can a Body as Extended Round or Triangular c. And then I would know why we cannot by attentive Consideration and due Reflexion on those Things as thus conceiv'd by us frame a Science grounded on the Things thus apprehended as well as Mathematicians can upon a Body consider'd as grounding their proper Objects or as grounding their Notions of such and such Modes of Quantity such as are the Degrees Proportions or Figures of it Let us not Blaspheme in our Thoughts the Bounty of Infinite Goodness It was the Devil's first Calumny against God that he envy'd Manking Knowledge Let not us carry it on by entertaining such an unworthy Conceit of Essential Goodness but dispose our selves by seeking a Right Method to Knowledge and pursuing it with Industrious Study and we may be Certain of Success While I was writing my Method to Science the Attempt to shew the Reason all along for such Notions as were taken from the Thing according to the manner of Being it had in my Understanding and therefore was to be carried through with perpetual Reflexion on the Things there did appear so discouraging that I was sometimes half sorry I had undertaken it But I saw the World needed it and knew all Truths were Connected and therefore was confident of God's Assistance in such a necessary and useful Occasion Indeed Providence has left us no Means to know what is done in the Moon or other Stars tho' perhaps they are as busie there as we are in this Sublunary Planet the Earth because it is not to our purpose to know such Things But whoever considers those Metaphysical Objects will at first sight discover how Useful the Knowledge of them is both in regard of their Influence upon all Inferior Sciences and to raise us to Contemplation as also to Explicate Establish Defend and Comfort Christian Faith For there is a Gradation of Truths as well as a Connexion of one Truth with another The Natural are Foundation-Stones To bear the Supernatural ones Which tho' they to Heaven's Top aspire 'T is the same Ground rais'd Stories higher Bless'd Soul which to the Throne Divine Winds it self up by its own Line All these high Encomiums of Metaphysicks if it shall please God to protract my Span of Life some few Inches longer I doubt not but to shew are no more but its just Due and amongst the rest its Clearest Demonstrative Evidence and Certainty Particularly that the Study of that Science is so far from increasing Doubts or leading to Scepticism as perhaps Mr. L. may apprehend that on the Contrary the Knowledge of it is the most effectual Means imaginable to settle all Doubtfulness and to Convert or Confound the greatest Scepticks 6. Mr. Locke's Tenet of no Innate Notions nor consequently Innate Principles does perfectly agree with my Sentiments both as to the Thesis it self and the Reason for it which is that God has laid Connatural Causes to give us our Notions and therefore it did not become his Sovereign Wisdom to do such a needless Action as to ingraft them by his own Hand immediately Besides which that Judicious Author Accumulates so many other Pregnant and Solid Reasons to fix that Position of ours in an Immoveable Certainty that I see not but it may for the future deserve the Repute of An Establish'd and Leading Maxim in Philosophy REFLEXIONS ON THE SECOND BOOK REFLEXION Second ON The First CHAPTER 1. I Agree perfectly with this Learned Author That our Observation employ'd either about External Sensible Objects or about the Internal Operations of our Minds perceived and reflected on by our selves is that which supplies our Understandings with all the Materials of Thinking As also that a Man first thinks when he begins to have any Sensations That the Impressions made on the Senses are the Originals of all Knowledge That the Mind is of its own Nature fitted to receive those Impressions That in receiving Ideas or Notions at first the Mind is Passive That 't is all one to say the Soul and the Man thinks And Lastly That Men do not always think which last Thesis he confutes here very elaborately But I cannot at all agree to some Positions he makes use of to oppose this last Tenet and indeed needlesly for he produces good store of solid Arguments sufficient to confute it 2. For First He makes the having Ideas and Perception to be the same thing I apprehend he means that when we have Ideas we must perceive we have them because he says afterwards that the Soul must necessarily be conscious of its own Perception Indeed had he said the Having Ideas when he is Awake and Attentively reflects on those Ideas it had been a Certain and Evident Truth Otherwise 't is manifest that we retain or have our Ideas or Notions in our Mind when we are soundly asleep it being a strange and extravagant Paradox to say that we get them all again as soon as ever our Eyes are open and yet we do not then know them and to say we do is to come over to his Adversary and grant the Thesis he is Impugning For if a Man does think when he is sound asleep 't is without Question that he may think always 3. Next I must utterly deny his Position that We cannot think without being sensible or conscious of it To disprove which I alledge that when a Man is quite absorpt in a serious Thought or as we say in a Brown Study his Mind is so totally taken up with the Object of his present Contemplation which perhaps is something without him that he can have no Thought at that very Instant of his own Internal Operation or that he is Thinking or any thing like it I have been call'd sometimes from my Study to Dinner and answered I am coming Upon my Delay they call'd me again and ask'd Why I came not having promis'd it I deny'd I heard or saw or answered them yet upon Recollection I remember'd afterwards that I did I knew then that they call'd me since I understood their Words and answered pertinently yet it is most manifest that I did not at the Time of the first Call understand that I understood it or know that I knew it since it came only into my Mind afterwards by Reminiscence or Reflexion which argues I had the Knowledge of it before by a Direct Impression otherwise I could not have remember'd it 4. Tho' this Thesis of Mr. Locke's is mention'd hereafter it were not amiss to speak my Sense of it where I first meet it He judges that we know our own Thoughts which are Spiritual by Experience And I deny we have any Experience but by Direct Impressions from sensible Objects either coming from them at first or re-excited He thinks it impossible to know but we must at the same time be Conscious or which is the same know we know And I judge it impossible we should know we know at the same time we have that
into fashion For he gives no reason why he did not rather constantly use the word Notion which importing a part of Cognition does most certainly better suit with a Treatise about Human Understanding 4. As for the Sense in which he takes the word IDEA he professes that he uses it to express whatever is meant by Phantasm Notion Species or whatever it is that the mind can be employ'd about in thinking Which manifests that he uses that word very Equivocally For a Phantasm and a Notion differ as widely as Body and Spirit the one being a Corporeal the other a Spiritual Resemblance or rather the one being a Resemblance or a kind of Image or Picture the other the thing Resembled as will be seen hereafter Again 't is agreed to by all the World that Brutes have Phantasms but they can have no Notions for these are the Elements or Materialls whose agreeable Connexion furnishes our Mind with Science of which Beasts which have no Mind are incapable and therefore it were both unnatural and to no purpose to put Notions which are the Primary Affections of the Mind in those meer Animals I am more at a loss to find that in the last page but one in his Epistle to the Reader he seems to contradistinguish Notions to Ideas which how it consists with the indifferency he grants the word Idea here to signify Notions I cannot at all comprehend 5. I must confess it is generally a fruitless contest to dispute about a Word which is nothing but a Sound or a Character were but the determinate Meaning of it told us by the user of it Let it be A or B or what he pleases provided the distinct Sense of it be clearly manifested by the Writer or Speaker it were in that case Logomachy and impertinent Cavil to except against it But when the Author 's own Explication of it does contrary to the Nature of Explications declare it is used ambiguously it laies a force on me to remark it lest it may lead the Reader as it infallibly must into great Errors unless it 's double Sense be warily distinguisht in the ensuing discourse which I have not observed to be done any where by this otherwise accurate Author 6. From this undistinguish'd Ambiguity of the word Idea it follows naturally that even his own excellent Judgment and consequently his Reader 's must necessarily sometimes deviate and tho' his general intention was only to pursue the Knowledge of Things yet he must needs be sometimes misâ—ed at unawares to entertain Fancies for Real Knowledges as will occasionally be shown hereafter For the present I cannot omit one particular it being of such main importance 7. The Author believes all sorts of Animals to have in some degree Perception Now Perception as I conceive signifies Knowledge for under what sort of material Action to rank it I confess my self at a loss But let it be only the first step and degree towards Knowledge and the in-let of all the Materials of it still he says the dulness of the faculties of some Brutes makes them remote from that Knowledge which is to be found in some Men So that it seems in other Men there may possibly be no more Knowledge at least in some things than in Brutes nor does he any more than probably conjecture that Beasts have not the power of comparing which may be observed in Mâ—n belonging to general Ideas and useful to abstract Reasonings Now this so jumbles together Spiritual Natures with those which are meerly Corporeal that if this be so we shall be at some loss to know our own Kind to define what Man is or to distinguish our selves from our younger Brothers in knowledge Brutes or our Souls from theirs For if by Ideas there be meant Notions as his Expressions leave it indifferent and that a Man's knowledge consists in having these Ideas in him and Brutes have also such Ideas and that moreover they may possibly have also in some sort a power to compare those Notions and both judging and discoursing most evidently consist in comparing our Notions I see no Operations peculiar to a Man but what Brutes may perform in a lower degree and since Degrees do not vary the Species for otherwise dull Men would be of another Species from those who have more wit we could consequently never know what Mankind meant or who is a Man who not unless in outward appearance nor lastly how our Souls or Minds do differ from their Fancies or Imaginations Again M. L. affirms B. 2. Ch. 11. § 11. that it seems as evident to him that Beasts do reason as that they have Sense than which certainly nothing in the world can be more evident or undeniable Now if this be so all those who hold that a Rational Animal is a proper and adequate Definition of Man ought to hold Brutes to be Men. Mr. L. will say that Brutes can only reason in Particulars having no General Ideas because they cannot Abstract nor do we see they make use of any General Signes to express Universal Ideas Indeed they have no such Signes as Words to notify they have any such Ideas but if we may conclude from their Outward Actions on which only Mr. L. seems to ground his good Opinion of them that they have Reason we may as well gather from the same ground that they have General Ideas too For example when a Horse sees a Man a far off he can only have an Idea that it is something for the Object cannot at that distance imprint a more particular Idea of it self but that most General one and therefore 't is evident the Horse must either have a General Idea of it or none at all whereas yet he must have some Idea of it because he sees it though confusedly Coming nearer the Object imprints a more distinct Idea of a Man yet not so distinct as to represent this Man in particular At length coming very near the same Object is apt to imprint an Idea of this particular Man which shews plainly that all those Ideas the Object gave him before were General ones To proceed we may observe that while it appear'd only to be something which was a very abstract Idea the Horse carry'd it abstractedly too and remain'd unconcern'd When it appear'd to be a Man it began to be a little concern'd having to do with such kind of things as us'd to do it either Good or Harm and therefore it stares at it a common carriage in sheep especially as if it study'd or consider'd what to make of it in order to its own Interest or Self-preservation But when the Object imprints an Idea of this particular Man who either us'd to bring him Provender or come to catch him to make him work he either comes towards him or runs away which different behaviour of theirs if outward Actions were in this case worth building on is as good a sign that Brutes have General Ideas as we can expect
her To explicate which hard point we may reflect that all the Essential Notions of a Thing were it possible to comprehend them all of a Body for example are Intrinsecal to it as also all those Modes or Accidents of it the Complexion of which does constitute the Essence of that Body and even taking them singly as meer Accidents they depend for their being on that Body as on their Substance But it is not so with the Natures of those Bodies or their Modes or Accidents as they are in the Soul For they are no Determinations or Modes suitable or belonging to her Nature as 't is Spiritual nor depend Solely on her as on their Subject for their Existence as all Modes in their Natural Subjects do Whence follows that when she knows them they are purely in her as Extrinsecall to her or as other Things and as having their genuin Existence elsewhere or out of the Mind And in this consists the Excellency of a Spiritual Nature from which we may demonstrate her Immateriality and by Consequence her Immortality that by reason of the Superlative Nobleness of her Essence she can comprehend the whole Nature of Bodies tho' she may know other higher Natures also all its Accidents its Existence without us and whatever can belong to it and yet so as to stand a-loof from it and preserve her Distance and Height above it and is withall through the Amplitude of her Nature able to engraft on her infinitely capacious Stock of Being all other things and give them besides their own if they be inferiour Natures or Bodies a far Nobler Existence in her self This Definition of Knowing will I doubt not look like Gibberish to short-sighted Speculaters who have not reflected steadily on the Souls Spiritual Operations and on what Manner things are in the Mind But if each step to it be as I cannot doubt but it is demonstrable the Evidence of the Premisses and the Necessity of the Consequence ought to obtain of every Learned Man not be startled at the Strangeness of the Conclusion because Fancy is dissatisfyed That Inferiour Faculty is to be curb'd and kept within its own narrow Sphere and forbid to meddle with Spiritual Subjects which are beyond its reach and Skill and are only manageable by Reason grounding it self on such Notions as are above Matter And if it appears by this Rigorous Test that our Notions are the very things as distinct from us all the rest of it will follow of Course by a Natural and Necessary Consequence PRELIMINARY Third That all our Science is grounded on the Things themselves and How this is performed 1. BUT how can the Things be in our Understanding since the Thing in its first and proper signification being an Individual Substance is the subject of Innumerable Modes or Accidents which we can never reach or comprehend and therefore it can never be known by us compleatly as Mr. Locke has very elaborately demonstrated at large and as my self have also proved in my Method This being so clear and confess'd a Truth it seems to follow hence against us both that neither the Ideists have any Idea of it Resembling it fully nor we any Notion of it which is truly and entirely the same with it intellectually and so neither of us can properly speaking pretend to know any Thing as we ought 2. To clear this important Difficulty on which the whole Affair of Science and the Confutation of Scepticism seems mainly to depend it is to be noted 3. First That the Notion of the Individuum Thing or Suppositum can never for the Reason now given be Distinct and Compleat but Confused and Imperfect For let us take any Individual thing v. g. a Stone we shall find that it has in it what answers to the Notion of a Thing or what has Being as also of Extended Dense Hard Opacous Dinted c. it is Divisible into innumerable Particles its peculiar Mixture consists of many diverse-natured Parts with such an Order or Position amongst them c. of all which our Senses with their best Assistances can not afford us clear Knowledge nor consequently imprint any Clear Notion of that whole Thing in our Mind 4. Secondly That since to know a Thing is to have the Notion of it in our Mind our Knowledge must be such as the Notion is If the Notion be Clear Intire and Distinct our Knowledge too is such and if the Notion be Obscure Partial and Confused our Knowledge must be Obscure Partial and Confused likewise 5. Thirdly We can have such a Notion of every Individual thing if it be not as the smallest Atoms are too little to be perceptible by our Sense as tho' it be Confused as to it self may serve to distinguish it from all other Things and to make us know it Exists separately from all others and independently on them Moreover that it is the Suppositum or Subject which has its own Nature or Essence in it and also all the Modes or Accidents belonging to it Thus when we see a Bag of Sand or Wheat poured out our Senses acquaint our Mind pre-imbued by some common Notions that each Grain can exist separate and has sustains or gives Being to its own Accidents without the Assistance of any of its Fellow-Grains 6. Fourthly This Confused Knowledge of the Thing in gross is sufficient for such a Degree of Science of it as we can have in this State For tho' we cannot have a distinct Knowledge of it all taken in the Lump and therefore do not pretend to have Science of it thus considered nor of each Considerability in it taken by Detail yet we know that Confusedly it contains in it self what answers to all the many distinct Conceptions we make of it which are the Ground of all the Science we have they being all stored up and amassed in the Thing and apt to be drawn or parcell'd out thence by our Abstractive Considerations of it 7. Lastly That our Distinct Knowledge or Science is built on our Distinct Notions of the Thing fram'd in our Minds by Impressions on the Senses which are many and the Manners of their affecting us also manifold Hence our Soul in this State can have no Distinct or Clear Knowledge of the Thing but by piece-meal or by Distinct Different Partial Inadequate or as they are generally and properly called Abstract Notions as Mr. Locke has frequently and judiciously exemplify'd in the several Conceptions or Notions we have of Gold which we may consider as yellow heavy solid malleable dissolvable in aqua Regia c. Whence tho' it be perhaps impossible for us to reach all the Considerabilities that may be found in it which ground our Different Notions yet each Notion we have of it being Distinct from all the rest and being truly the Thing as far as 't is thus Consider'd hence we can have Science of the Thing tho' confusedly of the whole yet Distinctly of
belongs the Imperfection of our Understanding which not able to comprehend the whole Thing is forced to make many Inadequate Ideas or Notions of it which not reaching to particularize the Thing must therefore be Common or General as containing more under them Indeterminately that is Confusedly In two Cases also Names seem to cause in us Confused Ideas One when the Word is perfectly Equivocal and signifies neither Sense determinately The other when a Multitude of Words are huddled together inartificially or stammer'd out unintelligibly to which we may add our not understanding the Language thorowly In which Cases we have either no Notion at all or if any a very Confused one And these seem to me the only solid Ways to breed Confused Ideas as being taken from the Nature of the Things and of their Circumstances and from the Nature of the Words as Words that is from their Significativeness As for the Secret and Unobserved References the Author speaks of which the Mind makes of its Ideas to such Names I must confess I know not what it means more than that the Understanding knows perfectly or imperfectly what the Word stands for or which is the same what is its true and proper Meaning Concerning Infinity of all sorts whatever I have said enough formerly on divers Occasions 3. The 30th Chapter needs no New Reflexion The 31th Of Adequate and Inadequate Ideas has in it much of true Philosophy especially where he makes the Essences of Things consist in the Complexion of the Modes or Accidents I grant that whole Complexion is not knowable by us in this State But why have not we as much Knowledge of them as is necessary for us Or why must we think we know Nothing of them unless we have over and above our Use all those superfiuous Degrees of the Knowledge of Things as may satisfie also our Curiosity or Humour By those Accidents of Gold which we know we can discern Gold Ordinarily from other Metals Or if any Cunning Fellow would impose upon Nature and us and undermine that slighter Knowledge of the Generality to cheat them God has furnish'd us especially those whose peculiar Concern it is with Means to countermine their Sophisticating Arts. I grant too that our Idea of Individual Substances is not Adequate but if an Imperfect Notion of them be sufficient for our purpose and withall most sutable to our Imperfect Understanding why should we desire more 4. Moreover there is another Reason of a higher Nature and most Supreamly Wise grounded on what the Metaphysicians term Altissimae Causae which we call First Principles why this Complexion of Accidents should be so Numerous and Millions of Ways variable It becomes the God of Truth so to order his World that Things should be a Ground for Truth Now had there not been almost as Infinite Variety of those Modes which constitute and consequently distinguish every Individuum it might happen there being such an innumerable Multitude of those Individual Things that some Two of them which by being Two must be Different would yet differ in nothing or in no respect or Mode and so they would be One and not One which is a Contradiction Nay not only divers Things but each Discernable and Divisible Part of the same Thing however seemingly Uniform must have a various Complexion of those Modes to distinguish them For Example Let a 20s Piece of Gold be divided into Forty Parts each Part after Division being now a Whole and a Distinct Thing from all the rest must either have some Distinct Modes in it to distinguish it from all the others or it would be Distinct and yet Not distinct having nothing to distinguish it that is it would be One Thing and yet Not one Thing or rather the same Part and yet Not the same Part and this in the same respect viz. under the Notion of Substance Thing or Part which is a perfect Contradiction Wherefore the God of Nature who is always Essential Truth has so order'd it that Things and each part of Things how minute soever should have a Ground in them of differing from one another as whoever is used to Microscopes will easily discover As for what concerns us this Inconceivable Variety tasks our Industry employs our Speculation and raises our Contemplation by making us see that God's Wisdom is infinitely exalted in the least of his Creatures and by obliging us to break out into Transports of Admiration Ecce Deus magnus vincens Scientiam nostram 5. Since then we see and experience that Things do exist and therefore nothing being Able to do what 't is not Capable to do are Capable of Being Actually or Existing since we know they existed not of themselves or by virtue of their Own Essence and therefore that to be meerly or purely Capable of Existing is the very Nature or Notion of Created Things considering them precisely according to the Notion of Thing or Substance Since we know the Last Distinction or Individuation of Things thus consider'd consists intrinsecally in the Complexions of Modes or Accidents which ultimately determins them to be this and since withall we have such Outward Marks and Signs of their Individuality from their Existing in the same Time and Place and other such like Circumstances in which Sense and not in making them intrinsecally constitute the Individuum Mr. Locke's Doctrin in this Point is admitted Lastly Since there are the highest Reasons imaginable that this Individual Complexion of Accidents should be impossible to be comprehended by us in this State let us content our selves with this sufficient Knowledge which we have of them without grasping foolishly at more than we are able to fathom 6. In my Judgment this Acute Author might have excused this 32th Chapter Of True and False Ideas He grants they cannot properly be True or False in themselves and Ideas or Notions being nothing but the Nature of the Thing as thus or thus conceiv'd in our Minds can have no Consideration belonging to them but what they are in themselves or that they are what they are which is called their Metaphysical Verity and therefore as he says well they can no more be True or False than a single Name can be said to be such The Improper Truth or Falshood which he seems willing to attribute to them belongs as he also intimates to Judgments that is to the Connexions of his Ideas and not to the Ideas or Notions themselves which are the Parts that are capable to be connected But if This Truth or Falshood which Mr. Locke would force his Reason to shew can any way belong to them it will not be Improperly but Properly such for Truth and Falshood are most properly found in Judgments and only in them Wherefore either no Formal Truth or Falshood at all can belong to Ideas or it must be Proper Truth or Falshood which is what the Author denies as contrary to his Intention REFLEXIONS ON THE THIRD BOOK
onely Light is properly and formally the Act which informs or actuates that Power which cannot possibly be express'd better than by these Words The Act of a Perspicuous Body as it is Perspicuous For putting the Air or the Water to be that Medium those Bodies may have many other Acts or Accidental Forms in them as Rarity Fluidity Humidity Coldness c. yet according to none of these is Light the proper Act of either of them but as they are Pellucid or Perspicuous because whatever other Qualities or Powers they may have if they had not that called Perspicuousness it could not affect those Bodies at all I observe by Mr. Locke's Discourse here that he makes account Definitions are made for the Vulgar Whereas they are only fram'd by Art for Men of Art or Philosophers But surely he is pleasant and cannot mean seriously when he finds fault with this Definition as Useless and Insignificant because it will not make a Blind Man understand what the Word Light means The Meaning of the Word is the Notion of it in our Mind and our Notions or Ideas as both of us hold come in by Impressions from the Object upon our Senses If then Blind Men could have no sensible Impression of Light 't is impossible they should have any Idea or Notion of it let the Definition be never so good Definitions are the Work of Reflexion and are to suppose our Natural Notions which are the Rough Draughts of Knowledge Common to us and to the Vulgar Art is to polish our Notions and bring them to Exactness and Concinnity by Defining them and not to imbue us with them when Nature never gave them And 't is a hard Case if Aristotle's Definitions must be Useless and Insignificant unless they work Miracles 15. I agree with him that the Definition of Motion which he says is that of the Cartesians viz. That 't is the Successive Application of the Parts of the Superficies of one Body to those of another is Faulty Whether it be theirs or no I know not I think they give another Yet I doubt not but Mr. Locke has his Reasons why he dislikes it Mine is this because Successive Quantity and Motion are the self-same Formal Notion and so the Definitum is as plain as the Definition which should explain it Besides that Application is one sort of Motion and therefore is harder to be understood than Motion it self which is the Genus to it All which Absurdities and others such Aristotle wisely avoids by using the Transcendent or more Common Notions of Act and Power 16. I pardon Mr. Locke's Opinion That nothing is Essential to Individuums because this Error is Common or rather Epidemical amongst the Modern Schools and springs hence that those Authors do not distinguish between what serves for Logical Speculations and what is the Real Constitution of Things in Nature For what can the word Essentia of which Essential is the Denominative possibly mean but that formal Notion quâ Ens est Ens. Since then the Notion of Ens or Thing is only Proper to the Individual Substance as being its First Analogate it follows that if they be divers Entia or Things they must have divers Formal Constituents or divers Essences Nay more it follows that Ens being only properly spoken of Substantia Prima or the Individuums and Improperly of Substantiae Secundae and much more of the Modes or Accidents therefore Essence the Formal Constituent of Ens can only be properly said of the Essences of Individuals and improperly of any other Essences So that only divers Individuals in proper Speech do differ Essentially or have Essential Differences belonging to them But of this enough in my Method I only remark how odd it is to say that Two Men are Two Things and yet do not differ under the Notion of Thing but only Accidentally or according to the Notion of some Mode or Accident which is perhaps as much as my self now do differ from my self a Year ago and yet I am the same Thing now I was then But I have said enough above of what Intrinsecally Constitutes divers Entities or Individuums and how we sufficiently know them tho' we comprehend not the whole Complexion of Accidents that constitutes their Individual Essences on which a good part of this 6th Chapter proceeds 17. The two last Chapters contain many various Observations in them and such as may both delight and in some sort profit inquisitive Wits Yet they touch upon some difficult Points which are contrary to my Sentiments and cannot well be solv'd without first laying my Grounds especially that about the Unknowableness of Real Essences To clear which farther and withall to meet with other Difficulties that may occur it will be necessary to lay or repeat for the Foundation of my future Discourses some few Principles I have I hope demonstrated in my Preliminaries that all our Ideas or Notions which are Solid and not Fantastick are nothing but several Conceptions of the Thing or which is the same taking the Word Conception for the Object and not for the Act of Conceiving the Thing diversly conceiv'd Hence all our Conceptions or Notions are Inadequate especially if they be Distinct and not Confused Hence the most abstracted Notion we have or can have let it be Figure Colour Existence or what other we please even tho' signify'd by the most Abstract Term is still the Thing consider'd precisely as having those Modes in it in regard that as those Modes or Accidents have no Entity of their own but meerly that of the Thing which they affect so they can have no Intelligibility or Knowableness which is the Property of Entity but as they are conceiv'd to belong to the Thing or to be It So that Hardness being that by which a Thing is formally Hard neither would Hardness be Hardness nor would Existence be Existence if they were the Hardness or Existence of Nothing for Nothing can neither be hard nor exist nor have any other Affections belonging to it Again 't is evident we can have no distinct Notion of the whole Ens or Individuum nor consequently of the Essence properly such which is the Form that Constitutes the whole Ens For this contains in it what grounds or Corresponds to great multitudes of Inadequate or Partial Notions and contains them blended as it were in the Thing as in their Root and this so Confusedly and inseparably that only that most acute Divider call'd Acies Intellectus can take them a sunder or separate them Moreover there are not only Confus'd and Distinct Ideas as Mr. L. acknowledges but also which I remember not he takes notice of Notions or Ideas which are more and less Confused or Distinct or partly one partly the other and this with very great variety as is seen in his Example of Gold of which and the same may be said of all other Bodies some Men gain by Degrees more distinct Knowledges than others do To
random or hap-hazard Lastly If our Method be observ'd Complex Ideas cannot be taken for Simple ones as has been shewn Mr. Locke does in most of his 23. Fifthly That the Distinction of Simple and Complex Clear and Obscure Notions is not to be taken from Appearances to our Fancy but from the solid Grounds now spoken of is seen farther by this Instance that many Men are much distasted at the Notions belonging to Metaphysicks such as are Being Ens Essence Act Power and such like The Reason of which is that we do customarily reflect upon our Notions and endeavour to define or explain them Whence in Metaphysical ones finding this to be very Difficult and in many of them Impossible hence Men fancy them to be Inconceivable and Incomprehensible and thence they take a Toy at Metaphysicks and pretend it insuperably hard and mysterious Now it passes with these Reflecters as it does with those that would look stedfastly on the Sun at Noon-day they find a kind of Cloud hovering before their Eyes and seem bedarken'd with too much Light The Test to stick to in such Cases is to set themselves to define or explicate their Notions which done if they find they can invent no Notions more Clear than those Notions themselves are they may be sure they are self-evident and may safely look upon them as such and if they find they can be defin'd or explain'd they may be sure there will be found in their Definition or Explication more Notions equivalent to that one and thence they may be assur'd also that the Notion Defin'd or Explicated has more Parts or Composition in it and therefore is not Simple nor perfectly Clear since it needs to be made Clear by others which therefore must be more Simple and Clearer than It. 24. Sixthly It appears from what is said that 't is not to avoid different Significations of Words that Men suppose a Real Essence belonging to each Species but because 't is impossible there should be any Individual Thing but it must have Superior Notions or which is the same it must be of some sort or other in Nature and the Notion of this Sort or Species must be an Essential and main Part of the Individual Essence For 't is evident that Nature forces us to have both the one and the other Notion without any form'd Design of ours and Words have nothing to do but to signifie them 25. Lastly Hence it appears that Words do not therefore become Ambiguous because they have no Settled Standards in Nature as Mr. Locke apprehends in Mix'd Modes especially in Moral ones For all Virtues and Vices being nothing but Dispositions to act according to Right Reason or contrary to it have as fixed Standards in Nature as Reason it self has taking Nature for the Reflexions we naturally have upon the Operations of our Soul and for what is Agreeable or Disagreeable to its true Nature as also on the Subjects and Circumstances about which and in which it is employ'd Hence the Words which he instances in viz. Sham Wheedle Banter are evidently Deviations from Right Reason in our Just and Civil Comportments with other Men and all the Notions that go to their Definitions are as much Connected as any other Genus and Difference are in any other Definition whatever So likewise his Mixed Modes Murther and Sacrilege are defin'd The Killing a Man lawlesly and the Taking to our selves lawlesly or Abusing Holy Things and have the same Solid Connexion as any other Notions which consists in this that the one of them is Common or Determinable properly by the other and the other is Particular or Determinative of it which makes them Cohere together in good Sense As for our Soul 's Connecting them at pleasure it is quite otherwise She has Notions of each Common Head naturally and Nature and Art do both of them conspire to oblige us to divide those Heads by Intrinsecal Notions called Differences and it is not at her Pleasure and Choice what Differences shall be Proper what Disparate Nature has settled the Agreeableness of one of these Notions to the other so that should we put a Difference to a Generical Notion which is Inconsistent with it the Notion thus defin'd would be Nonsence and Chimerical and no Wiser than Green Scarlet or a Four-square Triangle 26. Let the Obscurity and Ambiguity of Words spring from what Causes Mr. L. pleases concerning which he is very Acute in his 10th Chapter it is to me very evident that the Thing signify'd is not to be blam'd for the Abuse of Words and that this Abuse of them must spring from one of these three Heads viz. Ambiguity of Single Words the ill Contexture of them and their Mis-application Artificial Words are indeed as was said more liable to Obscurity and perhaps Logical ones most of all But since the Users of those Words do pretend to Learning let them define their Terms of Art and it will quickly appear whether they agree in the Notion of those Terms or no and by declaring what the Notion meant by that Term is useful for it will appear which of the Definitions agrees truly to that Notion and which does not 27. Tho' then some Men have the Knowledge of more Accidents in the same Thing or in the same Essence than another Man has yet it does not follow they agree in nothing but the Name or that they substitute the Name for the Thing for they do both of them acknowledge and agree that they speak of the same Thing or of the same Essence notwithstanding this more particular Knowledge which one of them has of it above the other In the same manner as divers Persons may know or discourse of the same Individual Man Socrates tho' the Complexion of Accidents which constitute the Individuum be far greater than that which constitutes the Specifick Notion notwithstanding that one of them better knows his Humour Temper Constitution Science Virtue and his Degree of Rationality which is most Essential to him as he is This Man than the other does Whence this Position does not only make all Philosophy or Knowledge of Things which are not such but by their Real Essence which formally makes them such to be impossible but it makes even our Ordinary Communication amongst Men unintelligible because we should still speak of Divers Things and not of the same For Divers they must be if they have Divers Essences which formally constitutes them such Yet I must declare that I verily judge this Learned Author delivers this Doctrine out of his Sincerity without intending to do any Favour to the Scepticks and that he is not aware how much this leans to that Maxim of the Pyrrhonians viz. that Nothing can be known unless it be known perfectly which is sufficiently confuted by this Evident Reflexion that our Soul works by Inadequate Notions and builds her Knowledge on those Partial Notions that is we can truly know that Thing though
the same Thing in part as is explicated above V. g. Master and Scholar are grounded on the Actions and Passions of Teaching and being Taught which are Inadequate Conceptions Co-existing in those two Persons and Identify'd materially with those Subjects And the same is found in all others which are thus Connected And the Last Of Real Existence As when we say Peter is clearly imports that what is meant by Peter the Subject and by Existent which is the Predicate imply'd there in the Word is are Co-existent or are found in the same Thing But more of this when we come to consider his 4th Chapter Of the Reality of our Knowledge 7. His Second Chapter Of the Degrees of our Knowledge distinguishing it into Intuitive Demonstrative and Sensitive is admirably Solid Clear and Rational throughout The First of these is proper to Principles the Second to Proofs the Last to the Knowledge of Particular Things or Modes by the way of Experiments Indeed Intuitive Knowledge is proper to Pure Spirits call'd Intelligences or Angels which because they do not glean their Knowledge from various Impressions on the Senses consequently they do not divide the thing into Parts by Inadequate Notions when they come to know it nor compound those Notions again into Propositions as we do but at one direct and full View call'd Intuition they comprehend the whole Thing and all that belongs to it at once Whence it seems not so proper to attribute Intuition to us Mortals who are but poor Retailers of our Imperfect and short Notions which we spell as it were and put together as Children do Letters when they are otherwise not able to read whole Words currently But this is very pardonable in Mr. Locke for to say true 't is very hard to find another Word which fits our Knowledge of First Principles much better tho' I think Self-evidence might serve My self have long ago had such a Thought tho' I express'd it warily in these words There is nothing in all our Knowledges that in the manner of it comes so near the Angelical Intuition as does our Knowledge of Self-evident Principles express'd by Identical Propositions It divides as little as is possible for us in this State for it predicates the same of the same nay the whole of the whole and for the same Reason it as little compounds again Whence it resembles it not a little in its Absolute Evidence and Immovable Firmness and is the nearest Approach possible to Simple Intuition That so as the Order of the World requires the Supremum infimi may immediately confine upon the Infimum Supremi 8. I was much pleased to see Mr. Locke declare that upon this Intuition depends all the Certainty and Evidence we have of our Knowledge and particularly that in every Step Reason makes in Demonstrative Knowledge that is in every Consequence we deduce there is an Intuitive Knowledge of the Agreement or Disagreement of the next intermediate Idea I add Upon which Agreement all the Force of Consequenee that is all our Reasonings are grounded The Evident Proof he gives for it here is worthy the attentive Consideration of his Learned Readers 'T is not in this occasion only but in divers others tho' I have not always noted them that Mr. Locke and my self have without design'd Confederacy agreed in Positions of great Moment which I know not how have escap'd the Thoughts of all other Authors I have seen The Reader may please to review my Method to Science B. 3. Less 1. § 3. where I discourse thus Wherefore since if the Consequence in which consists the Essence and all the Force and Nerves of Discourse be not Clear and Evident there could be no Certainty or Evidence of any thing that needs to be made known or Concluded and so our Faculty of Exact Reasoning would have been given us to no purpose hence 't is manifest that however one Proposition may be made known by other Propositions that are connected and consequential to one another yet the Consequence it self cannot be proved by Another Consequence For the Question would still return how and in virtue of what that Consequence which made the other Evident is Evident it self and so in infinitum Whence it follows that the Evidence of all Consequences whatever must be built on something in a higher manner Evident than any Consequence or Proof can otherwise make it that is on a Self-evident Proposition The certain Knowledge of which kind of Propositions as Mr. Locke holds is to be had by Intuition 9. I have been larger upon this Point and do most especially recommend it to the best Reflexion of our Readers because it is not only the Deepest and Firmest Ground but also the very best Test of all Argumentation and therefore the main Hinge on which all Science turns I must confess for all that I cannot see why since all Self-evident Truths can only be express'd by Identical Propositions this Learned Gentleman is so shy to use those Words since the Sense he brings on this Occasion is clearly Equivalent to those Identical Forms of Speech nor if put into Propositions can be express'd by any other I think we should not be asham'd of them or think them Trifling because some Men of Fancy who never set their Thoughts to trace Evidence and Truth to their Originals are pleased to make themselves Sport with them nor because their Terms are too closely connected For they must be so and were they not so they would be unworthy the Name of First Principles nor do us any Good when we come to reduce other Truths into them which is the best Way of Demonstrating 10. The Extent of Humane Knowledge of which he treats in his 3d Chapter is a very Excellent Subject Science has two Capital Enemies Scepticism and Dogmatism The one will allow very little or Nothing at all to be known the other pretends to know too much The former by breeding a perfect Despair of Knowledge discourages the Industry of the best Wits and makes them since Truth cannot be found to addict themselves only to Wordish Talk and Declamation To which contributes not a little that many who have incomparable Fancies have oftentimes the worst Judgments especially if they have let their Wits loose to Raillery and Drollery For such Persons proud of their Joking Talent do think they answer a Demonstration if they can but break a Jest upon it And besides they have the Faculty of cutting Capers beyond the Moon and raising Objections at random The Latter does perhaps as much Harm by Presuming to demonstrate every Thing And the Over-weening of these Men is the more pernicious because they make a Shew of a great Friendship and Zeal for Science and yet by falling short of their Extravagant Pretensions they throw a Scandal upon her and make weak Distinguishers apprehend there is no Science at all The One deviates from Zeal for Truth in Excess the Other in Defect And the
that Supposition there would have been no Motion For Motion of Material Entities is perform'd by the Intervening of the Parts of the one between the Parts of the other and so Dividing it which is impossible unless the one had been Rarer or more yielding the other Denser or less yielding But this once settled 't is evident from the very Terms that there are Proper Causes both on the Agent 's and Patient's Side for the one's Dividing and the other's being Divided For the Rare being more Divisible than the Dense 't is demonstrable that the Dense being impell'd against the Rare by Motion which comes from a Superior Agent the Rare being more Divisible will give way and be divided by the Dense which is clearly impossible in the Corpuscularian Hypothesis which puts all Parts of their Matter to be equally Rare or Dense or rather as the Cartesians do neither Rare nor Dense all Qualities according to them being made by mingling their three Elements which Elements are themselves made by and presuppose the Motion of their First Matter Whereas yet it is impossible to conceive but those Parts of that Matter must be either Rare or else Dense at least to some Degree And as denying the Rarity and Density in the First Bodies does by making Motion impossible put the Course of Nature out of Frame both in its Beginning and Progress so it utterly destroys all Demonstration in Physicks which is grounded on Mediums from Proper Causes and Proper Effects 16. Passing over many Immediate Steps which shew how those Four Principal Qualities Heat Cold Moisture and Driness are made of Rarity and Density acted upon by the common Causes in Nature we come to shew how these two Primary Qualities do constitute many Secondary ones and how these last are refunded into the other as their Proper Causes and therefore are Demonstrable by them as by their Proper Mediums A few Instances may serve as Hints to explicate others That great Pellucidity in the Air is necessarily and properly refunded into its extream Divisibility or Rarity by which it becomes easily penetrable in all its Parts by those Spicula Ignea the Rays of the Sun and Opacity for the same Reason is the Proper Effect of Density which hinders its Subject from being penetrated or Divided by them whence also it is a Proper Cause of Repelling or Reflecting them Again Who sees not that Liquidity which makes its Subject easily yielding to be flatted evenly as we see in Ponds or driven to run into Cavities by the common Motion of Gravitation is a proper Effect of Rarity as Consistency is of Density Spissitude is a Constipation of Dense Parts or the Want of Pores to admit the Ingress of other Bodies Grossitude is clearly nothing but Density in a bigger Quantity of its Parts Friability is refunded into great Dense Parts and very large Rare ones Whence those Rare Parts which were they less would better cement those Parts together being now very large and withal very Divisible are easily divided and consequently the Body is soon shatter'd As we find in Dry Clods out of which while they were yet Wet Dirt those Parts which were Watry being drawn by Heat large Cavities are left which the Air now possesses On the other side Ductility and Malleability are the Effects of the very smallest Rare Parts finely compacted with the minutest Dense ones Those Small Dense Parts so closely woven and in a manner Contiguous keep the Rare from evaporating and the Rare by being such and interwoven with the Dense all over make the Compound yield to Expansion without Breaking being very small are not easily separable and yet tho' rarify'd farther by the subtilest Agent Fire they render it Fusible 17. Were these Principles which I rawly and briefly touch on here pursu'd by Learned Men with Immediate Consequences which true Logick assisting is far from impossible the Nature of those first-mixt Qualities and by their means of many others would not be very hard to explicate But if Men are resolv'd to neglect all Natural Principles and the Intrinsecal Constitution of the First Bodies in Nature and will needs run upon nothing but Mathematical Notions which pre-suppose those Principles nor could be found in Nature unless the other be first admitted or Division made Possible for neither Parts nor consequently Figures of Parts could be made without Division nor Division unless some Bodies were naturally apt to divide others to be divided that is unless some were Rare others Dense or if instead of demonstrating their Natural Principles by the Superiour Science they will needs have recourse to Voluntary Suppositions and violate the Nature of Causality and of the Deity it self by making him whose Proper Effect he being Essentially Self-existence is to give Existence or create to be the Proper and Immediate Cause of Motion and go about to prove Ignotum per Ignotissimum by supposing as they sometimes do that God wills this or that which is for the Interest of their Tenet and too hard to prove If I say Men are resolv'd to follow such Untoward Methods 't is no Wonder Science does not advance but the World is detain'd in Ignorance of many things which otherwise it might know Did Learned Men set themselves to carry forwards the Grounds of Nature in Euclides Physicus where they will find Demonstrations enow to farther Conclusions with the same Zeal as they do the Mathematicks I doubt not but the Evident Truths which would by Degrees disclose themselves would both encourage and enable them to make a farther Progress in Knowledge nor would the Science of Second Qualities about which Physical Demonstrations ought in great part be employ'd be held so Desperate But to leave these Discourses and apply my self to Mr. L. I cannot but wonder that amongst all his Ideas of Qualities he not so much as once mentions as far as I remember those two Chiefest ones of Rarity and Density tho' nothing is more obvious in the whole Course of Nature than these are Which with many other Reasons makes me think he had not seen or at least well weigh'd the true Aristotelian System which he might have seen in Sir Kenelm Digby's Treatise of Bodies and its Latin Preface as also in Institutiones Peripateticae but took it as represented by the Modern Schools For my self I must declare I verily judge that the Grounds I here insist on are the only true ones that a Natural Philosopher can have that they are Demonstrable and I do offer my self to maintain them to be such if it shall please any Learned Objector to attempt to show these Principles Faulty or that we build on any Supposition at all and not on what 's either Self-evident or easily and immediately Reducible to Self-evidence Which I believe no other Sect of Philosophers did ever so much as pretend to 18. To come to those Qualities which are the Formal Object of our Senses called by Mr. Locke Secondary Qualities I
have shewn already that divers of them are Intelligible and Explicable by Rarity and Density only certain little Respects are added to them which too lie in our Ken Nor do I doubt but most of the others may be clearly and distinctly known by the same Grounds Indeed divers of them depend on the Figure and Texture of Parts which tho' we can never know with a Mathematical Exactness yet I see not why we may not demonstrate the Natures or Kinds of each Quality so far as to distinguish them from others and refund them into their Proper Causes which is enough for our purpose and most proportionable to our State For Example Light brings from the Wall into the Eye and so into our Knowing Power the Notion of Whiteness and of other Colours from other Objects It cannot be doubted then since Light of its self is Uniform but that there is some Disposition in the Surface of the Object or the Figure of its outmost Parts which reflects Light after a different manner and affects the Seer accordingly Nor is it hard to conceive but very Evident that a very smooth Surface as having fewest Pores in it will reflect more Light and so make it more Visible especially if those Outmost Parts be Roundish which reflect Light every way or towards all sides It is manifest then that that Quality which is most Visible of all others being that which we call Whiteness the Proper Causes of that Quality may be found out Which will further appear hence that if on the contrary the Surface have Small-pointed Parts and Large Pores much of the Light will be lost in those shady Grotts and scarce any Beam of it reflected which therefore is the Proper Cause of that Lightless Appearance call'd Blackness which is the Reason why when there is no Light at all to be reflected all things seem Black If we hold a Thousand Needles Points towards our Eye they appear Black because of the vastness of the Interstices or Cavities in proportion to the extant Parts which should have reflected the Light Whereas were the Object a polish'd Plate of Steel the Interstices or Pores being less it appears more luminous and whitish which may give us some faint but sure Light how this Colour is made The Intermediate Colours are made by the Mixture and Demixture of those Extreams whence out of the Degrees of their partaking those Contrary or Subcontrary Qualities are framed as Blue Green Yellow and all other Colours Nor is this Degree constituting each of those Species Unknowable A Picture-drawer can tell us what Proportion of his Paint of such a Colour he adds to that of another Colour to make what Third Colour he pleases We see then that the Secondary Quality of Colour may come within the Compass of our Knowledge Nor do I see why the rest of them may not become equally Intelligible did we seriously set our Reflex Thoughts on work to study them especially Experimental Knowledge assisting by hinting to us such Matters of Fact as give Light to our Reason when furnish'd with and attentive to true Natural Principles how it may reduce those Qualities unto their Proper Causes which is the only Work of Science REFLEXION Eighteenth ON The 4th and 5th CHAPTERS 1. I Come now to a nearer view of the 4th Chapter Of the Reality of Knowledge the main point in which the whole Doctrine of the Ideists is concern'd To State it rightly I do not doubt as I have exprest my self formerly but that the Ideists have many true Notions of the Things that is the Things themselves in their Minds after a Natural Manner as well as their Opposers have notwithstanding their ill Speculation and thence oftentimes discourse right for the same Reason that tho' some Philosophers held that the Eye sees per Emissionem others per Receptionem Radiorum yet they naturally saw both a like however their Speculative thoughts disfer'd about the manner how Seeing was made Wherefore the true State of the Question is whether they can have any Real Knowledge of the things in Nature according to the Principles of the Ideists or by their puting our Notions which are the Ground and Materials of our Knowledge to be onely Likenesses Appearances Similitudes Resemblances Pourtraitures or Pictures of the Things which are the names they give them and not the Things themselves in our minds For if they can have no Real Knowledge or Knowledge of the Thing by such meerly representing Ideas then it must be said that those Ideas being confessedly the First and onely Materials of their Knowledge the Ideists will become oftentimes liable to deviate from Nature and fall into Errour by adhering to such Groundless Principles as is the Substituting very often Empty Resemblances or Fancies for the Things themselves nor can they ever be able to give a Solid Account by their Principles that they know any thing 2. Now it seems to me tho' I should wave those many pregnant Arguments brought against them in my three first Preliminaries that the very Position of the Ideists does decide the Question and confute themselves For if we may trust their words they agree that we know the Things as well as the Ideas and onely differ in the manner how Of which Mr. L. tell us here § 3. 'T is Evident the mind knows not Things immediately but onely by the Intervention of the Ideas it has of them Whence I much fear that by Ideas he means Phantasms or Material Pictures in the Imagination by whose Intervention 't is indeed confest we know For otherwise it is far from Evident that we know them by means of those Spiritual Conceptions we call Notions since we bring many close Arguments fetcht from the Nature of the Thing to prove that there is perfect Evidence of the Contrary For those Ideas or Notions being held and shown by us to be the Things in our Mind their very being there or in a Knowing Power is to be known Nor can they be held by us to be the means to know themselves for so the same would be the Means and End both which is a Contradiction But let us consider his words The mind he says knows the Things by the Intervention of Ideas The Question then is what the Idea does and what the word Intervention means Does the Mind see the Thing without by sending out her Rayes of Knowledge to it This cannot be said in regard all the Acts of Knowledge which the Mind has are Immanent ones and are receiv'd in that which produced them as in their onely Subject Does then the Thing that is without send its beams by the Ideas as by a kind of Spiritual Optick-glass to which the mind lays her Intellectual Eye Neither can this be said for the Mind could see or know the Thing it self were it in it else how could it know the Ideas Rather were the Thing in the Understanding it could not but be known whether there were any Similitude besides
tho' Words be needful to signify them And therefore I must deny that The Consideration of Words is a necessary part of the Treatise of Knowledge meaning by that word Philosophical Knowledge as our Circumstance determin us Let Logicians but take care that the Words be Univocal and not Equivocal or double sensed and all else that can be consider'd to belong to Truth is to be look'd for in the Mind and can be no where else Hence I cannot admit his Distinction of Certainty of Truth and Certainty of Knowledge in any other sense than that Knowledge is the Act and Truth the onely Object of that Act since nothing can be known to be what is not nor known to be True which is not True The Generical Notion Certainty should first have been explicated ere those two sorts of it had been defin'd otherwise both those Definitions must necessarily remain Unintelligible I shall presume that I have in my METHOD shown from its Grounds what Certainty is viz. The Determination of our Understanding or Judging Power by the Object 's actuating it or being actually in it as it is in its self With which what his putting together of Words in Verbal Propositions has to do surpasses my understanding And 't is as hard to conceive that General Truths can never be well made known and are very Seldom apprehended but as conceiv'd and express'd in Words That General Truths cannot be made known to others without Words is in a manner as Evident as 't is that we cannot see one anothers Thoughts nor is this peculiar to General Truths for scarcely can Particular ones be made known any other way But that they cannot be known or apprehended by our selves which seems here to be his meaning but as conceiv'd and express'd in Words is so far from Evident that the Contrary is such for it is impossible to express them in Words unless we do first apprehend and conceive them in our Thoughts and were not this so all the while we use Words in speaking of General Truths we should do nothing but talk of we know not what For our Thoughts and Apprehensions are ex Natura rei presupposed to the Words by which we express them and to do otherwise is to let our Tongue run before our Wit Whence we account them silly and Senseless people and Perverters of Nature who make use of Words before they know their Meaning 2. I have shown above that it is not necessary to our being Certain of any Proposition that we know the precise bounds and Extent of the Species it stands for but that 't is sufficient to know it in part Distinctly and the rest of it or the whole Confusedly provided that part of it which we know is sufficient to distinguish it from all other Species And were not this so it would follow that we never could know the Truth of any Universal Proposition whatever especially when we discourse of the Species Infima which requires a Complexion of very many Accidents whose precise Number and Bounds are utterly unknowable by us A Position which makes Logick useless scarce any Conclusion being deducible from Premisses unless one of them be an Universal and quite destroyes all Science which is employ'd about Universal or General Truths He instances in Man and Gold and judges that for want of knowing the Extent of their Species it is impossible with any Certainty to affirm that all Men are Rational or all Gold yellow We cannot indeed know this by considering every Individual Man by the poll But if by the word Man we mean no more but a Rational Animal it is so far from Impossible to know and affirm that All Men are Rational that 't is Impossible not to know it And were it a proper place to make good that Definition here I could demonstrate that it does agree to Man and can agree to nothing else and therefore that Definition is True and Adequate Nor can the contrary be sustaind any other way but by unacquainting us with our selves and our own Kind and by jumbling together these Species which are distinguisht by Contradictory Differences and Confounding the vastly-Distinct Natures and Properties of Corporeal and Spiritual Beings As for the Species of Gold Yellowness which he instances in is not Essential to it as Rationality is to Man as being but one of those Accidents by which we distinguish it from other Species of Minerals and I have hinted some other formerly which are more Intrinsecal and Essential to it than its Colour Again we are moreover Certain by manifest and daily experience and by the constant and Common Practise of the World that Mankind is acquainted with enow of those Accidents to distinguish it One bespeaks a Golden Cup and the Goldsmith makes it for him Nor was it ever heard that any of this Trade did hope to Cozen a Sensible Man by obtruding upon the Buyer Brass or any other Mettal for Gold or if he did that Goldsmith's-Hall could not distinguish it Nay if it be but a little alloyd there are ways to find it out which shows that Mankind is furnisht with means enow to distinguish Gold from other Mettals and for the same reason other things also tho' the Extent of all the Species and their precise bounds be not exactly known to those Speculaters who will needs forgo their Natural Knowledge of Things to pursue Scrupulous Fancies which let loose to fly at rovers are too hard for their Reason Unestablish'd by Principles 3. Hence an Answer is given to Mr. Locke's Acute Difficulty viz. That 't is impossible for us to know that this or that Quality or Idea has a necessary Connexion with a Real Essence of which we have no Idea at all that is according to his Principles no Knowledge For since a Real Essence is that which constitutes such a kind of Ens or Species and what distinguishes an Entity or Species from all others does also make it this or that Species that is does constitute it it follows that since by my Discourse here we have such a Degree of Knowledge of that kind of Ens called Gold as to distinguish it from all others we have a Sufficient and True tho' not an Adequate and Distinct Knowledge of its Essence too that constitutes it such a kind of Ens. Indeed if nothing will content us but Superfluous Knowledge for Curiosity sake of each particular Mode that belongs to that Essence 't is no wonder if we labour in vain and by over-straining to go beyond our selves in this State fall short of our Aim I must confess that it would concern us much as we are to know whether there be any Quality which we do not yet know in the Thing inconsistent with those we do know for this would blunder our Notion of it and make it Chimerical But as it is impossible Creative Wisdom should lay Grounds for Contradiction so in case those Qualities be all Consistent where is the harm not to know
that such Propositions do not concern Existence he means I suppose Existence in Nature or out of the Mind or else not at all and the Copula est must necessarily signifie some kind of Existence as well as Identifie the two Terms in every Proposition or otherwise it would be a Sound or no Word But this Discourse is perhaps needless being as I think in great part granted here All I intend by it is to clear the Notion of Existence in the Title and that it means Existence out of the Mind by which Things or Individuums are in themselves whether we think of them or no. I grant too that we have so certain a Knowledge of our own Existence that it can need no Proof but I deny we have it by Intuition and I affirm we got it and have it by plain Sensation or Experience in the same manner as we know the Existence of other Bodies as will be shewn when we come to reflect on the 11th Chapter 2. His Demonstration of a Deity Chap. 10th is very acute nor does he here affect Recourse to his Ideas or build on them expressly or as he too often does in other places take Phantasms for Notions which takes off the force of his Reasons Particularly he argues so strongly that a Cogitative Being can never be made of meer-Matter that I do judge it Unanswerable And withall that it necessarily concludes that Brutes can have no Knowledge without having something in them that is Spiritual which I am sure he will not say I could wish Mr. L. had been steady to this Distinction of those two Natures of Spiritual and Corporeal which adequately divide Ens Which I think he was not when he said B. 4. Ch. 3. § 6. that he sees no contradiction in it that God should if he pleas'd give to certain Systems of Created Senseless Matter put together as he thinks fit some degrees of Sense Perception and Thought For if the Nature of meer Matter by being Commodiously put together can bear the having Thoughtfulness it is but compounding it more artificially and it may be as Cogitative as the Wisest Man living and so farewell to all Spirituality of our Soul nay to all Spiritual Nature whatever For to what end should God create the Distinct Nature of Spirits if Matter wisely orderd could perform all their Operations If once we yield that Matter conveniently contrived can be capable of any degree of Knowledge it is but contriving it better and better and who can stint Gods Omnipotency in this more than in other things and it may be capable of the highest Degree of Science and consequently to create Spiritual Nature at all would be needless and to no purpose Besides if Men and Brutes differ onely in the Degrees of Knowledge they ought to be of the same Species since Magis et minus non variant specïem For otherwise every single Man would make a Distinct Species which is a plain Contradiction Against this Position of the possibility of Matters being Cogitative he argues here very Vigorously § 10. and shows clearly that Incogitative Matter and Motion whatever changes it might produce of Figure and Bulk could never produce Thought He will say that tho' it could not do this of it self yet God could make it do it But if God cannot contradict himself or do Unwisely then since his Creative Wisdom has Establisht each kind of Nature to be it self and no other then to put in God a Power to confound those Natures again which he does if he should confound the Primary and proper Operation of Spirits which is Thought Knowledge or Reason by giving it to Bodies is to put a Power in God to do Contradictions that is to do Impossibilities for whatever is against the Essence or Nature of any thing makes that thing not to be it self which is against an Identical and self evident Proposition and a Direct Contradiction 3. The Clear Distinction of Corporeal and Spiritual Natures is of that vast importance that tho' it may seem a little unseasonable I cannot but take this occasion to reflect once more upon Mr. L's doctrine in this point apprehending I may not meet with a fitter opportunity hereafter I have reason to think that he does not exclude Materiality out of the Idea of Spirit or at least of the Soul which all Christian Philosophers and most Heathens too hold to be of a Spiritual Nature On the other side he attributes Reason and Knowledge in some degree at least to Brutes Now out of these two positions it follows demonstratively 1. That the Corporeal and Spiritual Natures are not clearly distinguisht which utterly destroys all possibility of Truth in Philosophy and seems to do no small prejudice to Truths of a Higher Concern which are left Inexplicable to Men of Sense if those inferiour Truths which relate to the Clear Distinction of those two Natures be violated and render'd Uncertain For Corporeal and Spiritual Natures comprizing or dividing between themselves the Objects of all the Sciences a Philosopher can treat of whether they be Physicks Ethicks or Metaphysicks all which must necessarily build their Discourses and draw their Conclusions from such Notions as are taken from and do of right belong to those two Distinct Natures it follows that if these two Natures be confounded and jumbled together and be not clearly Distinguisht it is impossible any Clear Conclusion can be drawn from either of them or any Rational Discourse made concerning them 2. That Mr. L's way of Philosophizing by Ideas which leads him into such strange Errours or at least affords him no certain Light to Distingush those Natures is good for nothing at all For if it cannot furnish him with means to put a Clear Distinction between Natures so widely Distant and Different from one another much less can it assist him to show clearly what Modes Accidents or Properties belong to one Nature what to the other or to Distinguish those Natures which are Infericur to those two General ones and therefore differ far less from one another than They did It remains then to show that Mr. L's Doctrine by way of Ideas does not put a Clear Distinction between the aforesaid Natures but confounds them together He holds it not to be Certain that Immateriality is not included in the Notion of our Spiritual part the Soul it may therefore be Material or have Matter in it for any thing his Way of Ideas tells him and therefore since Matter cannot be crampt into an Indivisible it may be Divisihle or Extended and so may be Divided or Shatter'd that is its Unity being thus lost and consequently its Entity it may cease to bee or be Corrupted Again if it be Divisible it must be to some degree or either more or less Divisible that is Rare or else Dense If Rare then since Passivenes is Essential to the Notion of Matter it may by the operation of other Material Causes which never wants be Condens'd and
above of the Word Ideas that we can build no Degree of Certainty nor Improvement of Knowledge upon it especially since Mr. Locke himself according to his usual Candour and Modesty declares here he does but think it true But which is the hardest Case of all to embrace this Principle we must be oblig'd to quit all our Self-evident Maxims as of little Use upon which our selves and all the Learned part of the World have proceeded hitherto 12. 'T is a great Truth that it is a right Method of advancing Knowledge to Consider our Abstract Notions But if these be not the Things nor as Mr. Locke's Complex Ideas are so much as like them I see not but that let us Consider them as much as we will we shall be never the nearer attaining any Real Knowledge by such a Consideration I add that it is also as necessary to find out Middle Terms that are Proper without which no Science can be had of any New Conclusion nor consequently can we without this advance one Step in Exact Knowledge 'T is a certain Truth also that Morality is capable of Demonstration tho' I do not remember that any Author but Mr. Locke and my self have been so bold as openly to profess it The Current of Slight Speculaters having long endeavour'd to make it pass for a kind of Maxim that there is no perfect Certainty to be had but only in Lines and Numbers Whereas the Principles of Morality are as Evident and the Notions belonging to such Subjects as Clear as those in Natural Philosophy perhaps Clearer as this worthy Author has shewn most manifestly 'T is also True that Knowledge may be better'd by Experience But if he means Scientifical Knowledge which is the Effect of Demonstration I must deny it unless Common Principles of Nature do guide Experience and give it Light of the True and Proper Causes of what Experience inform'd our Senses for without their Assistance as I have shewn in the Preface to my my Method Experimental Knowledge can never produce any one Scientifical Conclusion I add that True Science would be a Thousand times more advanc'd did Learned Men bend their Endeavours to begin with the Primary Affections of Body and thence proceed gradually to Secondary or more Compounded ones For this Method would furnish Studious Men with good Store of Proper Middle Terms to deduce their Demonstrations Lastly 'T is true that we must beware of Hypotheses and Wrong Principles But where shall we find any Sect. of Philosophers who for want of Exact Skill in Logick and Metaphysicks are not forc'd to build upon Hypotheses and those generally False ones too but our Anti-Ideists whom I take to be true Followers of Aristotle in his main Principles and the only true Understanders of his Doctrine It being indeed scarce possible that those who are not well qualify'd with those two Sciences should be capable to Comprehend his True Sense 13. Mr. Locke judges that a Man may pore long enough on those Maxims us'd by Euclid without seeing one jot the more of Mathematical Truths Self-evident Truths need not be por'd upon at all nor were they ever meant for the attaining New Knowledges by poring on those Propositions singly consider'd Yet these Maxims must be pre-supposed to be True and admitted or the Arguments would very often want their best Cement that gives them an evident and necessary Coherence They are prefix'd by Euclid at first both because they may often come in play afterwards as also because it would throw off the Tenour of the Discourse to mention them still expresly every time there needs Recourse to them Whence it was judg'd fit by him and others like him to premise them at first and then refer to them Let Men but observe how and in what Occasions Euclid makes use of them and it will then be best seen what they are good for But if they are good for nothing at all I am sure it must be concluded that both Euclid himself and such Writers and Users of Maxims were all of them a Company of vain idle Fops to amuse their Readers by proposing so solemnly such Ridiculous Trifles and dubbing those Insignificant Baubles with the Honourable Titles of Maxims and Principles To fix which Dis-repute upon him and his Imitaters will I doubt much Scandalize every True Member of the Commonwealth of Learning REFLEXION 21th ON The Fourteenth Fifteenth and Sixteenth CHAPTERS 1. I Am sorry I must declare that in Mr. Locke's 14th Chapter which treats Of Judgment there is scarce one Line that I can yield to I discourse thus Judgment does most evidently import the Fixure of our Understanding in its Assent to the Truth or Falshood of any Proposition For to say I judge a thing to be so is the same as to say I am fully and firmly persuaded it is so Now this Fixure of the Mind may arise from two Causes Reason and Passion Under the Word Reason taken at large I comprehend all kind of Evident Knowledge whatever that can belong to a Rational Creature To Passion belongs all Precipitancy of Assent from what Motive or Cause soever it springs The Former makes us adhere to what we judge upon such Motives as by their Evidence do determine the Understanding to Assent and fix it in that Assent which Motives therefore can be only such as are purely Intellectual or such as by our Proceeding upon them we see clearly the Thing must be so or not so as we apprehend The Later springs from the Will corrupted and byassed by some Interest or Pleasure which inveigles our Understanding to adhere to it as a Truth because the Will would have it so Again there are two sorts of Objects Man as having two Natures in him may be employ'd about viz. Outward Action and Inward Assent The former does generally concern the External Conveniences or Necessities of our Temporal Life here the Later the Interiour and Natural Perfection of our Soul which is the Adhering to Truth and rejecting of Errour In the Former of these we can have no Clear Evidence or very seldom both because Outward Actions are employ'd about Particulars of which we can have no Science as also because those Particulars about which we are to Act are surrounded with almost Innumerable Circumstances which we cannot Comprehend and way-laid by the Undiscoverable Ambushes of Fortune so that we can seldom or never with absolute Certainty know whether they may or may not prove Successful Notwithstanding which Dangers when there is Necessity or great Conveniency to Act Outwardly we may without disparaging our Reason fall to acting upon a Probability the Necessity obliging us to do so and the Impossibility of perfect Assurance acquitting us of Imprudence But of Assenting or of Judging Inwardly that a Proposition is True or False there can be no Necessity unless Evidence forces us to it in regard God's Goodness has furnish'd us with a Faculty of Suspending our Judgment in such Cases lest we
mistahen in Words of Art 5. Even in Terms of Art the Thing is chiefly signify'd 6. Metaphysical VVords not Unintelligible but most Clear 7. This Third Book concerning Words seems Unnecessary 8. VVhence J. S. is not much concern'd to reflect on it 9. Nature teaches us to define by a Genus and a Difference 10. Those who oppose this Method must be forced to use it 11. The Mind does not frame Universal Notions designedly but is forced to it by Nature 12. Nominal Essences Groundless and Catachrestical 13. Aristotle's Definition of Motion defended 14. Aristotle's Definition of Light most Proper 15. The Cartesian Definition of Motion Faulty 16. Individuums under the same Species differ Essentially 17. Whence we must take our Measures of Simple and Compound Notions 18. The same Rule holds in Accidents as well as in Substance 19. The Idea or Notion can never be in Fault when we Name Things wrong 20. Confused Notions may have more Distinct ones annex'd to their Subject 21. Coofused Notions do not exclude but include those Distinct ones which are yet Undiscover'd 22. We must not judge which Notions are Simple which Compounded from Clear or Obscure Appearances they make to our Fancy but from the Rule given above § 18 19. §23 Shewn hence because those Men conceit that Metaphysical Notions are Obscure whereas they are evidently the Clearest 24. Not the Design of avoiding Different Significations of Words but Plain Nature forces us to put Real Essences 25. VVords are not Ambiguous for want of Settled Standards in Nature 26. The Thing signify'd is not to be blam'd for the Abuse of VVords but their Ambiguity ill Contexture or Misapplication 27. Imperfect Knowers agree in the Thing and not in the Name only 28. The Knowing Things by Abstract Notions promotes and not hinders Science 29. By Mr. Locke's Principles there is no way to remedy the Abuses of VVords 30. Mr. Locke's Sentiment after all Ambiguous Reflexion Seventeenth §1 OF the Second Operation of our Understanding 2. Mr. Locke's Definition of Knowledge in many respects Faulty 3. Knowledge cannot consist in the Connexion or Disagreement of Ideas 4. The True Definition of Knowledge 5. Our Definition of Knowledge farther maintain'd 6. Hence there is but one sort of Connexion in which Knowledge consists viz. that of Co-existence 7. The Degrees of our Knowledge assign'd by Mr. Locke very Solid §8 Every Step we take in Demonstrative Knowledge or every Consequence must be grounded on Self-Evidence 9. The great Usefulness of this last Position 10. Scepticism and Dogmatism are both of them highly Prejudicial to Science 11. VVe have Sensitive Knowledge of other Notions besides Existence 12. Onely Principles and Demonstration and not Experiments can give us any Intelligible Explication of Natural Qualities 13. Short Hints of the true Aristotelian Grounds 14. How all Secondary Qualities come to be made 15. The Course of Nature is fundamentally built on on the Admission of Rarity and Density 16. That by these Grounds the Nature of Secondary Qualities is Demonstrable 17. The True Reason why some Men think them Inexplicable 18. The Possibility of Demonstrating them shewn by the Instance of Colour Reflexion Eighteenth §1 THE State of the Question §2 How we know the Things by Means of Ideas Inexplicable 3. The Ideists must be forc'd to grant that the Thing known is in the Mind 4. The Necessity of the Things being in our Mind farther enforced 5. Mathematical and Moral Knowledges are grounded on the Thing in the Mind 6. All Essential Predicates and Accidental ones too are truly the Thing and the whole Thing imply'd confusedly § 7. That our Complex Notions are Regular and Well-grounded Mr. Locke's not so 8. In what manner we compound such Notions 9. All Pleas fail the Ideists unless they perfectly distinguish Phantasms from Notions 10. Odd Miscarriages of Nature ought not to shock Natural Principles The Cartesians are concluded against by J. S. as well as other Ideists or rather more 11. All Truth consists in Joining or Separating Partial Conceptions of the Things and not in Joining or Separating Ideas 12. The Distinction of Truth into Mental and Verbal Extravagant and the Parts of it Co-incident Reflexion Nineteenth § 1. UNiversal Propositions in the Mind are easily Knowahle Antecedently to VVords 2. 'T is not necessary to know the precise Bounds and Extent of the Species 3. Unnecessary Knowledge not to be Coveted nor the VVant of it Complain'd of 4. The Nature and Use of General Maxims mistaken by Mr. Locke 5. The Terms of General Maxims Clearer than those of Particular Propositions 6. Such General Maxims are never used to deduce Conclusions from them but to reduce Inferiour Truths to them 7. The Absolute Necessity of First Principles Asserted 8. How other General Maxims do govern all our Actions and Sayings 9. The Discarding General Maxims destroys all Science This Errour springs from Men's taking Wrong Measures in judging what Notions are Clear and what Confused § 10. That not General Maxims but their Abuse breeds Danger to Science 11. His Instance that General Maxims are fit to prove Contradictions shews he quite mistakes the Notion of Body 12. Ideism is the Genuin Parent of Enthusiasm in Philosophy 13. Identical Propositions not to be ridicul'd 14. The Right Way how to use them and that Mr. Locke himself does and must rely upon them 15. Neither Ideas nor Names can be Predicate or Subject but the Thing it self as conceiv'd by us in whole or in part 16. Mr. Locke's new Instructive Way is utterly Insignificant 17. That the Signification of Words is the Meaning of them their Meaning is our Notion and our Notion is the Thing Reflexion Twensieth § 1. UNiversals must relate to the Existence they have in the Mind 2. To put any Knowledge in Brutes is against the Nature of Things and Implicatory 3. Mr. Locke confounds Material and Spiritual Natures 4. Mr. Locke's Principles confound Humane and Brutal Natures 5. To Create is the Peculiar Effect of Self-Existence 6. The Thought cannot move the Body and why §7 The Notion or Nature of the Deity being once setled to be Self-Existence all that can be said of it follows Demonstratively 8. We can know there are Angels tho they do not operate 〈◊〉 us 9. We know at first our own Existence in the same manner as we know the Existence of other Things i. e. by Sensation and not by Intuition 10. No Improvement of Science without some General Principles Mr. Locke's Principles examin'd 11. Mr. Locke's Main Principle which is to ascertain all other Principles Inevident 12. What Things hinder the Advancement of Science 13. Euclid and such others not blameable for laying Principles or General Maxims Reflexion Twenty First §1 THE Point stated §2 Mr. Locke confounds Outward Action to which we may proceed upon a Probability with Inward Assent to which we may not 3. A strange Character of our Judging Faculty 4. That God has provided due Motives of Enjoin'd Assent to all Mankind if
reflect on it Nature teaches us to define by a Genus and a Difference * B. 1. L. 3. § 2. Those who oppose this Method must be forced to use it The Mind does not frame Universal Notions designedly but as forced to it by Nature Nominal Essences Groundless and Catachrestical Aristotle's Definition of Motion defended * See Method to Science B. 1. L. 8. §. 2. Aristotle's Definition of Light most Proper The Cartesian Definition of Motion Faulty Individuums under the same Species differ essentially * B. 1. L. 3. § 11. Whence we must take our Measure of Simple and Compound Notions The same Rule holds in Accidents as well as Substance The Idea or Notion can never be in Fault when we Name things wrong Confused Notions may have more Distinct ones Annext to their Subject Confused Notions do not exclude but include those distinct ones which are yet Undiscover'd We must not judge which Notions are Simple which Compounded from the Clear or Obscure Appearances they make to our Fancy but from the Râ—le given above § 18 19. Shown hence because thâ—se Men conceit that Metaphysical Notions are Obscure whereas they are evidently the Clearest Not the Design of avoiding different Signification of Words but plain Nature forces us to â—put Real Essences Words are not Ambiguous for want of setled Standards in Nature The Thing signify'd is not to be blam'd for the Abuse of Words but their Ambiguity ill Contexture or Mis-application Imperfect Knowers agree in the Thing and not in the Name only The Knowing Things by Abstract Notions promotes and not hinders Science By Mr. Locke's Principles there is no Way to remedy the Abuse of Words Mr. Locke's Sentiments after all Ambiguous Of the Second Operation of our Understanding Mr. L.'s Definition of Knowledge in many respects Faulty Knowledge cannot consist in the Connexion or Disagreement of Ideas The true Definition of Knowledge Our Definition of Knowledge farther maintain'd Hence there is but One Sort of Connexion in which Knowledge consists viz. that of Co-existence The Degrees of our Knowledge assign'd by Mr. L. very Solid Every Step we take in Demonstrative Knowledge or every Consequence must be grounded on Self-evidence The great Usefulness of this last Position Scepticism and Dogmatism are both of them highly prejudicial to Science We have Sensitive Knowledge of other Notions besides Existence Onely Principles and Demonstration and not Experiments can give us any Intelligible Explication of Natural Qualities Short Hints of the true Aristotelian Grounds * See Method to Science B. 1. L. 3. § §. 1 2. How all Secondary Qualities come to be made The Course of Nature is fundamentally built on the Admission of Ratity and Density That by these Grounds the Nature of Secondary Qualities is Demonstrable The true Reason why some Men think them Inexplicable The Possibility of demonstrating them shewn by the Instance of Colour The State of the Question How we know the Things by means of Ideas Inexplicable The Ideists must be forced to grant that the Thing known is in the Mind The Necessity of the Thing 's being in our Mind farther inforced Mathematical and Moral Knowledges are grounded on the Thing in the Mind All Essential Predicates and Accidental ones too are truly the Thing and the whole Thing imply'd consusedly That our Complex Notions are Regular and well grounded Mr. L's not so In what manner we compound such Notions All Pleas fail the Ideists unless they perfectly distinguish Phantasms from Notions Odd Miscarriages of Nature ought not to shock Natural Principles Hence no Vacuum The Cartesians are concluded against by J. S. as well as other Ideists or rather more All Truth consists in Joining or Separating Partial Conceptions of the Things and not in Joining or Separating Ideas The Distinction of Truth into Mental and Verbal Extravagant and the Parts of it Coincident Universal Propositions in the Mind are easily Knowable Antecedently to Words 'T is not necessary to know the precise Bounds and Extent of the Species Unnecessary Knowledge not to be coveted nor the Want of it complain'd of The Nature and Use of General Maxims mistaken by Mr. Locke The Terms of General Maxims Clearer than those of Particular Propositions Such General Maxims are never used to deduce Conclusions from them but to reduce Inferiour Truths to them * Book 3. Less 4. The Absolute Necessity of First Principles Asserted How other General Maxims do govern all our Actions and Sayings The Discarding General Maxims destroys all Science This Errour springs from Men's taking wrong Measures in judging what Notions are Clear what Confused That not General Maxims but their Abuse breeds Danger to Science His Instance that General Maxims are fit to prove Contradictions shows he quite mistakes the Notion of Body Ideism is the Genuin Parent of Enthusiasm in Philosophy Identical Propositions not to be ridicul'd The right Way how to use them and that Mr. Locke himself does and must rely upon them See Meth. to Science B. a. L. 2. § 18 Neither Ideas nor Names can be Predicate or Subject but the Thing it self as conceived by us in whole or in part Mr. L.'s new Instructive Way is utterly Insignificant That the Signification of Words is the Meaning of them their Meaning is our Notion and our Notion is the Thing Universals mnst relate to the Existence they have in the Mind To put any Knowledge in Brutes is against the Nature of the Thing and Implicatory Mr. L. confound Material and Spiritual Natures Mr. L's Principles confound Human and Brutal Natures To create is the Peculiar Effect of Self-existence The Thought cannot move the Body and why See Method to Science Book 1. Less 5. §. 7. The Notion or Nature of the Deity being once settled to be Self-existence all that can be said of it follows Demonstratively We can know there are Angels tho' they do not operate'on us We know at first our own Existence in the same manner as we know the Existence of other Things i. e. by Sensation and not by Intuition See Method to Science Book 1. Less 8. §. 7. No Improvement of Science without fome General Principle Mr. Locke's Principles examin'd Mr. Locke's main Principle which is to ascertain all other Principles Inevident What Things hinder the Advancement of Science Euclid and such others not blameable for laying Principles or General Maxims The Point stated Mr. L. confounds Outward Action to which we may proceed upon a Probability with Inward Assent to which we may not A strange Character of our Judging Faculty That God has provided due Motives of Enjoin'd Assent to all Mankind if they be not wanting to themselves * See Method to Science B. 3. L. 8. To assent upon a Probability is against the Commonest Light of Reason There cannot be in proper Speech any Degrees of Assent Probable Assent is Nonsense or Impertinent What kinds of Distinctions are Disallowable in Disputation Charity to Sincere and Weak Misunderstanders is a Christian Duty Tradition built on meer Hearsay has little or no Force A more Firm Assent is due to Points certainly known to be Reveal'd than to Scientifical Conclusions How Syllogisms came to be invented at first The True Use and Abuse of them Objections against Syllogistick Arguing clear'd Syllogisms are useful for Demonstration Syllogisms are of no use in Probable Discourses Other Mistakes about Syllogism Clear'd Inferences and Consequences of Words abstracting from their Sense is strangely against all Reason and Preposterous What is due to Reason what to Divine Revelation The First Caution to be observ'd in order to this Point The second Caution to be used in this Point Reason is not to be rely'd on in things beyond its Sphere The Notion of is True must be distinguish'd from the Notion of may be true or may not be true Therefore that no Assent ought to be built on Probable Mediums is Demonstrable All Errour comes by Assenting upon Probability The Tenet that we ought to Assent upon Probability is highly prejudicial to Piety and to best Christian Morality To apply our selves to the Right Method to find out Truth and Science is the onely Antidote against Errour No possible Way or Certain Standard to take the Just Measures of Probabilities The Certain Rule not to be mis-led by Authority Mr. Locke seems to take someThings for onely Probable which or the Authority for them are Demonstrable The Members of Mr. Locke's Division of Sciences are partly Co-incident partly not belonging to Science at all The Connatural way how Sciences are to be Divided and Subordinated Some very Useful Corollaries concerning that Subject