the only objects of thought? or, Whether it is not possible for men to think of things which are not ideas in the mind? [151] To this question it is not easy to give a direct answer. On the one hand, he says often, in distinct and studied expressions, that the term idea stands for whatever is the object of the understanding when a man thinks, or whatever it is which the mind can be employed about in thinking: that the mind perceives nothing but its own ideas that all knowledge consists in the perception of the agreement or disagree ment of our ideas: that we can have no knowledge farther than we have ideas. These, and many other expressions of the like import, evidently imply that every object of thought must be an idea, and can be nothing else. On the other hand, I am persuaded that Mr Locke would have acknowledged that we may think of Alexander the Great, or of the planet Jupiter, and of numberless things which he would have owned are not ideas in the mind, but objects which exist independent of the mind that thinks of them.+ How shall we reconcile the two parts of this apparent contradiction? All I am able to say, upon Mr Locke's principles, to reconcile them, is this, That we cannot think of Alexander, or of the planet Jupiter, unless we have in our minds an idea-that is, an image or picture of those objects. The idea of Alexander is an image, or picture, or representation of that hero in my mind; It is to be remembered that Reid means, by Ideas, representative entities different from the cognitive modifications of the mind itself-H. † On he confusion of this and the four subsequent paragraphs, see Note C.-Whatever is the immediate object of thought, of that we are necessarily conscious. But of Alexander, for example, as existing, we are necessarily not conscious. Alexander, as existing, cannot, therefore, possibly be an immediate object of thought; consequently, if we can be said to think of Alexander at all, we can only be said to think of him mediately, in and through a representation of which we are conscious; and that representation is the im. mediate object of thought. It makes no difference whether this immediate object be viewed as a tertium quid, distinct from the existing reality and from the Conscious mind; or whether as a mere modality of the conscious mind itself-as the mere act of thought considered in its relation to something beyond the sphere of consciousness. In neither case, can we be said (be it in the imagination of a possible or the recollection of a past existence) to know a thing as existing-that is, immediately; and, therefore, if in these operations we be said to know aught out the mind at all, we can only be said to know it mediately-in other words, as a mediate object. The whole perplexity arises from the ambiguity of the term object, that term being used both for the external reality of which we are here not conscious, and cannot therefore know in itself, and for the mental representation which we know in itself, but which is known only as relative to the other. Reid chooses to abolish the former signification, on the supposition that it only applies to a representative entity differ. ent from the act of thought. In this supposition, however, he is wrong; nor does he obtain an immediate knowledge, even in perception, by merely deny. the crude hypothesis of representation.-H. and this idea is the immediate object of my thought when I think of Alexander. That this was Locke's opinion, and that it has been generally the opinion of philosophers, there can be no doubt. But, instead of giving light to the question proposed, it seems to involve it in greater darkness. When I think of Alexander, I am told there is an image or idea of Alexander in my mind, which is the immediate object of this thought. The necessary consequence of this seems to be, that there are two objects of this thought-the idea, which is in the mind, and the person represented by that idea; the first, the immediate object of the thought, the last, the object of the same thought, but not the immediate object. [152] This is a hard saying; for it makes every thought of things external to have a double object. Every man is conscious of his thoughts, and yet, upon attentive reflection, he perceives no such duplicity in the object he thinks about. Sometimes men see objects double, but they always know when they do so: and I know of no philosopher who has expressly owned this duplicity in the object of thought, though it follows necessarily from maintaining that, in the same thought, there is one object that is immediate and in the mind itself, and another object which is not immediate, and which is not in the mind." Besides this, it seems very hard, or rather impossible, to understand what is meant by an object of thought that is not an immediate object of thought. A body in motion may move another that was at rest, by the medium of a third body that is interposed. This is easily understood; but we are unable to conceive any medium interposed between a mind and the thought of that mind; and, to think of any object by a medium, seems to be words without any meaning. There is a sense in which a thing may be said to be perceived by a medium. Thus any kind of sign may be said to be the medium by which I perceive or understand the thing signified. The sign by custom, or compact, or perhaps by nature. introduces the thought of the thing signified. But here the thing signified, when it is introduced to the thought, is an object of thought no less immediate than the sign was before. And there are here two objects of thought, one succeeding another, which we have shewn is not the case with respect to an idea, and the object it represents. That is, if by object was meant the same thing, when the term is applied to the external reality, and to its mental representation. Even under the Scholastic theory of repeesentation, it was generally maintained that the species itself is not an object of perception, but the external r ality through it; a mode of speaking justly reprehended by the acuter schoolmen. But in this respect Reid is equally to blame. See Note C.-H. cal. I apprehend, therefore, that, if philoso- | the word idea, but not with the philosophi phers will maintain that ideas in the mind are the only immediate objects of thought, they will be forced to grant that they are the sole objects of thought, and that it is impossible for men to think of anything else. [153] Yet, surely, Mr Locke believed that we can think of many things that are not ideas in the mind; but he seems not to have perceived, that the maintaining that ideas in the mind are the only immediate objects of thought, must necessarily draw this consequence along with it. The consequence, however, was seen by Bishop Berkeley and Mr Hume, who rather chose to admit the consequence than to give up the principle from which it follows. Perhaps it was unfortunate for Mr Locke that he used the word idea so very frequently as to make it very difficult to give the attention necessary to put it always to the same meaning. And it appears evident that, in many places, he means nothing more by it but the notion or conception we have of any object of thought; that is, the act of the mind in conceiving it, and not the object conceived.* In explaining this word, he says that he uses it for whatever is meant by phantasm, notion, species. Here are three synonymes to the word idea. The first and last are very proper to express the philosophical meaning of the word, being terms of art in the Peripatetic philosophy, and signifying images of external things in the mind, which, according to that philosophy, are objects of thought. But the word notion is a word in common language, whose meaning agrees exactly with the popular meaning of * When we contemplate a triangle, we may consider it either as a complement of three sides or of three angles; not that the three sides and the three angles are possible except through each other, but because we may in thought view the figure-qua triangle, In reality one and indivisible-in different relations. In like manner, we may consider a representative act of knowledge in two relations-1°, as an act represen tative of something, and, 20 as an act cognitive of that representat on, although, in truth, these are both only one indivisible energy-the representation only existing as known, the cognition being only possible in a representation. Thus, e g., in the imagination of a Centaur-the Centaur represented is the Centaur known, the Centaur known is the Centaur represented. It is one act under two relations-a relation to the subject knowing-a relation to the object represented. But to a cognitive act considered in these several relations we may give either different names, or we may confound them under one, or we may do both; and this is actually done; some words express. ing only one relation, others both or either, and others properly the one but abusively also the other. Thus Idea properly denotes an act of thought con When these two different meanings of the word idea are confounded in a studied explication of it, there is little reason to expect that they should be carefully distinguished in the frequent use of it. There are many passages in the Essay in which, to make them intelligible, the word idea must be taken in one of those senses, and many others in which it must be taken in the other. It seems probable that the author, not attending to this ambiguity of the word, used it in the one sense or the other, as the subject-matter required; and the far greater part of his readers have done the same. [154] There is a third sense, in which he uses the word not unfrequently, to signify objects of thought that are not in the mind, but external. Of this he seems to be sensible, and somewhere makes an apology for it. When he affirms, as he does in innumerable places, that all human knowledge consists in the perception of the agreement or disagreement of our ideas, it is impossible to put a meaning upon this, consistent with his principles, unless he means by ideas every object of human thought, whether mediate or immediate; everything, in a word, that can be signified by the subject, or predicate of a proposition. Thus, we see that the word idea has three different meanings in the essay; and the author seems to have used it sometimes in one, sometimes in another, without being aware of any change in the meaning. The reader slides easily into the same fallacy, that meaning occurring most readily to his mind which gives the best sense to what he reads. I have met with persons professing no slight acquaintance with the "Essay on Human Understanding," who maintained that the word idea, wherever it occurs, means nothing more than thought; and that, where he speaks of ideas as images in the mind, and as objects of thought, he is not to be understood as speaking properly, but figuratively or analogically. And, indeed, I apprehend that it would be no small advantage to many passages in the book, if they could admit of this interpretation. It is not the fault of this philosopher alone to have given too little attention to the distinction between the operations of the mind and the objects of those operations. Although this distinction be familiar sidered in relation to an external something beyond all languages, philosophers, when they speak to the vulgar, and found in the structure of the sphere of consciousness-a representation; but some philosophers, as Locke, abuse it to comprehend of ideas, often confound [155] the two tothe thought also, viewed as cognitive of this represen-gether; and their theory concerning ideas tation. Again, perception, notion, conception, &c. (concept is, unfortunately, obsolete) comprehend both, or may be used to denote either of the relations; and it is only by the context that we can ever vaguely discover in which application they are in. tended. This is unfortunate; but so it is.-H. has led them to do so; for ideas, being supposed to be a shadowy kind of beings, intermediate between the thought and the object of thought, sometimes seem to coa lesce with the thought, sometimes with the object of thought, and sometimes to have a distinct existence of their own. The same philosophical theory of ideas has led philosophers to confound the different operations of the understanding, and to call them all by the name of perception.* Mr Locke, though not free from this fault, is not so often chargeable with it as some who came after him. The vulgar give the name of perception to that immediate knowledge of external objects which we have by our external senses. This is its proper meaning in our language, though sometimes it may be applied to other things metaphorically or analogically. When I think of anything that does not exist, as of the republic of Oceana, I do not perceive it-I only conceive or imagine it.§ When I think of what happened to me yesterday, I do not perceive but remember it. When I am pained with the gout, it is not proper to say I perceive the pain; I feel it, or am conscious of it: it is not an object of perception, but of sensation and of consciousness. So far, the vulgar distinguish very properly the different operations of the mind, and never confound the names of things so different in their nature. But the theory of ideas leads philosophers to conceive all those operations to be of one nature, and to give them one name. They are all, according to that theory, the perception of ideas in the mind. Perceiving, remembering, imagining, being conscious, are all perceiving ideas in the mind, and are called perceptions. Hence it is that philosophers speak of the perceptions of memory, and the perceptions of imagina No more than by calling them all by the name of Cognitions, or Acts of Consciouness. There was no reason, either from etymology or usage, why perception should not signify the energy of immediately apprehending, in general; and until Reid limited the word to our apprehension of an external world, it was, in fact, employed by philosophers, as tantamount to an act of consciousness. We were in need of a word to express our sensitive cognitions as distinct from our sensitive feelings, (for the term sens. ation involved both,) and, therefore, Reid's restric tion, though contrary to all precedent, may be admitted; but his criticism of ther philosophers for their employment of the term, in a wider meaning, is wholly groundless.-H. But not exclusively.-H. And why? Simply because we do not, by such an act, know, or apprehend such an object to exist; we merely represent it. But perception was only used for such an apprehension. We could say, however, that we perceived (as we could say that we were conscious of) the republic of Oceana, as imagined by us, after larrington.-H. And this, for the same reason. What is remembered is not and can not be immediately known; nought but the present mental representation is so known; and this we could properly say that we perceived.-H. Because the feeling of pain, though only possible through consciousness, is not an act of knowledge. But it could be properly said, I perceive a feeling of pain. At any rate, the expression I perceive a pain, is as correct as I am conscious of a jain.-H. | tion. They make sensation to be a percep tion; and everything we perceive by our senses to be an idea of sensation. Sometimes they say that they are conscious of the ideas in their own minds, sometimes that they perceive them.* [156] However improbable it may appear that philosophers who have taken pains to study the operations of their own minds, should express them less properly and less distinctly than the vulgar, it seems really to be the case; and the only account that can be given of this strange phænomenon, I take to be this: that the vulgar seek no theory to account for the operations of their minds; they know that they see, and hear, and remember, and imagine; and those who think distinctly will express these operations distinctly, as their consciousness represents them to the mind; but philosophers think they ought to know not only that there are such operations, but how they are performed; how they see, and hear, and remember, and imagine; and, having invented a theory to explain these operations, by ideas or images in the mind, they suit their expressions to their theory; and, as a false comment throws a cloud upon the text, so a false theory darkens the phænomena which it attempts to explain. We shall examine this theory afterwards. Here I would only observe that, if it is not true, it may be expected that it should lead ingenious men who adopt it to confound the operations of the mind with their objects, and with one another, even where the common language of the unlearned clearly distinguishes them. One that trusts to a false guide is in greater danger of being led astray, than he who trusts his own eyes, though he should be but indifferently ac quainted with the road. CHAPTER X. OF THE SENTIMENTS OF BISHOP BERKELEY. GEORGE BERKELEY, afterwards Bishop of Cloyne, published his "New Theory of Vision,' ," in 1709; his "Treatise concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge," in 1710; and his "Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous," in 1713; being then a Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin. [157] He is acknowledged universally to have great merit, as an excellent writer, and a very acute and clear reasoner on the most abstract subjects, not to speak of his virtues as a man, which were very conspicuous: yet the doctrine chiefly held forth in the treatises above mentioned, especially in the • The connection of the wider signification of the term perception, with the more complex theory of representation, has no foundation-H. two last, has generally been thought so very absurd, that few can be brought to think that he either believed it himself, or that he seriously meant to persuade others of its truth. He maintains, and thinks he has demonstrated, by a variety of arguments, grounded on principles of philosophy universally received, that there is no such thing as matter in the universe; that sun and moon, earth and sea, our own bodies, and those of our friends, are nothing but ideas in the minds of those who think of them, and that they have no existence when they are not the objects of thought; that all that is in the universe may be reduced to two categories to wit, minds, and ideas in the mind. But, however absurd this doctrine might appear to the unlearned, who consider the existence of the objects of sense as the most evident of all truths, and what no man in his senses can doubt, the philosophers who had been accustomed to consider ideas as the immediate objects of all thought, had no title to view this doctrine of Berkeley in so unfavourable a light. They were taught by Des Cartes, and by all that came after him, that the existence of the objects of sense is not self-evident, but requires to be proved by arguments; and, although Des Cartes, and many others, had laboured to find arguments for this purpose, there did not appear to be that force and clearness in them which might have been expected in a matter of such importance. Mr Norris had declared that, after all the arguments that had been offered, the existence of an external world is only probable, but by no means certain. [158] Malebranche thought it rested upon the authority of revelation, and that the arguments drawn from reason were not perfectly conclusive. Others thought that the argument from revelation was a mere sophism, because revelation comes to us by our senses, and must rest upon their authority. Thus we see that the new philosophy had been making gradual approaches towards Berkeley's opinion; and, whatever others might do, the philosophers had no title to look upon it as absurd, or unworthy of a fair examination. Several authors attempted to answer his arguments, but with little success, and others acknowledged that they could neither answer them nor assent to them. It is probable the Bishop made but few converts to his doctrine; but it is certain he made some; and that he himself continued, to the end of his life, firmly persuaded, not only of its truth,* but of its Berkeley's confidence in his idealism was, however, nothing to Fichte's. This philosopher, in one of his controversial treatises, imprecates everlasting damnation on himself not only should he retract, but | great importance for the improvement of human knowledge, and especially for the defence of religion. Dial. Pref. "If the principles which I here endeavour to propagate, are admitted for true, the consequences which I think evidently flow from thence are, that atheism and scepticism will be utterly destroyed, many intricate points made plain, great difficulties solved, several useless parts of science retrenched, speculation referred to practice, and men reduced from paradoxes to common sense.' In the "Theory of Vision," he goes no farther than to assert that the objects of sight are nothing but ideas in the mind, granting, or at least not denying, that there is a tangible world, which is really external, and which exists whether we perceive it or not. Whether the reason of this was, that his system had not, at that time, wholly opened to his own mind, or whether he thought it prudent to let it enter into the minds of his readers by degrees, I cannot say. I think he insinuates the last as the reason, in the "Principles of Human Knowledge." [159] The "Theory of Vision," however, taken by itself, and without relation to the main branch of his system, contains very important discoveries, and marks of great genius. He distinguishes more accurately than any that went before him, between the immediate objects of sight, and those of the other senses which are early associated with them. He shews that distance, of itself and immediately, is not seen; but that we learn to judge of it by certain sensations and perceptions which are connected with it. This is a very important observation; and, I believe, was first made by this author." It gives much new light to the operations of our senses, and serves to account for many phænomena in optics, of which the greatest adepts in that science had always either given a false account, or acknowledged that they could give none at all. We may observe, by the way, that the ingenious author seems not to have attended to a distinction by which his general assertion ought to have been limited. It is true that the distance of an object from the eye is not immediately seen; but there is a certain kind of distance of one object from another which we see immediately. The author acknowledges that there is a visible extension, and visible figures, which are proper objects of sight; there must therefore be a visible distance. Astronomers call it angular distance; and, although they measure should he even waver in regard to any one principle of his doctrine; a doctrine, the speculative result of which left him, as he confesses, without even a cer tainty of his own existence. (See above, p. 129, note.) It is Varro who speaks of the credula philosophorum natio: but this is to be credulous even in incredulity.-H. This last statement is inaccurate.-H. it by the angle, which is made by two lines drawn from the eye to the two distant objects, yet it is immediately perceived by sight, even by those who never thought of that angle. He led the way in shewing how we learn to perceive the distance of an object from the eye, though this speculation was carried farther by others who came after him. He made the distinction between that extension and figure which we perceive by sight only, and that which we perceive by touch; calling the first, visible, the last, tangible extension and figure. He shewed, likewise, that tangible extension, and not visible, is the object of geometry, although mathematicians commonly use visible diagrams in their demonstrations." [160] 80 The notion of extension and figure which we get from sight only, and that which we get from touch, have been so constantly conjoined from our infancy in all the judg. ments we form of the objects of sense, that it required great abilities to distinguish them accurately, and to assign to each sense what truly belongs to it; difficult a thing it is," as Berkeley justly observes, to dissolve an union so early begun, and confirmed by so long a habit." This point he has laboured, through the whole of the essay on vision, with that uncommon penetration and judgment which he possessed, and with as great success as could be expected in a first attempt upon so abstruse a subject. He concludes this essay, by shewing, in no less than seven sections, the notions which an intelligent being, endowed with sight, without the sense of touch, might form of the objects of sense. This speculation, to shallow thinkers, may appear to be egregious trifling.+ To Bishop Berkeley it appeared in another light, and will do so to those who are capable of entering into it, and who know the importance of it, in solving many of the phænomena of vision. He seems, indeed, to have exerted more force of genius in this than in the main branch of his system. In the new philosophy, the pillars by which the existence of a material world was supported, were so feeble that it did not require the force of a Samson to bring them Properly speak ng, it is neither tangible nor visible extension which is the object of geometry, but intelligible, pure, or a priori extension -H. +This, I have no doubt, s in allusion to Priestley. That writer had, not very courteously, said, in his "Examination of Reid's Inquiry" " do not remember to have seen a more egregious piece of solemn trifling than the chapter which our author calls the Geometry of Vis bles,' and his account of the Idomenians,' as he terms th se imaginary beings who had no ideas of substance but from sight."-In a note upon that chapter of "Th Inquiry," I stated that the thought of a Geometry of Visibles was original to Berkeley, and I had then no recollection of Reid's acknowledgment in the present paragraph.-H. down; and in this we have not so much reason to admire the strength of Berkeley's genius, as his boldness in publishing to the world an opinion which the unlearned would be apt to interpret as the sign of a crazy intellect. A man who was firmly persuaded of the doctrine universally received by philosophers concerning ideas, if he could but take courage to call in question the existence of a material world, would easily find unanswerable arguments in that doctrine. [161]" Some truths there are," says Berkeley, “so near and obvious to the mind, that a man need only open his eyes to see them. Such," he adds, “I take this important one to be, that all the choir of heaven, and furniture of the earth-in a word, all those bodies which compose the mighty frame of the world-have not any subsistence without a mind." Princ. § 6. The principle from which this important conclusion is obviously deduced, is laid down in the first sentence of his principles of knowledge, as evident; and, indeed, it has always been acknowledged by philosophers. "It is evident," says he, "to any one who takes a survey of the objects of human knowledge, that they are either ideas actually imprinted on the senses, or else such as are perceived, by attending to the passions and operations of the mind; or, lastly, ideas formed by help of memory and imagin ation, either compounding, dividing, or barely representing those originally perceived in the foresaid ways." This is the foundation on which the whole system rests. If this be true, then, indeed, the existence of a material world must be a dream that has imposed upon all mankind from the beginning of the world. The foundation on which such a fabric rests ought to be very solid and well established; yet Berkeley says nothing more for it than that it is evident. If he means that it is self-evident, this indeed might be a good reason for not offering any direct argument in proof of it. But I apprehend this cannot justly be said. Self-evident propositions are those which appear evident to every man of sound understanding who appreliends the meaning of them distinctly, and attends to them without prejudice. Can this be said of this proposition, That all the objects of our knowledge are ideas in our own minds ? I believe that, to any man To the Idealist, it is of perfect indifference whether this proposition, in Reid's sense of the expression Ideas, be admitted, or whether it be held that we are conscious of nothing but of the modifications of our own minds. For, on the supposition that we can know the non-ego only in and through the ego, it follows, (since we can know nothing immediately of which we are not conscious, and it being allowed that we are conscious only of mind,) that it is contradictory to suppose aught, as known, (i.e., any ob. ject of knowledge.) to be known otherwise than as a phænomenon of mind.-H. |