consequently become Opacous or Visible or it may by the same Causes become Rarer and be turn'd into Fire Also being Divisible it may have parts of which one must be without the other that is it must be Impenetrable as to its own parts and thence be able to protrude another Material being and be Solid too in his Sense of that Word which is the same with Impenetrable Moreover since it must be Divisible it must be Quantitative or Extended and this not Infinitely but Finitely that is it must be Terminated wherefore Termination of Quantity being the Notion of Figure it may have Figure too In a Word if it may possibly be Material there is no Property of Body but may agree to the Soul and therefore the Soul tho' Spiritual may be Corporeal and so the Nature of Body and Spirit may be one and the same But what needs more than meerly his ascribing Materiality to it at least permitting it to belong to it Our Notion of Matter is taken from Body and from nothing else and therefore can be nothing but Body consider'd as not what it actually is but as 't is Alterable Changeable or apt to be another Thing that is as 't is Corruptible which I am sure Mr. L. will not say or think of our Soul Perhaps he may say that he only means that it may have Matter annex'd to its Spirituality But then he must grant that since this Materiality did not as an Accident accrue to the Soul afterwards she had it from her Nature and therefore it must be Intrinsecal to her and help to constitute her peculiar Nature and if this be so then when this Material kind of Compart is dissolv'd or corrupted for if Material it may be Alter'd wrought upon and Corrupted as other Material Compounds may the Complex or Compound it self is dissolv'd and so no longer the same but perish'd Besides what should the Soul do with two Material Comparts one Organical the other Inorganical Especially since there are as subtil Parts in this Visible Body of ours with which as the Form of the Body she is united viz. the Spirits as any perhaps Mr. Locke can conceive to be annex'd to her 4. To proceed He does but think it possible for any thing he knows that the Soul may have some Materiality but he positively judges that Brutes have Reason nay that 't is as Evident to him as that they have Sense Now if they have Reason they must know how to draw Consequences this being Essential to the Notion of Reason or rather the same Thing in other Words Again If they can Reason they can compare what 's meant by our Terms and have the Sense of those Sayings we call Propositions in their Knowing Power And since that Reason is not given them for nothing but for their Preservation they can compare Agreeable and Disagreeable Objects and pursue out of that Reason that which is most Agreeable that is they can Will Chuse and Act freely which are naturally consequent to their gathering by their Reason what is better or worse for them and thence Determining themselves to it accordingly I say themselves for if they have Reason then Reason is part of Themselves and not a Distinct Thing from them Out of which Two Things follow One That the Nature of Man and Brute are Confounded since all those Chief Operations Proper to Man are Communicable to Brutes Secondly That Mr. Locke will be at a loss to get an Idea of the Spirituality of his Soul or of other Spiritual Beings by reflecting on the Operations of his Mind since the same may possibly be found in such Beings as are meerly Corporeal Wherefore to conclude this Discourse all our Natural Notions of Body and Spirit and of all their Operations must be jumbled together in a kind of Indifferency to either and therefore those two Natures must be Confounded if either the Soul which is Spiritual may have Materiality Annex'd to her or Brutes which are material Entities may have Thought Knowledge and Reason Annex'd to them And since Mr. Locke affirms very rationally that one of his Ideas is not Another I cannot but think he becomes the more oblig'd to shew out of the Natures of those two Things liquidly and precisely how those two Natures are distinguish'd or else his way of Ideas will be conceiv'd to be meerly Phantastick and Unphilosophical being most unlike the Ideas in the Divine Understanding the Original Ground of all Truth which do not confound Natures but establish them in a most perfect Distinction to be what they are and no other I press not here how no Discourse at all in Philosophy can be Conclusive unless the Nature of Body and Spirit be perfectly and clearly contradistinguish'd nor repeat what I have shewn Reflex 9. § 7. that our Natural Notions teach us to distinguish perfectly between Body and Spirit which his Ideas do not but confound them and thence deprave our Natural Knowledge of Things I know he says but proves not that the having General Ideas puts a perfect Difference between Brutes and us to which I have spoken formerly I add that 't is a thousand times easier to have General Ideas they being but Imperfect Perceptions of the Thing than to have Reason as is easie to be demonstrated and has been manifested above 5. As for making something out of Nothing or Creating after we have prov'd that Existence is Essential to God and not Accidental to him which Mr. L. clearly demonstrates it follows thence and out of the Commonest Notion of Causality that it is not a matter of Wonderment or hard to believe that he should Create but that if he pleases to operate ad extra this is his Peculiar Action since nothing is more Evident than that Every Thing acts as it is Whence if God's Essence and his very Nature be Existence or Actual Being 't is demonstrable that it is not onely as peculiar to him to cause Actual Being or Create as it is for Fire to heat or Light to enlighten but moreover that this is the onely Effect that can immediately or without the intervention of Second Causes proceed from him 6. I much fear that it may seem something to weaken the true Argument for the Possibility of Creation to bring the Instance of our Thought moving our Body whence he concludes that Gods Power to do a Thing is not to be deny'd because we cannot comprehend its Operation For 1. Mr. Locke thinks he experiences this viz. that the Soul moves the Body whereas we do not experience that God Created any thing 2. As Mr. Locke has shown very ingeniously that onely the Man is Free So I affirm 't is the Man that wrought upon himself moves his Body and not his Thought onely And that as when we gaind our First Notions the Man was acted upon both according to his Corporeal and Spiritual Part so every New Act he had afterwards that proceeded from him as he was
being such as were we awake and had our rational fears about us we neither durst attempt nor could possibly perform without extream hazard But not to insist on these let us reflect on our selves even when perfectly awake and we shall discover that however we are set on work by Motives or Reasons yet we know not at all how the outward parts of our Body only which we experience in Brutes and ground the conceit of their having Knowledge upon them do perform any of their Operations What Man living though supposed the wisest much less the Generality knows how or by what passages he is to send Animal Spirits into the Muscles whence all our Motion proceeds or into what Muscles or what quantity of them is requisit to do such an Outward Action What Feats of Activity does a Rope-dancer show us How many ways does he distort wind turn poize stretch and ply the parts of his Body To do which the Animal Spirits are to be sent now into this now into that Muscle to move this or this or that Limb or Joint sometimes great quantity of them to make a vehement or quick Motion sometimes fewer to move them more moderately sometimes none at all into any of them when he has a mind to surcease all Motion and sit still Yet he knows no more than a Brute or a Stone does how he is to do any of this nor can give the least account how it is done All this is transacted by the wise Contrivance of the Body which is so framed as to be subservient to the Design the Man as he is Knowing and Rational had projected And the same is done in Brutes when either actual Impressions are made upon them from the Objects or those former Impressions are again excited in the Brain which done all the frisking motions of Pursuance and Avoidance which they perform do follow by a Course of Natural or Material Causes and withal according to those measures and degrees as are proportioned to the Efficacy of the first impellent Cause the Object in their Imagination the Agreeableness or Disagreeableness of which to the Nature of the Animal is that which sets all the Engine on work at first 11. Nor can the Objection bear any force that some Actions of Brutes resemble Reason even though it seems more then is found in Men since we experience that a Watch which is the work of an Artificer performs the Operations proper to it and tells us the time of the day with more exactness than the best Reason we have can do without such helps So that the Watches acting according to reason demonstrates indeed there was Reason in the Framer of it but argues none at all in the Engine it self Wherefore however the Actions of some Brutes may bear a show of Reason this can only argue that they are the workmanship of a Rational or Wise Maker but not that themselves acted knowingly or rationally while they did these Actions For my self I must declare that I have as much admired the wisdom shewn in the Action of a young Vine exerting and twisting its little Fingers about other things near it to support it self as it grew up as all the forementioned Circumstances weighed and abated at any Operation of a Brute and I doubt not but a Campanella who maintained that every thing in Nature had perception or some such other man of fancy would discourse and descant on it thus The poor week limber Vine knew and was well aware that not being able to support it self it would when it increast in length fall down flat on the ground and so be exposed to be trampled under foot and hurt and therefore did very prudently cling about other Vegetables or Poles near it to sustain it self and avoid that inconvenience And I dare affirm that we lose the best part of our Natural Contemplation by putting Brutes to have Knowledge for what wonder is there that such things as have a knowing Power in them should know or who admires it in a Man Whereas it justly raises our mind to high Admiration and Adoration of the Divine Artificer to see things which are made of meer Matter act with as much Wisdom and Prudence for their own preservation as the wisest Knower can by his best Wit of which he is so proud and sometimes with much more No doubt but the growth and operations of dull Vegetables do administer to devout Reflecters occasions of very high Contemplation and shall the Operations of sensitive Beings which are incomparably more excellent and more admirable as being the Top and Master-piece of this Material World afford little or none at all Now if their Nature be to have Knowledge in them and it be a thing common to all Creatures and expected that GOD should give to every thing what is its Nature there is little or no particular ground for our wonderment GOD has given Brutes a Knowing Power and that Power makes them know and there 's an end of our Admiration and consequently of our Contemplation and of that devout Admiration to which our Astonishment at the several Actions of those Natural Automata would otherwise raise us 12. I beg pardon for this long digression I thought fit to dilate thus largely on this point both because it is a very concerning and useful Preliminary as also to manifest how the using the word Idea hand over head as we may say and taking it Equivocally and indifferently for Phantasms and Notions leads this Great Man as it must needs have done every Man into great mistakes For Phantasms Beasts may indeed have they being no more but Effluuiums emitted from other Bodies and received by the portalls of the Senses into the Brain where the Animal Spirits stand readily waiting to move the Brute according as those Tinctures are agreeable or disagreeable to the Compound but Notions or which is the same Meanings or Apprehensions they cannot have for these being made by Direct Impressions upon our Spiritual part the Mind only which can mean or apprehend to judge they have any such would conclude they had a Spiritual and consequently an Immortal part in them which I am sure we shall both of us deny Besides had they Meanings or were capable of any they would be capable of the Meanings of our Words at least those amongst them which are most Docil and could Speak would not fail if well taught and educated to know much of our Language and Answer in some few occasions Pertinently which none of them ever did designedly and if they hap to do so by accident none thinks they meant as they spoke but all mankind laughs at the odd Chance as at a pleasant Jest. Those that teach them might point at the things when they pronounce their Names as Nurses do to little Infants and why might not Beasts learn them as well as Children at least learn as much in many years as they do in two or three Indeed some Words and
all its parts Continued or Coherent as Duality does make a Stone and a Tree formally Two or Rotundity in a Body makes it Round or any other Formal Cause is engag'd by its very Essence to put its Formal Effect which would induce a Clear Contradiction if it should not 10. 'T is not in this Occasion only but in many others too that Great Scholars puzzle their Wits to find out Natural Causes for divers Effects the true Reason for which is only owing to Trans-natural ones or from these Altissimae Causae which only Metaphysicks give us and it happens also not seldom that Men beat their Brains to find out Efficients for that which depends only on Formal Causes whose most certain Causality depends on no Second Causes but only on the First Cause God's Creative Wisdom which establish'd their Essences to be what they are Let any one ask a Naturalist why Rotundity does formally make a Thing Round and you will see what a Plunge he will be put to not finding in all Nature a Proper Reason for it The same in other Terms is the Ground of Mr. Locke's Perplexity how Extended Parts do cohere to which the properest and most Satisfactory Answer is because there is Quantity in them which is Essentially Continued and so does Formally give Coherence of Parts to Body its Subject By the same means we have a Clear Reason afforded us why Bodies impell one another which Mr. Locke thinks is Inexplicable For putting one Body to be thrust against another the Body that is Passive must either be shov'd forwards or there must necessarily be Penetration of Parts unless perhaps at first the Impulsive Force be so slight and leisurely that it is able to cause only some Degree of Condensation Every thing therefore acting as it is if the Body or the Quantity of it be Extended or have one Part without the other and therefore it be impossible its Parts should be penetrated or be one within the other the Motion of the Passive Body must necessarily ensue 11. To proceed Mr. Locke makes account we have as clear a Knowledge of Spirits as we have of Bodies and then argues that we ought no more to deny the Existence of Those than of These Which I should like well did he maintain and prove first that the Nature of Bodily Substances is clearly Intelligible But to make those Notions which are most Essential and Proper to Bodies and most Obvious of all others viz. their Entity or Substance and their Extension to be Unintelligible and then to tell us that The Idea of Spiritual Natures are as Clear as that of Bodily Substance which he takes such pains to shew is not Clear at all is as I conceive no great Argument for their Clearness nor their Existence neither but rather a strong Argument against both The Parallel amounting to this that we know not what to make either of the one or of the other 12. As for the Knowledge we have of Spiritual Natures my Principles oblige me to discourse it thus We can have no Proper or Direct Notions of Spiritual Natures because they can make no Impressions on our Senses yet as was shewn above our Reflexion on the Operations and Modes which are in our Soul make us acknowledge those Modes are not Corporeal and therefore that the Immediate Subject of those Modes our Soul is not a Body but of another nature vastly different which we call Spiritual Our Reason assures us also by demonstrating that the first Motion of Bodies could neither proceed immediately from God nor from our Soul which presupposes both that and many other Motions to her Being that there must be another sort of Spiritual Nature distinct from our Soul from which that Motion proceeds which therefore being Active and so in Act it self is not a Compart but a Whole and Subsistent alone which we call Angels Their Operations prove they have Actual Being and therefore a fortiori they are capable to be or Things Whence we must correct our Negative Expressions of them by our Reason and hold they are Positive Things all Notions of Thing being Positive Farther we can as evidently discourse of those Beings or Things tho' Negatively express'd as we can of any Body v. g. if an Angel be Non-quantus we can demonstrate it is Non-extensus Non-locabilis c. and from its having no Matter or Power which is the Ground of all Potentiality and Change 't is hence collected that 't is a Pure Act and therefore that once Determin'd it is Immutable at least Naturally Lastly I affirm that this presupposed we can discourse far more clearly of Spirit than of Bodies For there are thousands of Accidents belonging intrinsecally or extrinsecally to every Individual Body whence all our Confusion and Ignorance of it comes whereas in a Pure Spirit there are only three or four Notions viz. Being Knowledge Will and Operation for us to Reflect on and Manage and therefore the Knowledge of them is as far as this Consideration carries more Clearly attainable than is the Knowledge of Bodies REFLEXION Fourteenth ON The 24th 25th 26th and 27th CHAPTERS 1. THE 24th Chapter Of the Collective Ideas of Substance gives me no Occasion to reflect Only when he lays as it were for his Ground that the Mind has a Power to compare or collect many Ideas into one I am to suppose he means that the Mind does not this of her self alone without the Joint-acting of the Body as has been often prov'd above for otherwise the whole or the Man cannot be said to be the Author of that Action 2. The 25th Chapter gives us the true Notion of Relation and very clearly express'd which he seconds with divers other Solid Truths viz. That some Terms which seem Absolute are Relatives that Relation can be only betwixt two Things and that All things are capable of Relation What I reflect on is that he gives us not the true Difference between Real and meerly Verbal Relations nor the true Reason why some Relative Terms have and others have not Correlates He thinks the Reasons why we call some of them ExtrinsecalDenominations which is the same with Verbal Relations proceed from Defect in our Language or because we want a Word to signifie them Whereas this matters not a Jot since we can have the Idea or Notion of Relation in our Minds if we have good Ground for it whether we have a Word to signifie it or no or rather if we have a Real Ground for it we shall quickly invent either some one Word or else some Circumlocution to express it Let us see then what our Principles in this Affair say to us 3. Relation is not here taken for our Act of Relating for then it would belong to another common Head of Notions call'd Action but for the Thing as it is referred by our Comparative Power to another Wherefore there must be some Ground in the Thing for our thus referring in
so many Reflexions contains many Excellent and Uncommon Truths in it Tho' I do not think he owes any of them to his Way of Ideas but that he proceeded in such Occasions upon his Natural Notions in the same manner the Aristotelians do and thence made Right Judgments and Reflexions upon them by his own Acute Wit This Unfortunate Choice of their Method did as I conceive proceed hence that such Active and Quick Fancies do not patiently brook the Rains of Logick and Metaphysicks the former of which much against the Grain restrains them from taking their Wild Carreer by the Discipline of its Artificial Rules the other keeps them from Roving by the Self-evident Maxims it sorces their Understanding to accept of Whence if these two do not bridle and keep them in it is not to be expected in Nature that such High-mettl'd Fancies should be held within strict Bounds or kept to the Slow and Sober Pace of Solid Reason but that they will take their Vagaries and run over Hedge and Ditch whithersoever the Swift Career of that Nimble Faculty hurries them This Discourse I make the more willingly that those Students who read this may clearly discern that all their Application to gain Knowledge will be purely Lost Labour and Time thrown away if their First and Chief Care be not to take a Wise and Solid Method at the Beginning Having thus finish'd my long Address for which I beg your Pardon I shall now apply my self to make some few Discourses relating to my following Book 18. MAN being One Thing compounded of a Corporeal and a Spiritual Nature and every Thing acting as it is it follows that both those Natures must concurr to every Operation that flows from him as he is Man and consequently be produced by some Faculty belonging properly to each of those respective Natures Nor can it be doubted but that as those Faculties or Powers which are peculiar to both those Natures are as different as are the Natures themselves so the Immediate Objects peculiar to those Different Faculties must likewise be as widely Different from one another as are those Powers to which they belong and consequently be as vastly Opposite as the Natures of Body and Spirit can distance them It being then agreed to by all Parties that the Faculties or Powers which join in our Production of Knowledge are those we call the Imagination and the Mind or the Fancy and the Understanding I cannot doubt but it may be demonstratively concluded from the known Nature and Constitution of this Thing called MAN that to every Thought or Act of Knowledge we have those being such Operations as properly and formally belong to us as we are Men there must two sorts of Interiour Objects concurr whereof the One is of a Corporeal the Other of a Spiritual Nature and that otherwise those Acts could not be said to be Humane Acts or the Acts of that Suppositum or Compound Thing called Man but of one of those Natures onely a-parted from the other as to its Operation and consequently as to its Being Which Supposition is directly contradictory to the Natural Constitution of Man as he is distinguish'd on one side from a Brute who has nothing but Material Phantasms or Ideas on the other from an Angel or Intelligence in whom there is nothing of Matter or Fancy but all in it is purely Spiritual 19. The Distinction of these two Objects of the Fancy and of the Understanding being granted in some manner by all Sides I cannot but wonder how it hapt to escape the Thoughts of all the Philosophers both Ancient and Modern to explicate fully and clearly the Exact Difference between those two Objects of the Fancy and of the Understanding there being scarcely any one Point in Philosophy of half that Importance for the attaining of Truth and avoiding of Errour For both these being truly in us whenever we have an Act of Knowledge and withall being as far Removed from one another in their Natures as Body and Spirit are if Speculative Men either thro' mistake or thro' Inadvertence of this vast difference between them or out of Loathness to take Pains to look deep into the Intrinsecal Natures of Things imprinted in their Minds when they have Notions of them shall happen to mistake what they find Uppermost or most Superficial and therefore is easiest to their Fancy as Phantasms or Material Representations are for Notions which being of a Spiritual Nature do not make so obvious and familiar an Appearance as those Gay Florid Pictures did but are to be gather'd by Reason or made Understood by Reflexion and Study such Speculaters I say will be at the same loss and not much wiser than those Birds were that peck'd at Xeuxis 's Grapes to seed themselves mistaking the Outward Pourtraiture or Idea for the Inward Nature of the Thing For no Knowledge of the Things could ever be expected from Ideas taken as themselves take them for Similitudes since those Terms or Words which we use and must use when we speak or discourse of any thing whatever were intended by the Agreement of Mankind to signifie the Things themselves about which we are Discoursing and not to signifie meer Likenesses or Similitudes of them However this has been neglected by others I see 't is my Duty to say something of this Distinction of Phantasms from Notions I have in my 19th Reflexion § § 9 and 12. endeavour'd to show it To which I have here thought fit to annex some few 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Distinguishing Marks to know one from the other 20. My first Criterion shall be the Sensibleness of the former and Insensibleness of the other When we shut our Eyes or walk in the Dark we experience we have Ideas or Images of our Way or of other things we have seen in our Fancy and this without the least Labour of ours or any Reflexion And there is also beyond that something else in the Mind which tells us of what Nature or what Things those are which appear'd superficially to our Fancy which costs us Labour and Reflexion to bring it into the view of the Understanding so that we cannot get perfect Acquaintance with it unless we define it Nor is this Sensible as the other was but only Intelligible Not superficial or uppermost but hidden retruse and as we may say stands behind the Curtain of the Fancy Nor easie to comprehend at the first Direct Sight of our Inward Eye but costs us some Reflexion or some Pains to know it expressly and distinctly Which latter sort in each of these regards are those we call Simple Apprehensions Conceptions or Notions 21. The next Criterion shall be this We find we have in us Meanings now the Meanings of Words or which is the same taking that word objectively what 's meant by those Words are most evidently the same Spiritual Objects as are our Notions and 't is Impossible those Meanings should be the same with Ideas or Similitudes but
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
a Created Spiritual Nature but by a Negation of what 's Proper to Body so we can have no Notion of the Divine Nature but by Denying of him all that belongs properly to the Natures of such a Body and Spirit both and by acknowledging them infinitely short of resembling or even shadowing him Lastly We have no Notion or Expression that can sute with him no not even the most Metaphysical ones Ens includes Potentiality to Existence and all Potentiality signifying Imperfection must be utterly denied of him Existence seems to come nearer yet because it signifies a Formality supervening to Ens as 't is Existent and so is as it were a kind of Compart it cannot be Proper for his infinitely Simple Being And even Self-existence signifies a kind of Form or Mode of the Subject that Self-exists So that we have no kind of Notion or Expression that can perfectly agree to God's Infinite Essence but we are forc'd to content our selves to make use of sometimes one Attribute sometimes another that signifies some Perfection with Infinite annex'd to it which is not found in Creatures or which is denied of them or is Incommunicable to them Whence comes that Maxim of the Mysticks that God is better known by Negations or by affirming he is none of those Positive Perfections we find in Creatures than by applying any of our Positive Notions to him And this is all we can do in this State till Grace raising us up to Glory we come to know his Divine Essence as it is in its Self or as we phrase it See him Face to Face in contemplating which consists our Eternal Happiness 40. Thus much of our Notions which we call the First Operations of our Understanding and how they are caused in our Soul How our Judging and Discoursing which are the other two are made in it is shewn at large in the Second and Third Books of my Method to Science 41. If any Learned Man is dis-satisfied with this Discourse or has a mind to oppose it I think I have Right to require of him two Things First That he would not object his own Fancies or Dis-like of it or think that this is sufficient to invalidate it but that he would go to work like a Man of Reason and shew that This or That part of it does contradict Such and Such a Principle in Logick Physicks or Metaphysicks This is the only Solid Way of Objecting all other being but Empty Talk and Idle Cavil Next I think I have Right to demand since it is fundamentally necessary to Philosophy that this Point be clear'd that he would set himself to frame some Orderly and Coherent Discourse of his own built upon Evident Principles how or by what particular Means the first Knowledge of the Things without us comes into our Soul In doing which he will oblige the World very highly and my self very particularly And unless he does this he will be convinced to find fault with what himself cannot mend Which will manifest that he either wants true Knowledge or which is a far greater Defect Ingenuity PRELIMINARY Fifth Of the Proper and Genuine Signification of those Words which are of most use in Philosophy 1. THE main Hindrance of Science viz. The Mistake of Fancies for Realities or of meer Similitudes for Notions being provided against the other Grand Impediment to true Knowledge which is the taking Words us'd in Philosophy in an Ambiguous or wrong Sense is to be our next Care The Inconveniences which arise hence and the ways how to detect and avoid Equivocation are in my Method discours'd of in common and I have here in my Second Preliminary clear'd also in common the Signification of all Abstract Words and shewn that they mean the thing it self quatenus such or such or according to such or such a Consideration of it as is express'd by that Word My present Business to which my Circumstances oblige me is to clear in particular the Notion or Meaning of those most Important Words which being made use of by Learned Men and taken by them often-times in different Senses do so distract them in their Sentiments and by drawing their Intellectual Eye now to one side now to the other make them so frequently miss the Mark while they aim at true Science Not that my Intention in this Preliminary is to pursue the Mistakes of others but only to settle the True and Genuine Sense of such Words to be applied afterwards to the Mis-accepters of them as occasion requires tho' I may hint now and then some Abuses of them that so I may the better clear their proper Signification 2. I begin with Existence express'd by the Word is which is the Notion of the Thing precisely consider'd as it is Actually Being This is the most simple of all our Notions or rather indeed the only Simple Notion we have all the rest being but Respects to it For it has no kind of Composition in it not even that Metaphysical one of grounding divers Conceptions or Considerations of it as all others have Whence all Notions being by their Abstraction Distinct and Clear this most Abstracted Notion is so perfectly clear and self-evident that as it cannot need so it cannot admit any Explication They who go about to explain it show themselves Bunglers while they strive to approve themselves Artists For by telling us that 't is Esse contra Causas they put Esse which is the Notion defin'd in the Definition which is most absurd and against all Art and Common Sense Nay they make it more obscure than it was before by adding Extra Causas to it which are less clear than it self was By the Word Causes I suppose they mean Natural ones and so tho' it gives no Clearness to the Signification of the Word Esse yet it may at least consist with good Sense and may mean that the Thing was before or while it was not yet produced within the Power of those Causes or in the State of Potentiality and that Existence is that Formality or most formal Conception by which the Thing is put out of that imperfect State of having only A Power to be and is reduced to the perfecter State of Actuality or Actual Being 3. As it is impossible to misconceive this self-evident Notion so 't is equally impossible to mistake the meaning of the word Existence which properly expresses that Notion for if they take the word is to have any meaning relating any way to the Line of Ens or any Signification at all that is of its Nature purely Potential they quite destroy it's Notion And if they take it in any Sense for an Actuality not belonging to the Line of Ens they must necessarily take it to mean is not there being no Third or other such Notion to take it for in the same manner as if one takes not Ens to mean A Thing he must take it to mean Nothing Now tho' the Goodness
Easie and Immediate Consequence For putting a Body to be in such a Space it must be commensurate to such a Part of it otherwise that Body might take up all Space and must do so were it not Commensurate to some part of it only And to fancy a Thing Commensurate to the Parts of what is extended and it self not to be Extended likewise is a most extravagant Conceit and a plain Contradiction Again If a Body take up but one part of Space and not another part of it v. g. that part which is next it or in which it is Space must not only have Parts but also one Part without Another which is the very Notion of Extension Lastly Since Imaginary Space is put to be Vast and even Infinite it cannot consist in an Indivisible wherefore it must necessarily be Divisible and Diffused that is Extended Whence follows that to fancy Body to be put in such a Space or Place for he grants here § 11. that these two Ideas differ but in a certain Respect and yet not shove aside or remove those Extended Parts out of that Space is to make the Extended Parts of that Space and of the Body in it to be within one another or penetrated which implies a Contradiction Now if they be not Penetrated one of them must necessarily drive the other out of the Space it occupates and therefore the Parts of that Space must be Separable Moveable and Resistent as those of Body are they being in very deed the self-same 5. Hence is seen that in all this Discourse about Pure Space or Vacuum Mr. Locke consulted his Fancy and not his good Reason attending to the Things as they are in Nature That which mis-led him seems to be this because he finds not in his Idea of Space formally consider'd the Notion of Divisibility Separability nor Resistance but that it abstracts from them all as to the Formal Part of its Conception by which 't is distinguish'd from those others But this is not peculiar to Space nor bears it any Shew of being a solid Ground for the Existence of Space separately from Body For Figure has not in its Formal Notion Quantity and yet 't is nothing but Quantity thus terminated How many Notions have we of Quantity and several other Modes formally Distinct which yet are nothing else really and materially but Quantity it self Take Divisibility Extension Measurability Proportionability Impenetrability Space Place c. They have all of them some nice Formality or different Respect which distinguishes them and makes the Ideas or Notions of them as such to be Formally Exclusive of one another Divisibility speaks the Unity of the Potential Parts of Quantity Measurability the Respect they have to some determinate Quantity stated by our Mind Proportionability such a Degree of Equality or Inequality to another Thing or to their own Parts Impenetrability and Extension the Order or Situation of the same Potential Parts Space the same Quantity precisely and formally as it is a Capacity or Power to contain a Multitude of Things without any Determination or Adjustment of the Space to the Things contain'd in it so that the Notion of Space is the self-same as that of Room And Place signifies the same Quantity as having a Power to contain them Limitedly and Determinately Yet notwithstanding none ever conceited that because they were apprehended as formally distinct they could therefore exist separately without Quantity or without one another as he puts Space to exist without Body and Extension tho' all their Ideas are thus formally Distinct Nor consequently can Space for the same Reason exist without Extension and Body which seems to be his Ground built on the distinct Formal Idea he has of Space why he thinks there may be a Vacuum Or else his Ground is only a roving Imagination of a Vast Nothing beyond the Universality of Things fancy'd by him to be a Thing he knows not what nor of what Sort or Kind But enough of this formerly 6. The Notion of Extension stands in his way and therefore he endeavours to make it Unintelligible and Inexplicable He objects that to say that to be Extended is to have partes extra partes is the same as to say Extension is Extension First If it were the same in Sense where 's the Harm so it be only meant that it is the same in re or in the Formal Notion as long as the Expression is Different and not formally Identical At this rate we may ridicule all Definitions For to say Homo est Animal Rationale is the same in reality as to say Homo est Homo Next I deny they are formally the same Divisibility which is the Notion of Quantity expresses only that the Body it affects has Potential Parts and Extension expresses the Manner how it has those Parts viz. not Penetrated or one within another but without one another which adds a new Formality to the bare Notion of Quantity And this is a fair Explication for such a most Common and General Notion which having no Proper Genus but a Transcendent can bear no exact Definition 7. To our Objection that if Pure Space or Vacuum be not really a Body it not being pretended to be a Spirit it must be a meer Nothing and so cannot exist he replies if I understand him that there may be a Thing that is neither Spirit nor Body and he asks who told us there may not be such a Third Thing I answer Our evident Reason told it us by dividing Ens into Divisible and Indivisible which dividing Members being Contradictory allow no Third Thing which is neither the one nor the other Since then he must not say that such a vast Expansion as Vacuum beyond all Bodies is Indivisible either Mathematically as a Point is or Physically as those Things are which are insuparably Hard it must be Divisible and consequently Extended Separable c. as a Body is But this also he denies it to be and therefore 't is evidently concluded that 't is a meer Nothing 8. Nor will he acquaint us with his Thoughts whether Vacuum be a Substance or Accident till we shew him a distinct Idea of Substance Which seems to me a witty avoiding the Question rather than a Pertinent Answer Indeed we have no Distinct and Compleat Notion of a Suppositum or Individual Substance because it involves many distinct Notions or Considerabilities in it as their Ground But of Substance it self or which is the same of what is meant by the Word Thing 't is scarce possible to be Ignorant or to want a Distinct Idea of it For there is nothing from which we need or can distinguish the Notion of Substance or Ens and so to gain a Distinct Conception of it but either Non-Ens or Modus Entis from both which honest Nature if we attend to It and not to Preter-natural Fancies teaches us to distinguish it I should put the Argument thus Vacuum if any Thing must be
of Spiritual Natures without making long Excursions into Metaphysicks and perhaps this plain Discourse may help much towards it it being fetch'd from our most Natural Notions and known to us as it were by a kind of Experience Let us take then any Spiritual Mode or Accident a Virtue for Example and let it be that of Temperance which done let us ask our Natural Thoughts how Long Broad or Thick that Virtue is Is it as little as a Barly-corn or as big as a House Is it a Yard in Length or but an Inch Is it as Thick as a Wall or as Thin as a Wafer c. And Honest Nature would answer for us that 't is Nonsense to ask such a Question its nature being perfectly of another kind and utterly disagreeable to any of these Accidents Again Let us ask what Colour or Figure it is of Is it Blew Green or Yellow Is it Round Four-square or Triangular Is it Rare or Dense Hot Cold Moist or Dry And we shall discover that the Asker if serious would be look'd upon by all Mankind as a Fool or a Mad-man such Qualities as these being as much Disparate from the Subject we are Enquiring about as Knowledge is to a Beetle or Science to a Mushrom And yet it would not be wonder'd at that such Questions as these should be ask'd of any Body whatever And what does this amount to but that Nature assures us by her free and sober Acknowledgment of it that this Spiritual Mode call'd Virtue or Temperance is quite different from the whole Nature of Body and from any Corporeal Thing that by our Senses ever enter'd into our Fancy Since then this Spiritual Mode or Accident has nothing at all to do with Body or its Modes it is clearly evinced by the Ingenuous Confession of Unprejudiced Nature that the Subject of it which we call a Spirit is so vastly removed from all we can say of Body Being only excepted that 't is perfect Nonsense to attribute any thing to it which we find in Corporeal Natures Since then we can truly say of Corporeal Natures that they are Long Short Diffus'd Extended Commensurate to one another in their Bulk Motion Duration c. we must be forced to deny all those of Spirits and to Judge that they have nothing to do with any of these nor can bear the having such Modes apply'd to them or said of them under Penalty of forfeiting our plainest Reason and contradicting Common Sense And if it be such an Absurdity to apply them to Created Spirits how much more absurd must it be to explicate God's Eternity Infinity or Immensity by such gross Resemblances or an Imaginary Order to the Short and Fleeting Natures of Corporeal Creatures 8. Lastly to sum up all I deny that the Notion of Motion is taken from the continu'd Train of Distinguishable Ideas and I affirm that it is Imprinted by the Object without me and is one continually successive and undistinguish'd Mode there as it is in the Thing I deny too that Duration is Motion or Succession but only Being tho' our Being it being Unconstant and Fleeting is accompany'd with Succession and subject to Motion and Time and commensurate to them only not as 't is Being but as 't is Fleeting or perpetually Changing some way or other I deny it also as the most prodigious Enormity a Rational Soul could be liable to thro' its giving up the Reins of Reason to wild Fancy to say that our Measure of Time is applicable to Duration before Time For Mr. Locke makes Duration inconceivable without Succession and there could be no Succession before the World when there was only one Unchangeable God in whom is no Shadow of Vicissitude or Succession Does not the plainest Sense tell us that we cannot apply one thing to another but there must be One and Another and where 's that Other Duration or Succession before Time or before the World whenas 't is confess'd there was none Can any Man apply a Mode of Thing to Nothing which yet must be avowed by this Author for before the World there was nothing but God to whom it could not be apply'd and therefore there was nothing for Mr. L. to apply it to But this is parallel to that seducing Fancy that inveigled his Reason to hold a Vacuum he took the Notion of Space from Body and then apply'd it to what was neither Spirit nor Body but meer Nothing and here he took his Notion of Duration or Succession from Bodies moving and when he has done he would apply it to what 's not Body nor Spirit neither nor Motion nor like it but contrary to it that is he would apply it to meer Nothing I desire he would please to consider that the Thing to which Another is Apply'd must exist as well as that which is Apply'd to it and this antecedently to his Application of one to the other Wherefore both Space and Duration being both Modes or Accidents he must first prove there is something beyond the World to which he can apply the Mode of Space or something before the World to which he can apply the Mode of Successive Duration or it is perfect Nonsense even to talk of Applying one to the other But this he has not done and his way of attempting to do it seems to be this first he fancies he can apply those Modes to something there and then and thence concludes there must be Things there to which they may be apply'd as if his Fancy could create Entities at Pleasure or to please her Humour Nor matters it that we can apply stated Measures of Duration and thence imagin Duration where nothing does really endure or exist or by this means imagin to morrow next Year or seven Years hence for we cannot apply them by our Reason but only upon Supposition that they will exist and then there will be also some Thing or Subject supposed fit for them to be apply'd to whereas an imaginary Space beyond the World or imaginary Time or Succession before or after the World neither is now nor can there ever be any possible Subject to which they can be Apply'd and so the Application of them can bear no manner of Sense I must confess the word imagin which Mr. L. uses cap. 14. § 32. is very fit for his purpose and gives the greatest Semblance of Truth to his Discourse But by his Leave our Imagination cannot create Entities nor make Things to which he is to apply his Ideas to exist when they do not nor ever will exist and unless it can do this his Application is no Application for to apply a Thing or Mode of Thing to Nothing is no Application at all Both Space and Successive Duration are Modes Proper to Body whence only we had them and a Mode without the Thing of which 't is a Mode Modes having no Entity of their own is a meer Nothing Let him prove then first that there are beyond or before the
Will and consequently of its Acts of Love is an Appearing Good and the Lively Appearance of that Good is that which makes the Will prompt to act effectually whence since that which breeds Pleasure in us must needs appear Lively to be a Good to us there needs no more but to chuse wisely what is most Pleasant or most Agreeable to our True Nature Reason such as the best Spiritual Goods are and we may be sure by such a well-made Choice to arrive at that Best Greatest and Purest Pleasure Eternal Glory REFLEXION Twelfth ON The 21th CHAPTER 1. IN this Chapter of Power I find more to admire than confute The Author always Ingenious even when he errs has here much out done his former self Particularly his Explication of Freewill is generally speaking both Solid and Acute and his Doctrine that Liberty is consistent with a perfect Determination to Goodness and Virtue is both Learned and Pious Yet I am forced to disagree with him in some particulars In giving my Thoughts of which I will imitate Mr. Locke's laudable Method in making my Discourses Subservient and in shewing them to be Agreeable to Christian Principles 2. 'T is an excellent Thought that The Clearest Idea of Active Power is had from Spirit For Bodies can act no otherwise than as they are acted on themselves nor can the first mov'd Body that moves the rest push others forwards farther than it self is moved by something that is not Body or by some Spiritual Agent which therefore has the truest Notion of Agency in it without any Mixture of Patiency because the Body mov'd cannot react upon it Tho' therefore we may have by our Senses the Idea of Action and Passion from the Effects we see daily wrought by Natural Causes on fit Subjects yet the Clearest Idea of Action is given us by our Reason finding out that the Beginner of Corporeal Action is a Separated Spirit or pure Act and therefore not at all Passive from any other Creature nor from the Body it operates on by Reaction as is found in Corporeal Agents And our Reason gives us this Idea as it does many other Reflex ones by seeing clearly that neither can there possibly be Processus in infinitum amongst Corporeal Agents nor can they of themselves alone begin to move themselves nor move one another Circularly and therefore the First Corporeal Motion must necessarily be Originiz'd from some Pure Spirit or Angel Now Mr. Locke conceives that the Soul according to her Faculty call'd Will moving the Body gives him this clearest Idea of Active Power which Tenet I have in diverse places disprov'd formerly and shown that the Soul by reason of her Potential State here cannot principiate any Bodily Action nor the Man neither unless wrought upon by some External or Internal Agent which is in act it self 3. He Judges with good reason that the Vulgar mistake of Philosophers in making every Faculty or Power a Distinct Entity has caus'd much Obscurity and Uncertainty in Philosophy which humour of Multiplying Entities I am so far from abetting that perhaps he will think me to err on the other hand in making the Understanding and Will to be one and the same Power and affirming that they only differ formally in Degree He shows clearly how in proper Speech the Will is not Free but the Man unless it be signified with a Reduplication that by the Word Will is meant Man according to that Power in him call'd the Will For Powers as he discourses well belong only to Agents and are Attributes only of Substances and not of the Powers themselves Perhaps this reason of his will abet my position that the Understanding and Will are the same Power Those who make them two do this because they find in the Notion of Will only a Power of Acting and not of knowing and in the Notion of Understanding only a Power of knowing and not of Acting But the same Men make the Understanding direct the Will which they call a Blind Power by which they make one of those Powers formally as such to work upon the other as if the former were an Agent and the latter a Patient I add moreover that they do this with the worst Grace that is possible for what avails it the Will to be directed by the Understanding if it does not know how the Understanding directs it And to make the Will to know is to make it a knowing Power which is to make the Will tho' they never meant it to be the Understanding Not reflecting in the mean time when our Understanding is full of any Apparent Good the Man pursues it and so becomes or has in him a Principle or Power of Acting which is what we call Will. 4. Perhaps a Philosophical Discourse beginning from the Principles in this affair if exprest Literally and pursu'd home by Immediate Consequences may set this whole business in a Clearer Light and show us very evidently how Man determins himself to Action and therefore is Free as also how he is Predetermin'd to determin himself than any particular Reflexions on our own Interiour Which tho' they may oftentimes have some Truth in them yet not beginning from the bottom-Truths that concern the point in hand they can never be steady but are now and then liable to some Errours 5. Beginning then with the Animal part in Man and considering him barely as an Animal and wrought upon as other Animals are I discourse thus Particles agreeable to the Nature of the Animal being by the Senses convey'd into the Brain do if they be but Few lightly affect it and work no other effect but a kind of small Liking of it If more they make it as we say begin to Fancy it But if they be very many and sent from an Object very Agreeable or Good to such a Nature they will in proportion to their Multitude and Strength cause naturally a Tendency towards it and powerfully excite the Spirits so as to make the Animal pursue it that is they will become such a Principle of Action which in meer Animals we call Appetite To which Action that meer Animal is not carry'd thro' Choice or Freely but is naturally and necessarily Determin'd to Act for the Attainment of that Good in the same manner as Iron follows the Load-stone But if we consider this Animal as having now a Rational and Knowing Compart join'd to it things will be order'd after another manner For those Impressions are carry'd farther than the Region of the Brain even into the Soul it self which is endow'd with a Faculty of Reflecting upon those her Notions whence she gains exacter Knowledge of those Bodies that imprinted them Nor only so but she can reflect upon her own Operations too and know that she knows them by which means she comes acquainted with her own Nature and comes to see that Knowledge and Reason is that Nature of hers which she finds is a Nobler part of the
of Endless Misery It is also true that we are Conscious here of any perceptible Good or Harm that happens to our Person because we cannot but Reflect on what concerns any part of our Individuum which is our Self which yet is so far from proving that our Personality consists in this Consciousness that it proves the direct contrary For it shews that our Person or Individual Self affected thus agreeably or disagreeably is the Object of that Consciousness and Objects must be antecedent and pre-supposed to the Acts which are employ'd about them because the Objects are the Cause of those Acts. Nor is there any farther Mystery in the Word Self for it means no more but our own same Intelligent Individuum with which we are well acquainted partly by Direct partly by Reflex Knowledges 14. It looks so very odly to say that one of our own Acts should constitute our own particular Essence which it must do if our Personal Identity consists in our Consciousness that I am apt to think that Mr. Locke's great Wit aim'd at some other Truth tho' he hap'd to mis-apply it I can but guess at it and perhaps 't is this 'T is without doubt true that the Essence of Subsistent Spiritual Natures which as having no manner of Potentiality in them are Pure Acts I mean Angels consists in Actual Knowledge which Act is first of themselves And if so why may not this Act of the Soul call'd Consciousness employ'd about her self or her own Actions constitute the Soul or the Man's Personality But the difference lies here that those Pure Spirits having no Matter or Potentiality in them Annex'd to much less Identify'd with their Natures their Essence is formally constituted by their being in Act according to their Natures that is by being Actually Knowing Whereas the Soul in this State being immers'd in Matter and Identify'd or making One Thing with her Bodily Compart and needing to use it as her Conjoin'd Instrument as it were to attain Knowledge is therefore in a State of Potentiality whence she has no Innate Notions much less Principles but is meerly Passive in acquiring those First Rudiments of Knowledge However after she is thus pre-inform'd she or rather the Man according to his Spiritual Part is in part Active when he improves those Knowledges or ripens them to Perfection by his Reflexion and Reason as both of us hold 15. I see no Necessity of making any farther Remarks upon this Chapter after I have noted some other ill-laid and wrongly supposed Grounds which occasion'd his Mistakes As First That the Soul of a Man is indifferently alike to all Matter Whereas each Soul not being an Assistant but an Informing Form and withall being but the Form of one Particular and therefore fitted as was lately proved to the Disposition of the particular Pre-existent Embryo it can be receiv'd in no Matter but that which is individually determin'd in it self as to its Animality and therefore it requires a Form distinct from all others or as the Individual Constitution of the Embryo was Secondly § 28. he makes account the Specifick Idea if held to will make clear the Distinction of any Thing into the same and Diverse Whereas our Subject as I suppose being about Individual Identity and Diversity how the holding to the Specifical Idea in which all the Individuums under it do agree and which makes them one in Nature should clear the Distinction of Individuals is altogether inexplicable It must then be only the Individual Idea or Notion as far as we can reach it to which there go more Modes than to the Specifical and its Intrinsecal Composition which can diversifie Things Really or make them to be Really the same or Divers However some Outward Circumstances can do it quoad nos I am not much surpriz'd that Mr. Locke led by the Common Doctrine does think there are no Essential Notions under that which Logicians call the Species Whereas all Individuals being most properly Distinct Things must have also Essence being the Formal Constitutive of Ens Distinct Essences and so be Essentially Distinct. But of this enough in my Method Book 1. Less 3. § 11. c. His Proof of it is very plausible But the Reader may observe that while § 29. he uses the Word that Rational Spirit that Vital Union he supposes it That that is Individually the same instead of telling us what makes it That Besides that he throughout supposes Existence to individuate which is already confuted Lastly I observe that to make good his Distinction of Person from the Individual Substance and Individual Man he alledges that a Hand cut off the Substance is vanish'd By which 't is manifest that he takes Substance not for the Thing called Man constituted by a Soul as its Form but for the Quantity of the Matter or the Figuration of some Organiz'd Part Whereas taking the Word Substance as he ought for Ens or Thing no Alteration or Defalcation of Matter Quantity or Figure c. makes it Another Substance or Another Thing but such a Complexion of Accidents or such a New Form as makes it unfit for its Primary Operation to which it is ordain'd as it is a Distinct Part in Nature Nor can this argue in the least that Consciousness constitutes Personality because this happens not only in Men or Persons but also in Trees and Dogs which if they lose a Branch or a Leg are still the same Substance or Thing that is the same Tree and the same Dog as all the World acknowledges REFLEXION Fifteenth ON The 28th 29th 30th 31th and 32th CHAPTERS 1. THE 28th Chapter Of other Relations is very Ingenious and consonant to his his own Principles It might indeed shock a less attentive Reader to see Virtue and Vice rated or even so much as named so from the Respect they have to the Lesbian Rule of Reputation or Fashion call'd in Scripture Consuetudo Saeculi which the more Libertine Part of the World would set up and establish as a kind of Law And this I suppose was the Occasion that made that very Learned and Worthy Person Mr. Lowde except against it But the Author has clear'd that Point so perfectly in his Preface that none can now remain dissatisfy'd For who can hinder Men from fancying and naming things as they list 2. I take leave to discourse it thus The word Virtue both from its Etymology and true Use signifies Manly or becoming a Man taking him according to his Genuin and Undeprav'd Nature given him by God that is Right Reason This Reason if we use it and attend to it will give us the Knowledge of a Deity In Speculative Men by way of Demonstration in others by a kind of Practical Evidence from their observing the Regular and Constant Order of the World especially of the Celestial Bodies as likewise by their Scanning according to their different Pitch the Solid Grounds of the Christian Religion Reveal'd to us by
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
Ens adequately divided into Body and Spirit 8. Vacuum must either be Res or Modus Rei otherwise we can have no Notion of it 9. The Extravagant Arguments for Vacuum refuted 10. VVe can set Bounds to Space Time and to all Durations but God's 11. Annihilation implies a Contradiction and is not an Act of Omnipotency but of Impotency 12. The Cartesians can hardly avoid Vacuum 13. The having an Idea of Vacuum distinct from that of Plenum no Argument to prove it Reflexion Eighth § 1. THE plain Sense of the Vulgar gives us the true Notion of Time 2. Duration is not Succession but rather Opposite to it 3. 'T is a strange Paradox to say the Notion of Succession or Duration is to be taken from the Train of Ideas in our Mind 4. Our not perceiving Duration when we Sleep no Argument for it 5. This Tenet is against Experience 6. And against the Nature of Things and of Resemblances too 7. One Motion if Known and Regular may and must be a Measure to another 8. There is no Shew of Reason that the Equality of the Periods of Duration can possibly be taken from the Train of our Ideas 9. This odd Tenet not positively asserted by Mr. Locke Reflexion Ninth § 1. IMaginary Time before the VVorld a meer Illusion of Fancy 2. They who advance Tenets against Nature must alter the Meaning of those VVords that express our Natural Notions 3. God's Immensity not Commensurate to an Infinitely Expanded Space 4. VVe can have no Notion of a Vacuum but a Fancy onely 5. Scripture-Texts the worst sort of Arguments for Philosophers unless they be most Plain and Literally meant 6. Onely Self-Existence and what flows from that Notion is peculiar to God 7. Our Natural Notions assure us that 't is meer Fancy to explicate God's Attributes by respect to Corporeal Natures Reflexion Tenth § 1. ENdless Addition of Numbers can never give us the Notion of Infinity 2. How we come to have that Notion 3. And with what Ease 4. The Notion of Infinite is most perfectly Positive 5. Duration easily conceivable without Succession Reflexion Eleventh § 1. THoughts are not to be called Sensations § 2. Thinking is the Action and not the Essence of the Soul § 3. Mr. Locke's Position that Things are Good or Evil onely in reference to Pleasure or Pain is True and Solid Reflexion Twelfth § 1. THE due Commendation of Mr. Locke's Doctrine in this Chapter of Power 2. That some Spiritual Agent is the First Mover of Bodies The VVill cannot move our Bodies 3. The Understanding and VVill not Distinct Powers 4. Man's Freedom or Self-Determination deduced from Principles 5. The Difference between Men and Brutes in their Determination to Action 6. Man naturally pursues what is according to Reason or Virtuous Therefore his Nature has been perverted since his Creation 7. Therefore Supernatural Motives are added to strengthen Man's Weaken'd Nature or Reason 8. Supernatural Motives being the Stronger would always prevail were they duely apply'd to a Subject disposed 9. Why the Understanding and VVill must be the same Power Substantially 10. How to Conquer in our Spiritual Warfare 11. 'T is evident that Man Determins himself to Action 12. Yet as Pre-determin'd by God 13. Determination to Virtuous Action does perfect and not destroy Freedom 14. Good if evidently appearing such does certainly Determin the VVill. 15. How Wrong Judgments come § 16. Sin generally springs from True but Disproportionate Judgments 17. Of Uneasiness and Mr. Locke's Discourse concerning it 18. Good is the onely Determiner of the Will and not Uneasiness 19. Prov'd from our Natural Defire of Happiness 20. The Appearance of Good is of Greatest Weight but in a manner disregarded by Mr. Locke 21. Putting this Appearance his Reasons do not conclude 22. Prov'd because Ease is not the Perfection of a Soul 23. The Truth of this Point stated 24. Mr. Locke omits here the Idea of Power to be a Thing tho' Nature suggests and forces it Reflexion Thirteenth § 1. OUR Mixture of our Notions is Regular Mr. Locke's Irregular and Disorderly 2. Without knowing what Substance or Thing is we cannot pretend to Philosophy 3. All our Notions and amongst them that of Substance or Res is taken from the Thing 4. We cannot be Ignorant of the Notion of Substance or Thing 5. We know the more Inferiour Notions of Things less perfectly And Individual Essence the least of all 6. To gain a Distinct Notion of Substance or Thing we must consider it abstractedly from its Modes singly Consider'd 7. The Literal Truth how Substance and its Accidents or the Thing and its Modes are exactly known § 8. 'T is impossible not to know Extension it being in a manner Self-evident 9. The Cohesion of Extended Parts is above Physical Proofs and can onely be known by Metaphysicks 10. Whence 't is in vain to seek for Natural Efficient Causes for those Effects that depend on Formal Causes 11. We may have Clear Knowledge of Spiritual Natures by Reflexion 12. The Reason why and the Manner how Reflexion Fourteenth § 1. THE Mind alone does not collect Notions or compare them 2. Verbal Relations come not from Defect in our Language but for want of a Real Ground 3. What Causality is and what Grounds the Relations of Cause and Effect 4. The Knowing the Principle of Individuation must antecede the Knowledge of Identity and Diversity 5. What gives the Ground to specifie all Notions 6. What gives the Ground to our Notions of the Individuum 7. How Individual Men are constituted 8. Existence cannot possibly be the Principle of Individuation 9. The Outward Circumstances of Time and Place cannot conduce to constitute the Individual Essence 10. An Individual Man is formally an Individual Thing of that Kind and an Individual Person too § 11. The Essence of Things not to be taken from the Judgment of the Vulgar nor from Extravagant Suppositions 12. Consciousness cannot constitute Personal Identity 13. That Consciousness is Inseparable from every Individual Man 14. Yet Angels who are pure Acts are Constituted in part by the Act of Knowing themselves 15. No Soul is Indifferent to any Matter The Notion of the Individuum is Essential The Substance is the same tho' some Quantity of the Matter does come and go Reflexion Fifteenth § 1. THat is onely True Virtue which is according to Right Reason 2. How we come to have Confus'd Ideas or Notions 3. The VVhole Thing as it needs not so it cannot be known clearly 4. The Metaphysical Reason why this Complexion of Accidents which constitutes Individuums should be almost infinitely Various 5. VVe can Sufficiently know Things without Comprehending fully this Complexion 6. No Formal Truth or Falshood in Ideas or Notions Reflexion Sixteenth § 1. WHence Proper and Metaphorical Notions and VVords have their Origin 2. The General Rules to know the Right Sense of VVords § 3. Words of Art most liable to be mistaken 4. The Way how to avoid being
nice respect The Common Explication of Extension defended Ens adequately divided into Body and Spirit Vacuum must either be Res or Modus Rei otherwise we can have no Notion of it * Preliminary 4. §. 39. The Extravagant Arguments for Vacuum refuted Psal. 103. v. 24. We can set Bounds to Space Time and to all Duration but GOD's Annihilation implies a Contradiction and is not an Act of Omnipotency but of Impotency The Cartesians can hardly avoid Vacuum The having an Idea of Vacuum distinct from that of Plenum no Argument to prove it The plain Sense of the Vulgar gives us the true Notion of Time Duration is not Succession but rather opposit to it 'T is a strange Paradox to say the Notion of Succession or Duration is to be taken from the Train of Ideas in our Head Our not Perceiving Duration when we Sleep no Argument for it This Tenet is against Experience And against the Nature of Things and of Resemblances too One Motion if Known and Regular may and must be a Measure to another There is no shew of Reason that the Equality of the Periods of Duration can possibly be taken from the Train of our Ideas This odd Tenet not positively asserted by Mr. L. ImaginaryTime before the World a meer Illusion of Fancy They who advance Tenets against Nature must alter the Meaning of those Words that express our Natural Notions God's Immensity not Commensurate to an Infinitely Expanded Space We can have no Notion of a Vacuum but a Fancy only Scripture-Texts the worst sort of Arguments for Philosophers unless they be most Plain and Literally meant Only Self Existence and what flows from that Notion is Peculiar to GOD. Our Natural Notions assure us that 't is meer Fancy to explicate GOD's Attributes by respect to Corporeal Natures Endless Addition of Numbers can never give us the Notion of Infinity How we come to have that Notion * Prelim. 4. § 31 32. And with what Ease The Notion of Infinite is most perfectly Positive Duration easily conceivable without Succession * James 1. 17. * Apocal. cap. 1. v. 7. Thoughts are not to be call'd Sensations Thinking is the Action and not the Essence of the Soul Mr. L.'s Position that Things are Good or Evil only in reference to Pleasure or Pain is True and Solid The due Commendation of Mr. L's Doctrine in this Chapter of Power That some Spiritual Agent is the First Mover of Bodies The Will cannot move our Bodies * Preliminary 4. §. 25. 26. Refl 5. §. 1. The Understanding and Will not Distinct Powers Man's Freedom or Self determination deduced from Principles The Difference between Man and Brutes in their Determination to Action Man naturally pursues what is according to Reason or Virtuous Therefore his Nature has been perverted since his Creation Therefore Supernatural Motives are added to strengthen Man's weaken'd Nature or Reason Supernatural Motives being the stronger would always prevail were they duly Apply'd to a Subject dispos'd Why the Understanding and Will must be the same Power substantially How to conquer in our Spiritual Warfare 'T is evident that Man determines himself to Action Yet as Predetermin'd by GOD. Determination to Virtuous Action does perfect and not destroy Freedom Good if evidently Appearing such does certainly determine the Will How Wrong Judgments come Sin generally springs from True but Disproportionate Judgments Of Uneasiness and Mr. L's discourse concerning it Good is the only Determiner of the Will and not Uneasiness Prov'd from our Natural Desire of Happiness The Appearance of the Good is of greatest weight but in a manner disregarded by Mr. Locke Putting this Appearance his Reasons do not conclude Prov'd because Ease is not the Perfection of a Soul The Truth of this Point stated Mr. L. omits here the Idea of Power to be a Thing tho' Nature suggests iâ— Our Mixture of our Notions is Regular Mr. L.'s Irregular and Disorderly Without knowing what Substance or Thing is we cannos pretend to Philosophy All our Notions and amongst them that of Substance or Res is taken from the Thing We cannot be Ignorant of the Notion of Substance or Thing We know the more Inferiour Notions of Things less perfectly And the Individual Essence least of all To gain a Distinct Notion of Substance or Thing me must consider it abstractedly from its Modes singly consider'd The Literal Truth how Substance and its Accidents or the Thing and its Modes are distinctly known 'T is impossible not to know Extension is being in a manner Self-evident The Cohesion of Extended Parts is above Physical Proofs and can only be known by Metaphysicks Whence 't is in vain to seek for Natural Efficient Causes for those Effects that depend on Formal Causes We may have Clear Knowledge of Spiritual Natures by Reflexion The Reason Why and the Manner How * Reflex 9. §. 7. * See Method to Science B. 4. C. 6. §. 18. The Mind alone does not collect Notions or compare them Verbal Relations come not from Defect in our Language but for want of a Real Ground What Causality is and what grounds the Relations of Cause and Effect The Knowing the Principle of Individuation must anteceede the Knowledge of Identity and Diversity What gives the Ground to Specify all Notions What gives the Ground to our Notions of the Individuum How Individual Men are constituted * Method to Science B. 2. L. 1. §. 10. Existence cannot possibly be the Principle of Individuation The Outward Circumstances of Time and Place cannot conduce to constitute the Individual Essences An Individual Man is formally an Individual Thing of that Kind and an Individual Person too The Essence of Things not to be taken from the Judgment of the Vulgar nor from Extravagant Suppositions Consciousness cannot constitute Personal Identity * Reflex 2. § 2 3 4 5. That Consciousnes is Inseparable from every Individual Man Yet Angels who are Pure Acts are constituted in part by the Act of Knowing themselves No Soul is Indifferent to any Matter The Notion of the Individuum is Essential The Substance is the same tho' some Quantity of the Matter does come and go That is only true Virtue which is according to Right Reason How we come to have Confused Ideas or Notions The whole Thing as it needs not so it cannot be known clearly The Metaphysical Reason why this Complexion of Accidents which constitutes Individuums should be almost infinitely various * Job 36. 26. We can sufficiently know Things without comprehending fully this Câ—mplexion No Formal Truth or Falshood in Ideas or Notions Whence Proper and Metaphorical Notions and Words have their Origin The General Rules to know the right Sense of Words Words of Art most liable to be mistaken The way how to avoid being mistaken in Words of Art Even in Terms of Art the Thing is chiefly signify'd Metaphysical Words not Unintelligible but most Clear This Third Book concerning Words seems Unnecessary Whence J. S. is not much concern'd to
the Ideists behaved themselves as to this Point 6. How far the Author engages to clear this Difficulty 7. The First Cause carries on the Course of Second Causes by Immediate Dispositions 8. And therefore he affists Nature if dispos'd when it cannot reach 9. Therefore if the Matter can be dispos'd for a Rational Soul God will give it 10. There can be such a Disposition in Matter 11. Therefore some Material Part by which immediately the Soul has Notions from the Objects 12. Therefore Effluviums are sent from Bodies to that Part. 13. Therefore Man is truly One Thing which is Corporeo-Spiritual 14. Therefore some Chief Part in him which is primarily Corporeo-Spiritual or has both those Natures in it 15. VVhich is affected according to both those Natures because of their Identification in that part 16. The peculiar Temper of that Part consists in Indifferency 17. That Part very tender and Sensible yet not Tenacious § 18. That Part the most Noble of all Material Nature 19. Perhaps 't is Reflexive of Light or Lucid. 20. The Effluviums have in them the Nature of the Bodies whence they are sent 21. They affect that Part as Things Distinct from the Man 22. VVhy they Imprint Abstract Notions 23. The peculiar Nature of our Soul renders those Notions perfectly Distinct and Indivisible 24. VVhence Complex Notions come 25. The Soul cannot alone produce any new Act in her self 26. But by the Phantasms exciting her a-new 27. How Reminiscence is made 28. Memory and Reminiscence Inexplicable unless Phantasms remain in the Brain The Manner how Reminiscence is made in Brutes 29. How Reflexion is connaturally made 30. Direct Notions are Common to all Mankind and their Words Proper Reflex ones Improper and their Words Metaphorical 31. Whence we come to have Negative Notions 32. But those Negative Notions do not abstract from the Subject 33. How we come to have a Notion of Nothing 34. Hence great Care to be had lest we take Non-Entities or Nothings for Things 35. Logical Notions are Real ones 36. The Test to try Artificial Notions Hence all Philosophy is Real Knowledge 37. How our Soul comes to have Phantastick Notions or as we call them Fancies How to avoid being deluded by them 38. How we may discourse evidently of those Natures of which we have no Proper Notions § 39. We can have no Proper Notion of God 's Essence 40. The Author speaks not here of Comparing Notions or of Judgments 41. The Author's Apology for this Discourse and what can be the onely Way to go about to confute it Preliminary Fifth § 1. THE Design of the Author here § 2. The Meaning of the Word Existence 3. The Extream Danger of Misconceiving it 4. The Meaning of Ens or Thing 5. The Meaning of Entity or Essence 6. The Meaning of Matter and Form or of Power and Act. 7. What is meant literally by the common Saying that Matter and Form compound Body 8. The Literal Meaning of Substantial or Essential Forms The Reason why some Moderns oppose Substantial or Essential Forms The Meaning of Metaphysical Composition and Divisibility 9. What is the Principle of Individuation 10. The Meaning of the Word Substance The Word Improper 11. That the Word Supporting and Inhering taken Metaphorically may be allow'd and ought not to be Ridicul'd 12. The Meaning of Suppositum or Hypostasis 13. The Meaning of Suppositality 14. The Meaning of the Word Individuum 15. The Meaning of Substantia Prima and Substantia Secunda 16. The Word Accidents is Improper § 17. The Word Modes more Proper 18. The Word Quantity is very Proper 19. The Word Extension very Improper 20. The Meaning of Divisibility Impenetrability Space and Measurability 21. A short Explication what Quantity Quality and Relation are 22. What Transcendents are 23. The Five Sorts of Transcendents 24. Great Care to be had that Transcendent Words be not held Univocal 25. What great Errours spring thence shewn in the Univocal Acception of the Transcendent Word Compounded 26. The Cartesians Unadvised in going ultra Crepidam Reflexion First § 1. THE Excellent Wit and Unbyass'd Ingenuity of the Author of the Essay acknowledg'd 2. 'T is probable he has taken a Prejudice against Metaphysicks 3. The Incomparable Excellency of the Science of Metaphysicks shewn from the Objects it treats of 4. And from the Manner by which it handles them 5. The Knowledge of these High Objects Attainable by Natural Reason 6. Mr. Locke's Tenet of no Innate Ideas Solidly Grounded and Unanswerable Reflexion Second § 1. IN what the Author agrees and disagrees with Mr. Locke 2. We may have Notions without perceiving we have them § 3. VVe may think without being Conscious that we think 4. 'T is impossible to be Conscious or know we know without a new Act of Reflexion 5. 'T is impossible to be Conscious of or know our present Reflex Act but by a new Reflex one Hence we can never come to know our Last Reflexion 6. 'T is utterly deny'd that Consciousness causes Individuation The Unreasonableness of the Opinion that Men do always think Reflexion Third § 1. NO Notion Simple but that of Existence The Order of our Notions is to be taken from Nature 2. The word Solidity arbitrarily and abusively taken by Mr. Locke 3. His Solidity not at all Essential to Body 4. Space without Body or Vacuum is a meer Groundless Fancy 5. The Contrary to that Tenet demonstrated 6. Therefore 't is impossible there should be any True Experiment to prove a Vacuum Reflexion Fourth § 1. MR. Locke's First Chapter commendable § 2. Privative Notions connotate the Subject 3. Meer Motions made upon the Senses Insufficient to give us Knowledge of the Objects 4. Sensible Qualities are the same in the Objects as in the Mind § 5. The Pretence of God's Voluntary Annexing Improper Causes to Effects is Unphilosophical 6. The Power in the Object to cause Sensation and Knowledge is improperly such Reflexion Fifth § 1. IDeas or Notions are not Actual Perceptions but the Object perceiv'd and durably remaining It destroys the Nature of Memory to make it consist in the Reviving Ideas The Mind cannot revive Perceptions 2. Ideas in the Fancy may fade but Notions are never blotted out of the Soul Reflexion Sixth § 1. IF Brutes can know they may have General Notions and Abstract and Compare too 2. The Distinguishing our Notions guides our Reason and Judgment right 3. All Complex Ideas or Notions must consist of Simpler ones united in the Thing 4. Otherwise they are Groundless Fancies 5. The Manner how all Complex Ideas or Notions are made elaborately explain'd 6. How the Doctrine of Cartesius Mr. Locke and J. S. differ as to this Point Reflection Seventh § 1. EXtension not well Explicated Immensity worse 2. Place well Explicated 3. Body and Extension not the same Notion § 4. Space cannot be without Extension 5. Extension and Space differ onely Formally or in some nice respect 6. The Common Explication of Extension defended 7.
Point elucidated by Abstract and Concrete Words Hence Space without Body or Vacuum is a Contradiction The State of the Question Aristotle neglects to shew particularly how Knowledge was made Later Philosophers were at a great puzzle about it How the Schools explicated this Point How the Ideists behav'd themselves as to this Point How far the Author engages to clear this Difficulty The First Cause carries on the Course of Second Causes by Immediate Dispositions And therefore he assists Nature if Dispos'd when it cannot reach Therefore if the Matter can be Dispos'd for a Rational Soul GOD will give it There can be such a Disposition in Matter Therefore some Material Part by which immediately the Soul has Notions from the Object Therefore Effluviums are sent from Bodies to that Part. Therefore Man is truly One Thing which is Corporeo-Spiritual Therefore some Chief Part in him which is primarily Corporeo-Spiritual or has both those Natures in it Which is affected according to both those Natures because of their Identification in that Part. The Peculiar Temper of that Part consists in Indifferency That Part very Tender and Sensible yet not Tenacious That part the most Noble of all Material Nature Perhaps 't is Reflexive of Light or Lucid. The Effluviums have in them the Naturee of the Bodies whence they are sent They affect that Part as Things Distinct from the Man Why they imprint Abstract Notions The Peculiar Nature of our Soul renders those Notions perfectly distinct and Indivisible Whence Complex Notions come * Method to Science Book 1. Less 3. § 2. The Soul cannot Alone produce any New Act in her self But by the Phantasms exciting her anew How Reminiscence is made Memory and Reminiscence inexplicable unless Phantasms remain in the Brain The manner how Reminiscence is made in Brutes How Reflexion is connaturally made Direct Notions common to all Mankind and their Words Proper Reflex ones Improper and their Words Metaphorical Whence we come to have Negative Notions But Negative Notions as they are Negative do not abstract from the Subject How we come to have a Notion of Nothing Hence great Care is to be had lest we take Non-Entities or Nothings for Things Logical Notions are Real ones The Test to try Artificial Notions * See Method to Science B. 1. L. 7. §. 13 14. Hence all Philosophy is Real Knowledge How our Soul comes to have Phantastick Notions or as we call them Fancies How to avoid being deluded by them How we may discourse evidently of those Natures of which we have no Proper Notions We can have no Proper Notion of GOD's Essence The Author speaks not here of Comparing Notions or of Judgments The Author's Apology for this Discourse and what can be the only way to go about to confute it The Design of the Author here * Book 1. Less 11. The Meaning of the word Existence * Method 1. B. 1. L. 2. § 14. The Extreme Danger of Misconceiving it The meaning of Ens or Thing * B. 3. L. 7. * Ibid. The Meaning of Entity or Essence The Meaning of Matter and Form or of Power and Act. What 's meant literally by the common saying that Matter and Form compound Body The Literal Meaning of Substantial or Essential Forms The Reason why some Moderns oppose Substantial or Essential Forms The Meaning of Metaphysical Composition and Divisibility What is the Principle of Individuation The Meaning of the word Substance The word Improper That the words Supporting and Inhering taken metaphorically may be allow'd and ought not to be Ridicul'd The meaning of Suppositum or Hypostasis The Meaning of Suppositality The Meaning of the word Individuum The Meaning of Substantia Prima and SubstantiaSecunda The VVord Accidents is improper The Word Mode more proper The VVord Quantity is very Proper The VVord Extension very improper The Meaning of Divisibility Impenetrability Space and Measurability A Short Explication what Quantity Quality and Relation are VVhat Transcendents are The Five Sorts of Transcendents Great Care to be had that Transcendent VVords be not held Univocal VVhat great Errors spring thence shown in the Univocal Acception of the Transcendent word Compounded The Cartesians unadvis'd in going ultra Crepidam The Excellent Wit and Unbyassed Ingenuity of the Author of the Essay acknowledged 'T is Probable he has taken a Prejudice against Metaphysicks The Incomparable Excellency of the Science of Metaphysicks shewn from the Objects it treats of And from the Manner by which it handles them The Knowledge of these high Objects attainable by Natural Reason Mr. Locke's Tenet of no Innate Ideas Solidly Grounded and Unanswerable In what the Author agrees and disagrees with Mr. Locke We may have Notions without perceiving we have them We may Think without being Conscious that we Think 'T is impossible to be Conscious or know we know without a new Act of Reflexion 'T is impossible to be Conscious of or know our present Reflex Act but by a new Reflex one Hence we can never come to know our last Reflexion 'T is utterly deny'd that Consciousness causes Individuation The Unreasonableness of the Opinion that Men do always think No Notion Simple but that of Existence The Order of our Notions is to be taken from Nature The Word Solidity arbitrarily and abusively taken by M. L. His Solidity not at all Essential to Body Space without Body or Vacuum is a meer Groundless Fancy The Contrary to that Tenet Demonstrated Therefore 't is impossible there should be any True Experiment to prove a Vacuum * Method to Science B. 1. L. 2. §. 14. Mr. Locke's First Chapter commendable Privative Notions must Connotate the Subject * See Prelim. 3. §. 9 10 11. Meer Motions made upon the Senses Insufficient to give us Knowledge of the Objects * Prelim. 4. §. 26 27 28 c. Sensible Qualities are the same in the Objects as in the Mind The Pretence of GOD's Voluntary Annexing Improper Causes to Effects is Unphilosophical The Power in the Object to cause Sensation and Knowledge is Improperly such * B. 1. L. 7. §. 9 10 11. Ideas or Notions are not Actual Perceptions but the Object perceiv'd and durably remaining It destroys the Nature of Memory to make it consist in the Reviving Ideas The Mind cannot revive Perceptions * Prelim. 4. § 26 27 28. Ideas in the Fancy may fade but Notions are never blotted out of the Soul If Brutes can know they may have General Notions and Abstract and Compare too The distinguishing our Notions guides our Reason and Judgment right All Complex Ideas or Notions must consist of simpler ones united in the Thing Otherwise they are Groundless Fancies The Manner how all Complex Ideas or Notions are made elaborately explain'd How the Doctrine of Cartesius Mr. Locke and J. S. differ as to this point Extension not well Explicated Immensity worse Place well explicated Body and Extension not the same Notion Space cannot be without Extension Extension and Space differ only Formally or in some