at the same time have Leisure enough to run into other Matters about which there may be more Colour for Cavilling So that this cannot be the true Reason and I leave the Reader to judge what it is The last thing is the point of Reason and here he finds Leisure enough to expatiate But I shall keep to that point upon which he supposes the whole Controversie to turn which is whether the difference between Nature and Person which we observe in Mankind do so far hold with respect to the Divine Nature that it is a Contradiction to say there are three Persons and not three Gods And there are several things I proposed in order to the clearing of this Matter which I shall endeavour to lay down as distinctly as I can and I shall not be Hector'd or Banter'd out of that which I account the most proper Method although it happen to be too obscure for our Men of Wit to understand without Hazard of their Iaws The Principles or Suppositions I lay down are these I. Nature is One and Indivisible in it self whereever it is II. The more perfect any Nature is the more perfect must its Unity be III. Whatever is affirmed of a most perfect Being must be understood in a way agreeable to its Perfection IV. It is repugnant to the Perfection of the divine Nature to be multiplied into such Individuals as are among Men because it argues such a dependence and separation as is inconsistent with the most perfect Unity V. To suppose three distinct Persons in one and the same Indivisible Divine Nature is not repugnant to the Divine Perfections if they be founded on such relative Properties which cannot be confounded with each other and be in themselves agreeable to the Divine Nature VI. Whether there be three such distinct Persons or not is not to be drawn from our own Imaginations or Similitudes in created Beings but only from the Word of God from whom alone the Knowledge of it can be communicated to Mankind Let us now see how he proves that since there is no Contradiction for three Persons to be in one common human Nature it must be a Contradiction to assert three Persons in the same divine Nature He offers at no less than demonstrative Reason p. 58. c. 2. but I have always had the most cause to fear the Men that pretend to Infallibility and Demonstration I pass over his Mysterious Boxes as Trifles fit only to entertain his Men of Wit and come immediately to his demonstrative Reason is it be to be met with It comes at last to no more than this that Human Nature and Angelical Nature and Camel Nature have no Existence but only in our Conception and are only Notions of our Minds but the Persons in the same rational Being are not mere Metaphysical Persons or Relative Properties but they are such as necessarily suppose distinct Substances as well as distinct Properties But in the Trinity the Nature is a really existing Nature 't is a Spiritual Substance and endued with a great number of Divine Attributes not an abstracted or mere notional imaginary Nature and the Divine Persons are not distinct Substances or real Beings but Properties only in a real Being and in an infinite Substance This is the force of the Demonstration But now if I can make it appear that every Nature is not only One and Indivisible in it self but endued with Essential Attributes and Properties belonging to it as such then it will be evident that Nature is not a mere Abstracted Notion of our Minds but something which really exists somewhere and then the Foundation of this demonstrative Reason is taken away And I appeal to any Persons that consider things whether the Human Angelical and Camel Nature as he calls it do not really differ from each other and have such Essential Properties belonging to them as cannot agree to any other Nature For else it must be a mere Notion and Fiction of the Mind to make any real difference between them But if Human Nature and Camel Nature do essentially differ from each other then every Nature hath its Essential Unity and Properties which cannot belong to any other and that without any act of our Minds And if every Nature is really and essentially different from another it must have an Existence somewhere independent on our Notions and Conceptions It may be said That no such Nature doth really exist by it self but only in the several Individuals But that is not the present Question where or how it exists but whether it depend only on our Imaginations or the acts of our Minds and if it doth so then there can be no real and essential Difference in the Natures of Men and Beast which I think none who have the Understanding of a Man can imagine But really existing Natures he saith are in such Persons as necessarily suppose distinct Substances as well as distinct Properties and if they existed only in a common Nature as the Humanity and had not also distinct Substances they would never make distinct Persons I do allow that in created and dependent Beings there must be distinct Substances to make distinct Persons but he ought to have given an account what that is which makes distinct Persons ' necessarily to suppose distinct Substances For the Nature is One and Indivisible in them all or else every Individual must make a new Species which is an Absurdity I suppose he will not be fond of If there be then one and the same Nature in the Individuals whence comes the difference of Substances to be so necessarily supposed If it be from Diversity Dissimilitude Dependence and separate Existence as I asserted then these Reasons can hold only in created Beings and where they cannot hold as in the Divine Nature why may there not be a distinction of Persons founded on relative Properties without any distinction of Substances which is repugnant to the perfect Unity of the Godhead What demonstrative Reason nay what probable Argument hath he offer'd against this He takes notice p. 60. of what I had said about the distinction of Personality and Person and that Personality is originally only a particular Mode of Subsistence and a Person besides the relative Property takes in the divine Nature together with it And what Demonstration have we against this So far from it that he falls to Tristing again to keep his Men of Wit in good Humour So much for Madam Personality now for Sir Person Is this a decent way of Writing about these Matters to begin with the Talk of demonstrative Reason and to end with Burlesquing and turning them into Ridicule If this be an agreeable Entertainment for his Men of Wit it shews that they deserve that Character as well as he doth that of a Demonstrator But this sportfull Gentleman hath found something else to play with viz. that my Notion of three Subsistences without three Substances is really nothing but Sabellianism But I had already said
THE Bishop of Worcester's ANSWER TO Mr. Locke's Letter Concerning Some PASSAGES Relating to his ESSAY OF Humane Understanding Mention'd in the late Discourse in Vindication of the Trinity With a POSTSCRIPT in answer to some Reflections made on that Treatise in a late Socinian Pamphlet LONDON Printed by I. H. for Henry Mortlock at the Phoenix in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1697. THE Bishop of Worcester's Answer TO Mr. Locke's Letter c. SIR I Have seriously consider'd the Letter you were pleased to send me and I find it made up of two Parts A Complaint of me and a Vindication of your self To both which I shall return as clear and distinct on Answer and in as few words as the matter will permit 1. As to the Complaint of me it runs quite through the Book and even your Postscript is full of it The substance of it is that in answering Objections against the Trinity in point of Reason I produce several Passages out of your Essay of Humane Vnderstanding as if they were intended by you to that Purpose but you declare to the World p. 150. that it was written by you without any Thought of the Controversie between the Trinitarians and Unitarians and p. 224. That your Notions about Ideas have no Connexion with any Objections that are made by others against the Doctrine of the Trinity or against Mysteries And therefore you complain of it as an Injury done to you in imputing that to you which you have not done p. 95. or at least in leaving it so doubtfull that the Reader cannot distinguish who is meant p. 96. and this you call my peculiar way of Writing in this part of my Treatise Now to give you and others satisfaction as to this matter I shall first give an account of the Occasion of it and then shew what Care I took to prevent Misunderstanding about it The Occasion was this Being to answer the Objections in Point of Reason which had not been answered before the first I mention'd was That it was above Reason and therefore not to be believed in answer to this I proposed two Things to be consider'd 1. What we understand by Reason 2. What Ground in Reason there is to reject any Doctrine above it when it is proposed as a matter of Faith As to the former I observ'd that the Vnitarians in their late Pamphlets talk'd very much of clear and distinct Ideas and Perceptions and that the Mysteries of Faith were repugnant to them but never went about to state the Nature and Bounds of Reason in such a manner as those ought to have done who make it the Rule and Standard of what they are to believe But I added that a late Author in a Book call'd Christianity not Mysterious had taken upon him to clear this Matter whom for that cause I was bound to consider the design of his Discourse related wholly to Matters of Faith and not to Philosophical Speculations so that there can be no Dispute about his Application of those he calls Principles of Reason and Certainty When the Mind makes use of intermediate Ideas to discover the Agreement or Disagreement of the Ideas received into them this Method of Knowledge he saith is properly called Reason or Demonstration The Mind as he goes on receives Ideas two ways 1. By Intromission of the Senses 2. By considering its own Operations And these simple and distinct Ideas are the sole Matter and Foundation of all our Reasoning And so all our Certainty is resolved into two things either immediate Perception which is self-Evidence or the use of intermediate Ideas which discovers the Certainty of any thing dubious which is what he calls Reason Now this I said did suppose That we must have clear and distinct Ideas of what-ever we pretend to any Certainty of in our minds by Reason and that the only way to attain this Certainty is by comparing these Ideas together which excludes all Certainty of Faith or Reason where we cannot have such clear and distinct Ideas From hence I proceeded to shew that we could not have such clear and distinct Ideas as were necessary in the present Debate either by Sensation or Reflection and consequently we could not attain to any Certainty about it for which I instanced in the Nature of Substance and Person and the Distinction between them And by vertue of these Principles I said That I did not wonder that the Gentlemen of this new way of Reasoning had almost discarded Substance out of the Reasonable Part of the World Which Expression you tell me you do not understand But if you had pleased to have look'd back on the Words just before a Person of your Sagacity could not have missed the Meaning I intended Which are Now this is the case of Substance it is not intromitted by the Senses nor depends upon the Operations of the Mind and cannot be within the compass of our Reason But you say That if I mean that you deny or doubt that there is in the World any such thing as Substance I shall acquit you of it if I look into some Passages in your Book which you refer to But this is not the point before us whether you do own Substance or not but whether by vertue of these Principles you can come to any Certainty of Reason about it And I say the very places you produce do prove the contrary which I shall therefore set down in your own Words both as to Corporeal and Spiritual Substances When we talk or think of any particular sort of Corporeal Substance as Horse Stone c. tho' the Idea we have of either of them be but the Complication or Collection of those several simple Ideas of sensible Qualities which we use to find united in the thing called Horse or Stone yet because we cannot conceive how they should subsist alone or one in another we suppose them existing in and supported by some common subject which Support we denote by the name Substance tho' it be certain we have no clear or distinct Idea of that thing we suppose a Support The same happens concerning Operations of the Mind viz. Thinking Reasoning c. which we considering not to subsist of themselves nor apprehending how they can belong to Body or be produced by it we are apt to think these the Actions of some other Substance which we call Spirit whereby yet it is evident that having no other Notion or Idea of Matter but something wherein those many sensible Qualities which affect our Senses do subsist by supposing a Substance wherein Thinking Knowing Doubting and a Power of Moving c. do subsist we have as clear a Notion of the Nature or Substance of Spirit as we have of Body the one being supposed to be without knowing what it is the Substratum to those simple Ideas we have from without and the other supposed with a like Ignorance of what it is to be the Substratum to those Operations which we experiment in
Particulars you express it in 1. That your Meaning was to signifie all those Complex Ideas of Modes Relations and specifick Substances which the Mind forms out of simple Ideas So that these Ideas are allowed by you although they come not by Sensation or Reflection But is not the Notion of particular Substances a Complex Idea because it is a Complication of simple Ideas as will presently appear from your own words but all simple Ideas come in by Sensation and Reflection But you may say the Combination of them to make one Idea is an Act of the Mind and so this Idea is not from Sensation or Reflection It seems then the Mind hath a Power to form one Complex Idea out of many simple ones and this makes a true Idea of a particular Substance not coming in by Sensation or Reflection But I am still to seek how this comes to make an Idea of Substance I understand it very well to be a Complex Idea of so many Accidents put together but I cannot understand how a Complex Idea of Accidents should make an Idea of Substance And till you do this you are as far as ever from a true Idea of Substance notwithstanding your Complex Ideas 2. You never said that the general Idea of Substance comes in by Sensation or Reflection And if there be any Expressions that seem to assert it to be by a Complication of simple Ideas and not by Abstracting and Inlarging them because we accustom our selves to suppose a Substratum it ought to be look'd on as a slip of the Pen or a Negligence of Expression In which Cases I think no Man ought to be severe But was there not too much occasion given for others to think that the Idea of particular Substance was only a Complication of simple Ideas and because all simple Ideas do come in you say only by Sensation and Reflection therefore all the Ideas of particular Substance which is but a Complication of them must either come in those ways or else we can have no true Idea of particular Substance at all So that there are Two things wherein you are very far from giving Satisfaction 1. That although you say That the Idea of Substance in general is made by Abstraction yet you add That all the Ideas we have of particular distinct Substances are nothing but several Combinations of simple Ideas From whence it is plain that according to your repeated Assertions we can have no Idea of particular and distinct Substances but what is made up of a Complication of simple Ideas and although there may be some abstracted Notion or general Idea of Substance which is only an act of the Mind yet there is no real Idea of any particular Substance but what is a Complication of simple Ideas And that a Man hath no other Idea of any Substance let it be Gold or Horse Iron Man Vitriol Bread but what he has barely of those sensible Qualities which he supposes to inhere with a supposition of such a Substratum as gives as it were a support to those Qualities or simple Ideas which he has observed to exist united together These are your own words and what can the meaning of them be but that we neither have nor can have any Idea of a particular Substance but only with respect to the simple Ideas which make it up and these being sensible Qualities there is no such thing as an Idea of Substance but only a supposition of a Substratum to support Accidents 2. That although the Idea of Substance be made doubtfull by attributing it only to our accustoming our selves to suppose some Substratum yet the Being of Substance is not How is this possible Is not the Being doubtfull if the Idea be and all our Certainty come in by Ideas No say you the Being would not be shaken if we had no Idea of Substance at all What! not as to our Knowledge But you say there are many things in Nature of which we have no Ideas And can we have any Certainty of Reason as to those things For about that our debate is viz. What Certainty we can have as to Substance if we can have no Idea of it So that the Being of Substance on these Principles is far from being safe and secure as to us when we have so lame an account of the Idea of it But you have yet a farther distinction to bring off the Idea of Substance for you say 3. That the Idea of Substance is a Relative Idea For the mind can frame to it self Ideas of Relation and perceiving that Accidents cannot subsist of themselves but have a necessary Connexion with Inherence or being supported which being a Relative Idea it frames the Correlative of a Support which is Substance And now I think we have all that is said in Defence of the Idea of Substance viz. That there is a Complex Abstracted and Relative Idea of it which is derived from the simple Ideas got by Sensation or Reflection But this Relative Abstracted Idea is confessed to be an obscure indistinct vague Idea of Thing or Something and is all that is left to be the positive Idea which hath the Relation of a Support or Substratum to Modes or Accidents And that what Idea we have of particular and distinct Substances is nothing but a Complication of simple Ideas with the supposition of a Substratum or Support These being the Concessions and Distinctions you make in this Matter I must now return to the Occasion of this Debate which was whether the ground of our Certainty as to the Nature of Substance can be resolved into the simple Ideas we receive in by Sensation or Reflection The question is not Whether you doubt or deny any such Being as Substance in the World nor whether the Notion you have of it be clear and distinct for you confess it is not but the point in debate is What Certainty we can have of the Nature of Substance from the simple Ideas we have by Sensation or Reflection And here the question is not Whether the mind cannot form Complex and Abstracted general Ideas from those simple Ideas But whether those simple Ideas are the Foundation of our Knowledge and Certainty as to the Nature of Substance For you affirm over and over if I may have leave to say so That the simple Ideas we have by Sensation and Reflection are the Foundation of all our Knowledge And yet that the Ideas we have of particular distinct Substances are nothing but several Combinations of simple Ideas of Accidents Which being supposed I think it no hard matter to make it appear that we cannot come to any Certainty as to the Nature of Substance in this way of Ideas For 1. The simple Ideas afford no ground of Certainty any farther than as to themselves Outward Objects make an impression on our Senses and all the Certainty we have by them is that our Senses are so and
particular Substance a Complication of many simple Ideas for if it be so how could a Complication of simple Ideas which cannot subsist by themselves make the Idea of a Substance which doth subsist by it self This looks a little untowardly in the way of Knowledge and Certainty But there is no help for it a Substratum must be supposed to support these unlucky Accidents Let it be so then How came we to know that these Accidents were such feeble things What simple Ideas inform'd you of it If none then it is to be hoped there is some other way to attain Knowledge and Certainty in this matter No you tell me there is no need of any other way but this of Ideas How so Your words are these The general indetermined Idea of Something is by the Abstraction of the mind derived also from the simple Ideas of Sensation and Reflection But alas We are not upon the general indetermined Idea of something but upon the particular Idea of distinct Substances which is granted not to be by Abstraction but by a Complication of simple Ideas So that this is quite off from the matter But as to your general abstracted Idea I have something farther to say 4. A general Abstracted Idea of Substance is no real Substance nor a true Idea of one if particular Substances be nothing but a Complication of simple Ideas For you say That the Mind by Abstraction from the positive simple Ideas got by Sensation or Reflection comes to the general Relative Idea of Substance If then the general Idea be raised from the simple Ideas and those simple Ideas make that of particular and distinct Substances only by Complication then the general Idea of Substance can be nothing but an Abstracted Complication of these simple Ideas or else it is not by Abstraction from the simple Ideas But I do not deny that there is a general Nature of Substance which is as real as a general Idea can be and it is that which makes any particular Substance be what it is in its own Nature without respect to Individual Modes and Properties And although this general Substance doth not exist of it self yet it doth really exist in the several Individuals that belong to its kind and the several kinds of particular Substances are really distinguished from each other not merely by simple Ideas of sensible Qualities but by their inward Frame and Constitution as the Substance of a Man is from that of a Horse or a Tree For it is ridiculous to imagine that these really differ from each other only as Individuals of the same sort under the general Abstracted Idea of Substance And if there be Substances of several kinds really different from each other an account must be given not only of the general Notion of a Substratum for Accidents but of the specifick Nature of different Substances and wherein the difference of the unknown Support lies as to the Modes and Accidents of their kinds which I despair of ever seeing done by the simple Ideas of Sensation and Reflection And your self confess That we have no Idea of Abstract Substance and that by the Complex Idea of sensible Qualities we are as far from the Idea of the Substance of Body as if we knew nothing at all And now I freely leave the Reader to judge whether this be a tolerable Account of the Idea of Substance by Sensation or Reflection and whether I deserve so much to be complained of for exposing the unreasonableness of laying the Foundation of all our Certainty and Knowledge upon simple Ideas which we receive by Sensation or Reflection But before I proceed further it will be proper here to take notice how you justifie your Idea of Substance from the Etymology of the Word which say you is standing under or upholding I told you very little weight is to be laid on a bare Grammatical Etymology when the Word is otherwise used by the best Authors for the Essence of a thing and I named Cicero and Quinctilian and the Greek Word imports the same But still you say it is derived à substando and you tell us your opinion That if we knew the Original of Words we should be much helped to the Ideas they were first applied to and made to stand for If you mean the true Ideas of them I must beg leave to differ in my opinion and my Reason is this because Words were used before men came to form Philosophical Notions or Ideas of Things and therefore they were forced to make use of Words applied in another Sense or else to coin Words on purpose to express their own as Cicero often doth as Qualities Evidence Comprehension c. So that if substare were used in another Sense before it doth not follow that it ought to be so when we enquire into the true Ideas of Things But one of the best Criticks of the Latin Tongue in our Age hath told us that substantia is so called quia per se substat And substare is used by Terence not for standing under but for being stedfast Metuo ut substet hospes But as to your general Observation I think there are very few Words used in the Philosophical Language of the Romans but what were taken off from the original Sense they were applied to as Persona was first taken for a Man in Masquerade Genus for a Pedegree Species for a Sight from Specio to see Virtus for manly Courage and distinguish'd from Probity Sit virtus etiam non Probitate minor Ovid. de Pont. l. 3. And so Anima was first taken for the Breath in the Body as well as Spiritus Thence Varro saith Their Ancestors although they eat Leeks and Onions yet were bene animati had no ill Breath and thence Animam agere and efflare saith Cicero and from Anima he saith came Animus by which they understood the Mind Hinc Animus ad intelligentiam tributus saith Varro and many others of a like Nature But I shall only add one more and that is the Name of Idea so very often used by your self and others of late I wish we had been told the original use of it and how it was first applied that we might better judge of the true meaning of it now when so much Weight is laid upon it I find in Thucydides who was an accurate Writer and understood the true Sense of Words that an Idea is used by him for an Appearance and Shew without Reality as when he saith That the Athenians in dealing with the Sicilians made use of the same Idea which they had done before Where it can signifie nothing but what he calls before a Pretence But when the Philosophers came to use this Word they applied it to another Sense Plato made use of it to signifie the true Exemplars or Models of Things according to which the several sorts of them were framed and distinguished This Notion he had as many others from the
it and I am certain you do not think he hath promoted the great Ends of Religion and Morality I shall now proceed to consider the Arguments for proving a Supream Immaterial Substance which you freely allow to be so And my Design as I said was to shew that the certainty of it is not placed upon any clear and distinct Ideas but upon the force of Reason distinct from it To this you answer That Knowledge and Certainty in your Opinion lies in the Preception of the Agreement or Disagreement of Ideas such as they are and not always in having perfectly clear and distinct Ideas But those who offer at clear and distinct Ideas bid much fairer for Certainty than you do and speak more agreeably to your original grounds of Certainty For your Relative Idea which you here run to again is no certainty at all from the Idea but from the plain Evidence of Reason that Accidents cannot support themselves I pass over all which I think I have sufficiently answered already as when you spend so many Pages about my using the Plural Number when your words are only mentioned c. But I shall pass over nothing which may seem to an indifferent Reader to require any farther Consideration Whether you took this way of Ideas from the Modern Philosopher mentioned by you is not at all material but I intended no Reflection upon you in it for that you mean by my commending you as a Scholar of so great a Master I never meant to take from you the Honour of your own Inventions and I do believe you when you say That you wrote from your own Thoughts and the Ideas you had there But many things may seem New to one that converses only with his own Thoughts which really are not so as he may find when he looks into the Thoughts of other Men which appear in their Books And therefore although I have a just Esteem for the Invention of such who can spin Volumes barely out of their own Thoughts yet I am apt to think they would oblige the World more if after they have thought so much themselves they would examine what thoughts others have had before them concerning the same things that so those may not be thought their own Inventions which are common to themselves and others If a man should try all the Magnetical Experiments himself and publish them as his own Thoughts he might take himself to be the Inventor of them but he that examines and compares them with what Gilbert and others have done before him will not diminish the Praise of his Diligence but may wish he had compared his Thoughts with other Mens by which the World would receive greater Advantage altho' he lost the Honour of being an Original The Matter of Certainty you say one cannot imploy too many Thoughts about viz. as to the finding the true Grounds of it or wherein it is placed This I was led to consider by our Vnitarians placing it in clear and distinct Ideas and therefore rejecting the Mysteries of Faith because they could not have clear and distinct Ideas of them And one wrote purposely to shew that we were not to believe any Mysteries in the Gospel because all our Certainty depended upon the Preception of the Agreement or Disagreement of those simple Ideas which we have by Sensation or Reflection Now if these Principles of Certainty hold good as to all Propositions we can have no Certainty of Faith where we cannot perceive the Connexion of the Ideas contained in them I own that you say That Faith is an Assent to any Proposition not made out by any Deductions of Reason but upon the Credit of the Proposer But this doth not clear the matter for is Faith an Vnreasonable Act Is it not an Assent to a Proposition Then if all certainty in Acts of Reason be derived from the perceiving the Agreement or Disagreement of the Ideas contained in it either there can be no Certainty of the Reasonable Act of Faith or the Grounds of Certainty must be laid some other way But you say Where you want Evidence of things there is yet Ground enough for you to believe because God hath said it Which doth not yet remove the Difficulty from the true Ground of Certainty for say they Revelation is but a means of Information and God discovers by that such Propositions which we could not have found out without Revelation but where-ever Propositions are offered to our Vnderstandings we must judge of them by our Perception of the Agreement and Disagreement of the Ideas contained in them And Faith doth not overthrow Nature If therefore the Nature of Certainty lies herein we cannot be certain without it Is it not enough for you to disown the Consequence but to shew that it doth not follow from your Principles of Certainty But of this I have spoken already and I love not Repetitions I only take notice that you Assert and hold to the same I stick to my own plain way of Certainty by Ideas And so do those who reject the Mysteries of Faith because not agreeable to their Ideas and think they proceed upon your Grounds But you say That according to my Rules you know not where to place Certainty for in the Account I give of Des Cartes I have these words concerning him The first thing he found any Certainty in was his own Existence which he founded upon the Perception of the Acts of his Mind From hence he proceeded to enquire how he came by this Certainty and he resolved it into this that he had a clear and distinct Preception of it And from hence he formed his general Rule that what he had a clear and distinct Perception of was true Which in Reason ought to go on farther than where there is the like Degree of Evidence for the Certainty was not grounded on the clearness of the Perception but on the plainness of the Evidence Which is of that nature that the very doubting of it proves it since it is impossible that any thing should doubt or question its own being that had it not So that here it is not the clearness of the Idea but an immediate Act of Perception which is the true ground of Certainty And this cannot extend to things without our selves of which we can have no other Perception than what is caused by the Impression of outward Objects But whether we are to judge according to those Impressions doth not depend on the Ideas themselves but upon the Exercise of our Judgment and Reason about them which put the difference between true and false and adequate and inadequate Ideas so that our Certainty is not from the Ideas themselves but from the Evidence of Reason that those Ideas are true and just and consequently that we may build our Certainty upon them These I acknowledge to be my words and yet I see no Reason why I may not stick to them But you say
by what means now doth this Connexion between these two Ideas appear By the help of an Intermediate Idea What is that Even the Idea of Matter How so The Idea of Matter you tell us implies its Actual Division Divisibility and want of Perception c. which are the Arguments you use in this Proof Are they so indeed And will not the same Ideas prove our Souls to be Immaterial If want of Perception be in the very Idea of Matter how can Matter be made capable of Perceiving But I find you do not always attend to the Agreement or Disagreement of your own Ideas But of this before I proceed to the last Argument I produced to shew that your Proofs of the Existence of God doth not depend upon Ideas And the Substance of it I thus put together If we suppose nothing to be first Matter can never begin to be is bare Matter without Motion be Eternal Motion can never begin to be if Matter and Motion be supposed Eternal Thought can never begin to be For if Matter could produce Thought then Thought must be in the Power of Matter and if it be in Matter as such it must be the inseparable Property of all Matter which is contrary to the Sense and Experience of Mankind If only some Parts of Matter have a Power of Thinking how comes so great a difference in the Properties of the same Matter What Disposition of Matter is requir'd to Thinking And from whence comes it Of which no account can be given in Reason This I took to be the Force of your Argument which I said I was far from designing to weaken Only I observed that the Certainty of it is not placed upon clear and distinct Ideas but upon Reason distinct from it which was the Thing I intended to prove But you say You do not see but the same proof may be placed upon clear and distinct Ideas and upon Reason too I hope this matter is made a little clearer to you having so fully shew'd to you before that in the way of Ideas you can come to no Certainty about any Substance but by Reason as it is distinct from the Ideas i. e. as to Material Substances that your Certainty is resolved into this Principle of Reason that Accidents cannot subsist without a Substratum As to Spiritual Substance in us that depends on two things 1. That Thinking is only a Mode and must suppose a Substance 2. That Matter cannot think and therefore it must be an Immaterial Substance which I have proved from your own Principles As to a Supreme Immaterial Substance the evidence depends upon this Reason that Matter and Motion cannot produce Thought and therefore an Eternal Thinking Being must be Immaterial And that Matter and Motion cannot produce Thought is proved by this Reason that either it must be an inseparable Property of Matter or some account in Reason must be given why some part of Matter should think and not others And doth not all this proceed upon Reason as distinct from Ideas And when I said That the Certainty of it i. e. the Argument is not placed on clear and distinct Ideas but upon the force of Reason distinct from it I meant the Certainty from ideas although it were not so clearly expressed as it might have been but here I observe you call for the Plural Number which you are so offended with in other Parts of your Letter The next thing I undertook to shew was that we can have no clear and distinct Idea of Nature and Person from Sensation or Reflection Here you spend many Pages to shew that this doth not concern you Let it be so But it concerns the Matter I was upon which was to shew that we must have Ideas of these things which we cannot come to by Sensation or Reflection My words are I grant that by Sensation or Reflection we come to know the Powers and Properties of Things But our Reason is satisfied that there must be something beyond these because it is impossible that they should subsist by themselves So that the Nature of things properly belongs to our Reason and not to mere Ideas Still you are at it That you can find no Opposition between Ideas and Reason but Ideas are the Objects of the Vnderstanding and Vnderstanding is one of the Faculties imploy'd about them No doubt of it But you might easily see that by Reason I understood Principles of Reason allow'd by Mankind Which I think are very different from Ideas But I perceive Reason in this Sense is a thing you have no Idea of or one as obscure as that of Substance But if you set aside these common Principles of Reason your Ideas will signifie very little and will like Accidents want a Substratum to support them But your Notion of Nature and Person deserves to be more throughly consider'd Therefore to proceed more clearly in a debate of this Consequence with respect to the Doctrine of the Trinity what-ever you pretend to the contrary I shall first set down your Notions of Nature and Person from your own Words and then enter upon the Examination of them As to Nature you tell me in short it is this That it is a Collection of several Ideas combined into one Complex Abstract Idea Which when they are found united in any Individual Existing though joyned in that Existence with several other Ideas that Individual is truly said to have the Nature of a Man or the Nature of Man to be in him for as much as all these simple Ideas are found united in him which answer the Complex Abstract Idea to which the specifick name Man is given by any one which Abstract Specifick Idea keeps the same when he applies the Specifick Name standing for it to distinct Individuals i. e. no body changes his Idea of a Man when he says Peter is a Man from that Idea which he makes the Name Man to stand for when he makes John a Man As to Person in the way of Ideas you tell us That the Word Person in it self signifies nothing and so no Idea belonging to it nothing can be said to be the true Idea of it but when any Language appropriates it to any Idea then that is the true Idea of a Person and so of Nature These are therefore the signs of two Ideas they are put to stand for and by enumeration all the simple Ideas that are contained in the Complex Idea that each of them is made to stand for we shall immediately see the whole difference that is between them After which you conclude That you must content your self with this condemned way of Ideas and despair of ever attaining any Knowledge by any other than that or farther than that will lead you to it But this must not hinder me from enquiring a little more strictly into these Notions of Nature and Person for if these hold I do not see how it is possible to defend the Doctrine of the
Trinity For if these terms really signifie nothing in themselves but are only Abstract and Complex Ideas which the common use of Language hath appropriated to be the signs of two Ideas then it is plain that they are only Notions of the Mind as all Abstracted and Complex Ideas are and so one Nature and three Persons can be no more We must therefore examine what your Notion is of Abstracted and Complex Ideas and how it can be applied to Nature and Person and whether they are only signs of such Ideas as People have agreed to signifie by them To explain this I must give an account as well as I can from your self how these Abstracted and Complex Ideas come to be formed in our Minds and what is implied in them The Vnderstanding you say seems to you not to have the least glimmering of any Ideas which it hath not by Sensation or Reflection These and their several Modes and the Compositions made out of them we shall find contain our whole stock of Ideas and that we have nothing in our Minds which did not come in one of these two ways From hence you consider the several sorts of Ideas some Simple and some Complex The simple Ideas are the Materials of all our Knowledge and when the Vnderstanding is once stored with these simple Ideas it has the Power to repeat compare and unite them even to an almost infinite variety and so can make at pleasure new Complex Ideas But no understanding can make one new simple Idea not taken in by the ways before mention'd nor can it destroy those that are there After you have given an account of the simple Ideas both ways you come to the Faculty of Discerning in our Minds and there you reckon up Distinguishing Ideas Comparing Compounding and Abstracting The Reason of Abstraction you say is to have one general Name for many Particulars or else Names would be endless Which Abstraction is performed by separating the Ideas of particular Objects from the Circumstances of real Existence as Time Place c. Complex Ideas are those simple Ideas which the Mind unites as one Idea But still it is confin'd to those simple Ideas which it received by Sensation or Reflection which are the ultimate Materials of all its Compositions Of these you reckon Modes Substances and Relations The Ideas of Substances are such Combinations of simple Ideas as are taken to represent particular things subsisting by themselves And these are of two sorts one of single Substances as they exist separately as of a Man c. the other of several of these put together as an Army of Men. In your Chapter of Complex Ideas of Substances you affirm the Ideas of particular Substances to be made by a Combination of simple Ideas and again that it is by such Combination of simple Ideas as co-exist in some unknown cause of their Vnion That the Complex Ideas we have of God and separate Spirits are made up of the simple Ideas we have by Reflection by inlarging the Ideas we find in our selves In your 3d Book you consider general Terms And the Reason of them you say is because it is beyond the power of Human Capacity to frame and retain distinct Ideas of all Particulars And these are made by way of Abstraction from Circumstances of Time and Place After which you tell us That General Natures are nothing but Abstract Ideas and the whole Mystery of Genera and Species which make such a noise in the Schools is nothing else but Abstract Ideas with Names annexed to them From whence you say it is plain that General and Vniversal belong not to the real Existence of Things but are the Inventions and Creatures of the Vnderstanding made by it for its own use and concern only Signs whether Words or Ideas And the Abstract Idea and the Essence of the Species or Genus of the same thing and every distinct abstract Idea is a distinct Essence But then you distinguish the Real and Nominal Essence The former is the Real Internal Constitution of particular things and the Nominal is the Abstract Idea But there is so near a Connexion between them that the Name cannot be attributed to any particular Being but what has this Essence whereby it answers that Abstract Idea whereof that Name is the Sign These things you repeat and inlarge upon in several other places but this I think is the substance of what you say upon this matter For I would not willingly mistake or mis-represent your Meaning The Question now between us comes to this Whether the common Nature or Essence of Things lies only in an Abstract Idea or a General Name and the Real Essence consists only in particular Beings from which that Name is abstracted The Question is not Whether in forming the Notion of Common Nature the Mind doth not abstract from the Circumstances of particular Beings But it is whether there be not an Antecedent Foundation in the Nature of things upon which we form this Abstract Idea For it there be then it cannot be called an universal Name only or a meer sign of an Idea which we have formed from putting many simple Ideas together which Name belongs to all of such a sort as have those simple Ideas united together I know not how it comes to pass that a Man spinning Books out of his own Thoughts should hit so luckily upon the Thoughts of another Man I do not mean now about clear and distinct Ideas but about this Point of universal Names For Mr. Hobbs in his Chapter of Speech tell us That Names were to serve for Marks or Notes of Remembrance and therefore were called Signs Of these Names some are proper and singular to one thing as Peter John this Man this Tree some are common to many things as Man Horse Tree in respect of all which it is called an Vniversal there being nothing in the World Vniversal but Names for the things nam'd are every one of them individual and singular One universal Name is imposed on many things for their similitude in some Quality or other Accident and whereas a proper Name bringeth to mind one thing only Vniversals recall any one of those many And of Vniversals some are of more or less Extent the larger comprehending the less large and some of equal extent c. This is enough to let you see that these Notions are not so peculiar but that another Person from his own Thoughts too had said much the same things But whoever said or thought them first we must examine how reasonable these Thoughts are I know no Body that thinks now-a-days that Vniversals exist any where by themselves but I do think that there is a difference to be made between that and making them meer Names or signs of Ideas I. And the Reasons I go upon are these In the first place we are agreed that there is a supream