good Sense but that sacrifices to their Vanity and makes them esteem'd by Soâ—s One very considerable Fault is still behind which is that they are but in little care to seem to have read with Choice and Judgment all they desire being to be reckon'd great Readers especially of obscure Books that they may seem more Learned of Books that are scarce and dear that they may be thought to have every thing of wicked and impious Books which honest Men are afraid to read with much the same Spirit as some boast to have acted Crimes which others dare not Hence they rather cite very Dear very Rare very Ancient and Obscure Books than other more Common and Intelligible Astrological Cabalistical and Magical Books than such as are good and wholesome as if they did not see that Reading being a kind of Conversing they should rather desire to seem industriously to have sought the Acquaintance of Good and Intelligible than Wicked and Obscure Authors For as no Man in his Senses would chuse out for ordinary Converse People that want an Interpreter when the same things that are to be learn'd of them might be known another way so 't is ridiculous to read Books not to be understood without a Dictionary when the same things may be had in those that are more intelligible And as it is a sign of a deprav'd Nature to affect the Company and Conversation of the Impious so 't is the Criterion of a corrupt Heart to delight in reading Wicked Books But 't is an extravagant Pride for a Man to pretend to have read those which he has not which yet is a thing of very common occurrence For we find Men of Thirty Years standing quote more ill Books in their Works than they could have read in many Ages whilst they would have others believe they have very exactly read them But most of the Books of some of these Learned Gentlemen owe their Birth to the kind Dictionary and all their Reading may be reduc'd to the Indexes of the Books they quote and some Common Places heap'd together from out of different Authors I venture not to enter into the Particulars of these things nor to give Instances to prove them for fear of provoking Persons so fierce and cholerick as these Learned Pretenders as not caring to be revil'd in Greek and Arabick Besides that 't is needless more sensibly to evince what I have said by particular Allegations the Mind of Man being ready enough to tax the Management of others and make particular Application of this Discourse In the mean time let them hug themselves and feed upon this vain Fantom of Greatness and give one another the Applauses which we deny them For we have been perhaps already too troublesome by molesting them in their so seemingly sweet and grateful Enjoyments CHAP. IX How the Inclination for Honours and Riches conduces to Errour HOnours and Riches no less than Vertue and Science which we have already spoke of are principal Acquirements to give us the Ascendant over other Men. For there seems to accrue to our Being a Growth and Enlargement and kind of Independency from the Possession of these Advantages So that the Love we have for our selves naturally streaming out to Honours and Riches every body may be said to have some sort of Inclination for them We will explain in brief how these Inclinations obviate the Discovery of Truth and engage us in Falshood and Errour It has been shewn in several places that much Time and Labour Assiduity and Contention of Mind must go to the clearing up Compound Truths surrounded with Difficulties and depending on many Principles Whence it is easie to conclude that Men of publick Characters of great Employments who have large Estates to look after and great Affairs to manage and whose Hearts are fix'd upon Riches and Honours are not the fittest Enquirers after Truth and that they commonly err in point of all things difficultly known whenever they pretend to judge of them And that because First They have little time to lay out in the Search of Truth Secondly They take but little Pleasure in this Search Thirdly They are very incapable of Attention because the Capacity of their Mind is divided by the multitude of the Ideas of the things they wish for which take up their Thoughts whether they will or no. In the fourth place They fancy they know every thing and can hardly be induc'd to believe their Inferiours have more Reason than themselves some Matters of Fact they may vouchsafe to learn of them but are above being taught by them solid and
there is any Thing useful and which may be certainly and exactly known but it may be found out by an Arithmetical and Algebraical Method So that those two Sciences are the Foundation of all others and help us to the true Means to acquire all those that are accurate because the Capacity of the Mind cannot be better managed than it is by Arithmetick and especially by Algebra THE SECOND PART OF THE SIXTH BOOK Concerning METHOD CHAP. I. Of the Rules that are to be observed in the Search after Truth HAving explain'd the means how to improve the Attention and Extension of the Mind by which alone it may acquire a greater perfection that is become more enlightned sagacious and piercing it is time to set down those Rules the Observation whereof is absolutely necessary to resolve any Question whatsoever I shall insist long upon it and endeavour to explain them by several Instances that their necessity may be better known and the Mind accustomed to make use of them it being not so difficult or necessary to know them theoretically as to put them in Practice Let none expect here very extraordinary surprizing and abstruse things For on the contrary that those Rules may be good they must be very simple natural and few very plain and intelligible and depending on each other in short such as may lead our Mind and rule our Attention without distracting either For Experience shews that the Logick of Aristotle is of no great use because it takes up the Mind too much and disturbs the Attention it ought to give to the Subjects of its Enquiry Let then those Lovers of Mysteries and rare Inventions lay aside for a while that capricious humour and consider as attentively as they can whether the Rules we shall prescribe are sufficient to preserve Evidence in the Preceptions of the Mind and to discover the most hidden Truths Unless they suffer themselves to be unjustly prejudiced against those Rules by the simplicity and easiness of the same I hope that the great use which may be made of them as we shall shew hereafter will convince them that the most clear and simple Principles are the most pregnant and fecund and that rare and difficult things are not always so useful as our fruitless Curiosity endeavours to persuade us The Principle of all those Rules is that we must always preserve Evidence in our Reasonings to discover Truth without Fear and danger of being mistaken From that Principle follows this general Rule that respects the Subject of our Studies We ought only to Reason upon such things whereof we have clear and distinct Ideas and by a necessary consequence we must still begin with the most simple and easie Subjects and insist long upon them before we undertake the Enquiry into such as are more composed and difficult The Rules that concern the Method to be taken in resolving Questions depend likewise on the same Principle and the first of those Rules is that we must very distinctly conceive the State of the Question proposed to be resolv'd that is have Ideas of the Terms so distinct as that we may compare them together and discover the Relations which we look for When those Relations cannot be found out by an immediate comparison of their Ideas then the second Rule is that we must try by an Essay of Thought to discover one or several intermediate Ideas that may be a means or common measure to discover the Relations that are betwixt those things A special care is to be taken that those Ideas be the more clear and distinct as the Relations we endeavour to discover are more nicely exact and numerous When the Questions are very difficult and require a long Examination the third Rule is that we must carefully take off from the Subject to be consider'd all things whose Examination is not needful to the Discovery of the Truth we are in quest of For the Capacity of the Mind must not be vainly shar'd and divided but its strength must only be employed in such things as may enlighten it so that all those things which are to be laid aside are such as concern not the Question and which when taken off leave it whole and entire When the Question is thus brought within the least compass the fourth Rule is to divide the Subject of our Meditations into Parts and consider them one after the other in a natural order beginning with the most simple or those that contain the least number of Relations and never medling with the more composed before the most simple are distinctly known and become familiar When they are become familiar by Meditation the fifth Rule is to abridge Ideas and dispose them in the Imagination or write them upon Paper that they may no longer clog and fill up the Capacity of the Mind Though that Rule be always useful yet 't is not of absolute necessity unless it be in very intricate Questions that require a great extent of Mind for the Mind is only enlarg'd by the abridgment of Ideas But the use of that Rule and the following is best known by Algebra The Ideas of all the things that necessarily require Examination being clear familiar abridg'd and disposed and ranged in good order in the Imagination or written upon Paper the sixth Rule is to compare them all by the Rules of Complications one with the other alternately either by the View of the Mind alone or by the Motion of the Imagination attended with the View of the Mind or by the Calculation of the Pen joined to the attention of the Mind and Imagination If amongst all the Relations that result from those Comparisons you find not that which you enquire after then take off again all the Relations that are not subservient to resolve the Question make the others familiar abridge them posture and dispose them in the Imagination or write them upon Paper compare them together by the Rules of Complications and then see whether the composed Relation that is look'd for is one of the composed Relations that result from those new Comparisons If none of those new discover'd Relations contain the Solution of the Question then take off again those that are useless make the other familiar c. That is doe the same over and over and continuing thus you shall discover the Truth or Relation you enquire after how composed soever it may be provided you can extend the Capacity of your Mind to it by abridging your Ideas and still in all your Operations having before your Eyes the Scope you aim at For 't is the continual and steady view of the Question which must regulate all the advances of the Mind since we should always know whither we are going We must above all take care not to satisfie our selves with some glimpse or likelyhood but begin anew so often the Comparisons that are conducible to discover the Truths enquired after as that we may not withold our Assent to it without feeling the secret Lashes
Existence by the continual Sensations which God produces in us and which we cannot correct by Reason without offending Faith though we can correct by Reason the Sensations that represent them as endu'd with some Qualities and Perfections that are not in them So that we ought not to believe that they are such as we see or imagine them but only that they exist and that they are such as we conceive them by Reason But that we may proceed orderly we must not yet examine whether we have a Body whether there are others about us or whether we have only bare Sensations of Things which exist not Those Questions include too great Difficulties and are not perhaps so necessary as may be imagin'd to perfect our Mind and to have an accurate Knowledge of Natural and Moral Philosophy and some other Sciences We have within us the Ideas of Numbers and Extension whose Existence is undeniable and their Nature immutable and which would eternally supply us with Objects to think on if we desire to know all their Relations It is necessary to begin to make use of our Minds upon those Ideas for some Reasons which it will not be amiss to explain whereof the principal are Three The First is That those Ideas are the most clear and evident of all For if to avoid Errour we must still keep to Evidence in our Reasonings 't is plain that we must rather argue from the Ideas of Numbers and Extension than from the confus'd or compos'd Ideas of Physicks Morals Mechanicks Chymistry and other Sciences Secondly Those Ideas are the most distinct and exact of all especially those of Numbers So that the Habit which proceeds from the Exercise of Arithmetick and Geometry of not being content till we precisely know the Relations of Things endues the Mind with such an Exactness of Thought as is not to be found in those that are satisfied with the Probabilities so obvious to be met with in other Sciences The Third and chief Reason is That those Ideas are the immutable Rules and common Measure of all the Objects of our Knowledge For those that perfectly know the Relations of Numbers and Figures or rather the Art of making such Comparisons as are requisite to know them have a kind of Universal Knowledge and a very sure Means evidently and certainly to discover whatever goes not beyond the ordinary Limits of the Mind But those that are not skilful in this Art cannot with Certainty discover such Truths as are somewhat intricate though they have very clear Ideas of Things and endeavour to know their Compound Relations These or the like Reasons mov'd some of the Antients to apply their Youth to the Study of Arithmetick Algebra and Geometry Undoubtedly they well knew that Arithmetick and Algebra endue the Mind with such an Insight and Penetration as was not to be gotten by other Studies and that Geometry manages the Imagination so well as that it is not easily puzzl'd or confounded for that Faculty of the Soul so necessary to Sciences acquires by the Use of Geometry such an universal Nicety as promotes and preserves the clear View of the Mind even in the most intricate Difficulties And therefore he that desires always to preserve Evidence in his Perceptions and discover naked Truâ—hs without Mixture of Darkness and Errour must begin with the Study of Arithmetick Algebra and Geometry after he has obtain'd some Knowledge at least of himself and the Sovereign Being As for Books that make the Way to those Sciences easie I may refer to the Meditations of des Cartes as to the Knowledge of God and our selves to the Elements of Mathematicks newly printed as to Arithmetick and Algebra to the New Elements of Geometry printed in 1667 or to the Elements of Father Taquet Jesuit printed at Antwerp in 1665 as to ordinary Geometry and as to Conick Sections and the Solution of Geometrical Problemes to the Treatises of Monsieur de la Hire intituled Of Conick Sections Of Geometrical Places and Of the Construction of Equations to which may be added the Geometry of des Cartes I would not have advis'd to the Elements of Mathematicks as to Arithmetick and Algebra if I knew any Author who had clearly demonstrated those Sciences but Truth obliges me to a thing for which I may be blam'd by some People for Algebra and Analyticks being altogether requisite for the Discovery of compos'd Truths I must needs shew my Esteem for a Book which carries those Sciences very far and which in the Opinion of many Learned explains them more clearly than they had been hitherto By the careful Study of those general Sciences we shall evidently know a great Number of Truths very serviceable in all accurate and particular Sciences We may afterwards study Natural and Moral Philosophy as being very useful though noâ— very fit to make the Mind nice and quick-sighted And if we desire to preserve Evidence in all our Perceptions we must take a special Care not to be opinionated of any Principle that is not evident and to which the Chinese for instance would not be suppos'd to dissent after having throughly weigh'd and consider'd it And therefore we must only admit in Physicks those Notions which are common to all Men such as Axioms of Geometry and the clear Ideas of Extension Figure Motion Rest and others of that nature if there be any Perhaps it will be said that Extension is not the Essence of Matter But what is that to the purpose 'T is sufficient that the World which we conceive to consist of Extension appears like to that we see though it be not made of such a Matter which is good for nothing and altogether unknown whilst so much Noise is made about it It is not absolutely necessary to examine whether there are actually External Beings corresponding to those Ideas for we argue not from those Beings but from their Ideas We must only take care that our Reasonings which we make upon the Properties of Things agree with our inward Consciousness that is that our Thoughts perfectly agree with Experience because in Physicks we endeavour to discover the Order and Connexion of Effects with their Causes either in Bodies if they exist or in the Sense we have of them if they are not in being I say not however that we can doubt whether Bodies are actually existing when we consider that God is not a Deceiver and that the Order he has constituted in our Sentiments of Things both as to natural Occurrences and such as are wrought to create our Belief of what Reason is at a Loss to comprehend is very regular But I observe this because 't is not necessary to insist at first very long upon a thing which no body doubts of and is not extremely conducible to the Knowledge of Physicks consider'd as a true Science Neither must we puzzle our Heads with enquiring whether there are in the Bodies about us some other Qualities besides those of which we have clear
have explain'd in the Third Article Thus this Objection does not impugn my Principle but on the contrary corroborates it and if it be certain that 't is the Nature of Good to disseminate and communicate it self abroad for I stand not to examine that Axiome 't is evident That God being essentially and supreamly Good it is no Contradiction he should act in the Sence I intended OBJECTION against the Fourth Article Ignorance being a Consequence of Sin Adam before his Fall had a perfect Knowledge of the Nature of his own Body and of those he liv'd amongst He must for Example have been perfectly acquainted with the Nature of all Animals to give them as he did such Names as agreed to them ANSWER 'T is a Mistake Ignorance is neither an Evil nor a Consequence of Sin 'T is Errour or Blindness of Mind which is both one and the other None but God knows all things without any Shadow of Ignorance Ignorance is incident to the brightest and most enlightned Intelligences Whatever is finite cannot comprehend Infinity and thus there is no Spirit that can comprehend only all the Properties of Triangles Adam knew the first minute of his Creation whatever was requisite he should know and nothing more and it was to no purpose for him to know exactly the Disposition of all the Parts of his Body and of those he made use of the Reasons are to be seen in this Article and elsewhere The Imposition of Names in Scripture rather denotes the Authority than the perfect Knowledge of the Imposer As the Lord of Heaven had made Adam the Lord of Earth he conceded him the Privilege of giving Names to the Animals as he himself had done to the Stars 'T is evident That Sounds or Words neither have nor can have any natural relation to the things they signifie let the Divine Plato and the Mysterious Pythagoras say what they please of it One might perhaps explain the Nature of an Horse or an Oxe in an entire Book but a Word is not a Book and it 's ridiculous to imagine That Monosyllables as Sus which in Hebrew signifies a Horse and Sâ—bor which signifies an Oxe should represent the Nature of these Animals Notwithstanding there is great probability these Names were impos'd by Adam since they are found in Genesis the Author whereof assures us That the Names which Adam gave the Creatures were the same which were in use in his time for I cannot see what else can be meant by these Words Omne quod vocavit Adam animae viventis ipsum est nomen ejus And whatsoever Adam call'd every living Creature that was the Name thereof But I grant that Adam gave Names to Animals which have some reference to their Nature and I subscribe to the Learned Etymologies that an Author of this Age gives us of them I will that he call'd domestick Animals Behemoth because of their keeping silence the Ram Ajil because he is strong the Buck Sair because swift the Hog Chazir because of his little Eyes the Ass Chamor because in the East Country red Asses are common But I can't conceive that any more is requisite than to open the Eyes to know if a Buck be swift an Ass red and whether a Hog has little or great Eyes Adam calls by the Name of Beir and Behemah what we term a Brute or a great domestick Creature because these Beasts are mute and stupid What should we thence conclude That he knew perfectly their Nature That is not evident I should rather be apprehensive lest it should be thence concluded That Adam being simple enough to put a Question to an Oxe as being the largest of domestick Animals and wondring that he could not answer him despis'd him and nam'd by a Term of Contempt Beir and Behemah Second OBJECTION against the Fourth Article Some preventing Sensations are incommodious and painful Adam was just and innocent and consequently ought not to feel the smart of them He ought then on all occasions to be guided by Reason and Knowledge and not by preventing Sensations like those we have at present ANSWER I confess there are preventing Sensations which are disagreeable and painful but they never occasion'd any Pain in the first Man because in the instant they gave him any he by an Act of his Will withstood the Impression and in the very instant of that Volition he ceas'd to be touch'd with it These Sensations did only respectfully caution him what ought to be done or omitted and did not incommode his Felicity They but made him sensible that he was capable of losing it and that he who made him Happy could punish and make him miserable if he fail'd in his Fidelity But to perswade our selves that the first Man was never overtaken with the Sense of any lively Pain we need but consider these two things First that Pain is very light when the Motions it is annex'd to are very languid because it is always proportion'd to the force of the Motions that are communicated to the chief part of the Brain Secondly That is of the Nature of Motion to include a Succession of Time and it cannot be violent at the first instant of its Communication Which being suppos'd it is plain that the first Man never felt a violent surprizing Pain that was capable to make him miserable because he could put a stop to the Motions that caus'd it But if so be he could effectually stop them at the first instant of their Action there is no doubt but he would do it since he was always desirous of Happiness and that Aversion is naturally conjoin'd to the Sense of Pain Adam therefore never suffer'd any violent Pain but I think we are not oblig'd to say that he never felt any light and inconsiderable smart such as is that when we tast a sowre Fruit supposing it to be ripe His Felicity had been very tender if so little a thing had been able to disturb it For such Delicacy is a sign of Weakness for how can that Joy and Pleasure be substantial that such a Trifle can dissolve and annihilate Pain never truly molests our Happiness but when it is involuntary and possesses us in spight of our Resistance JESUS CHRIST was happy though on the Cross in the midst of his Groans and Agonies because he suffered nothing but what he was willing to undergo Thus Adam suffering nothing against his will it cannot be said we make him unhappy before his Sin in supposing him admonish'd by preventing but respectful and submissive Sensations of what he ought to avoid for the preservation of his Life OBJECTION against the Fifth Article Adam felt preventing Pleasures But these are involuntary Motions Therefore Adam was agitated with involuntary Motions ANSWER I Answer that Adam's Sensations preceded his Reason the proofs I have shown for it in the Fourth Article But I deny that they preceded his Will or that they stirr'd up in it any particular Motions For Adam was willingly admonish'd
upon its Center or successively approach another we perceive the motion of a sensible or Intelligible Figure though there be no motion in intelligible Extension For God sees not the motion of Bodies in his Substance or in the Idea he has of them in himself But only by the knowledge he has of his own Wills relating to them He sees their Existence only by that way because his Will only gives Being to all things The Wills of God change nothing in his Substance nor do they move it Perhaps Intelligible Extension is immoveable all manner of ways even intelligibly But though we see only this intelligible Extension immoveable or otherwise it seems moveable to us because of the Sensation of Golour or the confused Image remaining after the Sensation which we successively annex to the several parts of Intelligible Extension that furnishes us with an Idea when we see or imagine the motion of any Body From what I have said we may understand why we see the Intelligible Sun sometimes greater and sometimes less though it be always the same with respect to God For all that is requir'd to this is but to see one while a greater part of Intelligible Extension and another while a less and to have a lively Sensation of Light to bestow upon that part of Extension Now as all the Parts of Intelligible Extension are all of the same nature they may all indifferently represent any Body whatever It must not be imagin'd that the Intelligible World has any such relation to the material and sensible that there must be for instance an Intelligible Sun an intelligible Horse and an Intelligible Tree destin'd to represent to us the Sun an Horse and a Tree and that all those who see the Sun necessarily see this pretended intelligible Sun All intelligible Extension may be conceived Circular or to have an intelligible Figure of an Horse or a Tree and so may serve to represent the Sun an Horse and Tree and consequently be a Sun a Horse and a Tree in the intelligible World and likewise to become a sensible and visible Sun Horse and Tree if the Soul has any Sensation occasion by Bodies to affix to these Ideas Therefore when I said that we saw different Bodies by the knowledge we have of the Perfections of God which represent them I did not mean precisely that there were certain particular Ideas in God to represent each Body in particular and that we saw such a particular Idea in seeing such a particular Body For it is certain we could not see this Body sometimes great and sometimes small one while round and another while square if we saw it by a particular Idea that was always the same But I say we see all things in God by the application God makes of intelligible Extension to our mind in a thousand different ways and that thus intelligible Extension includes in it all the Perfections or rather differences of Bodies because of the different Sensations the Soul bestows upon the Ideas which she receives occasionally from them I have discours'd after another manner but it should be concluded that was only to make some of my proofs more forcible and sensible and it should not be gather'd from what I have here said that the foundation of those proofs is ruin'd I could give the reasons of the different ways wherein I explain my self if I thought it necessary I venture not to dive deeper into this Subject for fear of speaking things either too Abstract or Uncommon Or if that seem better for fear of hazarding to speak things which I neither know nor am capable of discovering Only let me produce those passages of Scripture which seem contrary to what I have now establish'd which I shall endeavour to Explain OBJECTION St. John in his Gospel and in the first of his Epistles says No man hath seen God at any time The only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the father he hath declar'd him ANSWER I answer that 't is not properly to see God to see the Creatures in him 'T is not to see his essence to see the essences of Creatures in his Substance as it is not to see a Mirrour to view only the Objects it represents Not but that we might say with St. Paul St. Austin St. Gregory and many other Fathers of the Church that we see God in this Life though in a very imperfect Manner The Words of St. Gregory in his Morals upon Job are these A luce incorruptibili caligo nos nostrae corruptionis obscurat cumque videri aliquatenus potest tamen videri lux ipsa sicuti est non potest quam longe sit indicat Quam si mens non cerneret nec quia longe esse videret Si autem perfecte jam cerneret profecto hanc quasi per caliginem non videret Igitur quia nec omnino cernitur nec rursum omnino non cernitur recte dictum est quia a longe Deus videtur Though St. Gregory in explaining this passage of Job Oculi ejus à longe prospiciunt says that in this Life we only see God a far of This is not as if God were not most present to us but that the Clouds of our Concupiscence conceal him from us Caligo nos nostrae corruptionis obscurat For in other places he with St. Austin compares the light of God which is God himself to the Light of the Sun which surrounds us and which we see not because we are blind or shut our Eyes when dazled with its Lustre In Sole oculos clausos tenemus St. Austin goes farther yet than his faithful Disciple St. Gregory For though he confesses that we know God but in a very imperfect manner at present yet he affirms in several places that God is better known to us than those things we fancy we know best He that has made all things says he is nearer us than his Creatures For in him we have Life and Motion and Being Most of Created Beings are not proportionate to our Mind because they are corporeal and of a sort distinguish'd from it And lower The Inquirers into the secrets of Nature are justly condemn'd in the Book of Wisdom for if they have been able to penetrate what is most secret and unreveal'd to Men with how much greater ease might they have discover'd the Author and Sovereign of the Vniverse The Foundations of the Earth are hid from our Eyes But he that laid the Foundations is present to our Minds And for this Reason that Holy Father believes that he that has Charity knows God better than he knows his Brother Ecce says he jam potest Notiorem Deum habere quam Fratrem Plane Notiorem quia praesentiorem Notiorem quia interiorem Notiorem quia certiorem I bring not any other proofs of St. Austin's Opinion Those who desire them may find all sorts in that learn'd Collection Ambrosius Victor has made of them in the second Volume of his Christian
if they were just and good And none perhaps could forbear laughing if instead of the Definitions which Aristotle gives of Hunger and Thirst when he says that Hunger is the desire of what is hot and dry and Thirst the desire of what is cold and moist we should substitute the Definitions of those words calling Hunger the desire of that which coacervates things of the same nature and is easily contained within its own Limits and difficultly within others and defining Thirst the desire of that which congregates things of the same and different natures and which can hardly be contained within its own bounds but is easily kept within others Surely 't is a very useful Rule to know whether Terms have been well defined and to avoid mistakes in reasoning often to put the Definition instead of the thing defined for that shews whether the words are equivocal and the Measures of the Relations false and imperfect or whether we argue consequently If it be so what Judgment can be made of Aristotle's Arguments which become an impertinent and ridiculous Nonsence when we make use of that Rule and what may also be said of all those who argue upon the false and confused Ideas of the Senses since that Rule which preserves Light and Evidence in all exact and solid Reasonings brings nothing but confusion in their Discourses 'T is not possible to lay open the foolish Capriciousness and Extravagance of Aristotle's Explications upon all sorts of matters When he treats of simple and easie Subjects his Errours are plain and obvious to be discover'd but when he pretends to explain very composed things and depending on several Causes his Errours are as much compounded as the Subjects he speaks of so that it is impossible to unfold them all and set them before others That great Genius who is said to have so well succeeded in his Rules for defining well knows not so much as which are the things that may be defined because he puts no Distinction betwixt a clear and distinct and a sensible Knowledge and pretends to know and explain other things of which he has not so much as a distinct Idea Definitions ought to explicate the Nature of things and the words of which they consist must raise in the Mind distinct and particular Notions But 't is impossible to define in that manner sensible Qualities as Heat Cold Colour Savour c. When you confound the Cause with the Effect the Motion of Bodies with the Sensation that attends it because Sensations being Modifications of the Soul which are not to be known by clear Ideas but only by internal Sensation as I have explain'd it in the third Book it is impossible to fix to those words Ideas which we have not As we have Distinct Ideas of a Circle a Square a Triangle and therefore know distinctly their Nature so we can give good Difinitions of them and even deduce from our Ideas of those Figures all their Properties and explain them to others by such words as are fixed to those Ideas But we cannot define either Heat or Cold in as much as they are sensible Qualities because we know them not distinctly and by Ideas but only by Conscience and inward Sensation Neither must we define the Heat that is without us by any of its Effects For if we substitute such a Definition in its place we shall find that it will only conduce to lead us into Errour For Instance if Heat be defined what congregates homogeneous things without adding any thing else we may by that Definition mistake for Heat such things as have no Relation to it For then it might be said that the Loadstone collects the Filings of Iron and separates them from those of Silver because 't is hot that a Dove eats Hempseed when it leaves other Grain because that Bird is hot that a covetous Man separates his Guineas from his Silver because he is hot In short there is no impertinency but that Definition would induce one into it were he dull enough to follow it And therefore that Definition explains not the nature of Heat nor can it be imploy'd to deduce all its properties from it since by literally insisting upon it we should draw ridiculous Conclusions and by putting it instead of the thing defined fall into Nonsense However if we carefully distinguish Heat from its Cause though it cannot be defined in as much as it is a Modification of the Soul whereof we have no Idea yet its Cause may be defined since we have a distinct Idea of Motion But we must observe that Heat taken for such a Motion causes not always in us the Sense of Heat For Instance Water is hot since its Parts are fluid and in Motion and most probably it feels warm to Fishes at least 't is warmer than Ice whose Parts are more quiet but 't is cold to us because it has less Motion than the Parts of our Body what has less Motion than another being in some manner quiet in respect of that And therefore 't is not with reference to the Motion of the Fibres of our Body that the Cause of Heat or the Motion that excites it ought to be defined We must if possible define that Motion absolutely and in it self for then our Definition will be subservient to know the Nature and Properties of Heat I hold not my self oblig'd to examine farther the Philosophy of Aristotle and to extricate his so much confus'd and puzling Errours I have shewn methinks that he proves not the Existence of his four Elements and defines them wrong that his Elementary Qualities are not such as he pretends that he knows not their Nature and that all the Second Qualities are not made of them and lastly that though we should grant him that all Bodies are compos'd of the four Elements and the Second Qualities of the First his whole System would still prove useless for the finding out of Truth since his Ideas are not clear enough to preserve Evidence in all our Reasonings If any doubt whether I have propos'd the true Opinions of Aristotle he may satisfie himself by consulting his Books of the Heavens and of Generation and Corruption whence I have exextracted almost all that I have said of him I would relate nothing out of his Eight Books of Physicks because some learned Men pretend they are but a mere Logick which is very apparent since nothing but rambling and undetermin'd Words are to be found in them As Aristotle often contradicts himself and that almost all sorts of Opinions may be defended by some Passages drawn out of him I doubt not but some Opinions contrary to those I have ascrib'd to that Philosopher may be prov'd out of himself And I shall not warrant for him but it is sufficient for me that I have the Books I have quoted to justifie what I have said of him and I care little whether those Books are Aristotle's or not taking them for such as I find them upon the
publick Fame for we ought not to trouble our selves with enquiring into the true Genealogy of Things for which we have no great Esteem CHAP. VI. General and necessary Directions to proceed orderly in the Search after Truth and in the Choice of Sciences LEST it should be said that we have only been destroying the Reasonings of others but establish nothing certain and undeniable of our own it will be convenient to propose in few words what Order we ought to observe in our Studies for the avoiding Errour and I design withal to shew some Truths and Sciences that are very necessary as bearing such a Character of Evidence as that we cannot withold our Consent without feeling the secret Upbraidings of our Reason I shall not explain at large those Truths and Sciences that 's already done and I intend not to reprint the Works of others but only to refer to them and to shew what Order we must keep in our Studies to preserve Evidence in all our perceptions The first Knowledge of all is that of the Existence of our Soul all our Thoughts are so many undeniable Demonstrations of it for nothing is more evident than that whatever actually thinks is actually something But though it be easie to know the Existence of our Soul yet her Essence and Nature are not so easily discovered If we desire to know what she is we must take care above all not to confound her with the things to which she is united If we doubt will argue we must only believe that the Soul is something that doubts wills argues and nothing more as long as we have not felt in her other Properties for we know our Soul only by the inward Sensation we have of her We must not mistake her for our Body for Blood for Animal Spirits for Fire and many other things for which Philosophers have mistaken her We must believe of the Soul no more than we are forced to believe of her by a full conviction of our inward Sense for otherwise we shall be deceiv'd Thus we shall know by a simple view or by internal Sensation whatever may be known of the Soul without being obliged to long reasonings that might lead us into Errour For when we reason Memory operates and whereever Memory operates there may be Errour supposing our Knowledge should depend on some wicked Spirits that should take delight in deceiving us Though I should suppose for instance a God who took delight in thus abusing me yet I am persuaded that I could not be deceived in a Knowledge of simple Perception as is that by which I know that I am that I think or that 2 and 2 are 4. For I am conscious to my self that in this extravagant Supposition such a deluding Spirit though never so potent could not make me doubt that I am or that 2 times 2 are 4 because I perceive those things with a simple view or Perception and without the use of Memory But when I reason as I see not evidently the Principles of my Reasonings but only remember that I have evidently seen them If that seducing God should join that Remembrance to false Principles as he might do if he pleas'd I should conclude nothing but what was false Just like those that make long Calculations fancying they remember that they have plainly seen that 9 times 9 are 72 or that 21 is a primitive Number or some other Errour of that Nature draw false Inferences from thence And therefore 't is necessary to know God and to be assured that he is no Deceiver if we desire to be fully convinced that the most certain Sciences as Arithmetick and Geometry are true Sciences for without that their Evidence is not full and we can still with-hold our Consent And 't is likewise necessary to know by a simple View and not by Reasoning that God is no Deceiver since reasoning may still be false in the supposition of a deluding God All the ordinary Proofs of the Existence and Perfections of God drawn from the Existence and Perfections of his Creatures are methinks liable to this Defect that they convince not the Mind with a simple Perception All those Arguments are Reasonings convincing in themselves but because they are Reasonings they are not demonstrative in supposing a wicked and deceitfull Genius They sufficiently shew that there is a Power superiour to us which is granted even by that foolish Supposition but they do not fully persuade us that there is a God or a Being infinitely perfect so that the Conclusion of those Arguments is more evident than the Principle T is more evident that there is a Power superiour to us than that there is a World since no Supposition can obviate our demonstrating that superiour Power whereas in supposing an evil and deceitfull Spirit 't is impossible to prove the Existence of the World because it may still be conceived that this wicked Genius gives us the Sense of things that are not in being as Sleep and some Distempers make us perceive things that never were and even feel an actual pain in imaginary Members such as we have lost or that we never had But the Arguments of the Existence and Perfections of God drawn from our Idea of infinite are Prooâ—s of simple sight We see there is a God as soon as we perceive infinite because necessary Existence is included in the Idea of infinite and that nothing but infinite can furnish to us the Idea of an infinite Being We likewise see that God is no Deceiver because knowing that he is infinitely perfect and that infinite cannot want any Perfection we plainly perceive that he will not seduce us and even that he cannot because he can but what he wills and what he is able to will And therefore there is a God a true God and a God that never deceives us though he does not always enlighten us and that we are obnoxious to Mistakes when we want his Light Attentive Minds perceive all those Truths by a simple intuitive Perception though we seem to make Arguments that we may demonstrate them to others so that they may be supposed as unquestionable Principles of our Reasonings for having known that God delights not in deceiving us nothing hinders but we may proceed to Reason 'T is also plain that the certainty of Faith depends on that Principle That there is a God uncapable of Deceipt For the Existence of God and the Infallibility of his Divine Authority are rather a natural Knowledge and common Notions as to Minds capable of serious Attention than Articles of Faith though to have a Mind susceptible of a sufficient Attention rightly to conceive those Truths and willingly to apply our selves to the understanding them be a particular Gift of God From that Principle That God is no Deceiver we might likewise infer that we have a real Body to which we are united in a particular manner and that we are surrounded with several others For we are inwardly convinced of their