clares himself not to understand him; and then it teaches only the signification of that word, and the use of that sign.

§ 8. But no real knowledge.-We can know then the truth of two sorts of propositions, with perfect certainty: the one is, of those trifling propositions which have a certainty in them, but it is only a verbal certainty, but not instructive. And, Secondly, we can know the truth, and so may be certain in propositions, which affirm something of another, which is a necessary consequence of its precise complex idea, but not contained in it. As that the external angle of all triangles, is bigger than either of the opposite internal angles; which relation of the outward angle, to either of the opposite internal angles, making no part of the complex idea signified by the name triangle; this is a real truth, and conveys with it instructive real knowledge.

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§ 9. General propositions concerning substances, are often trifling. -We having little or no knowledge of what combinations there be of simple ideas existing together in substances, but by our senses; we cannot make any universal certain propositions concerning them, any farther than our nominal essences lead us; which being to a very and inconsiderable truths, in respect of those which depend on their real constitutions, the general propositions that are made about substances, if they are certain, are, for the most part, but trifling; and if they are instructive, are uncertain, and such as we can have no knowledge of their real truth, how much soever constant observation and analogy may assist our judgment in guessing. Hence it comes to pass, that one may often meet with very clear and coherent discourses that amount yet to nothing. For it is plain, that names of substantial beings, as well as others, as far as they have relative significations affixed to them, may, with great truth, be joined negatively and affirmatively in propositions, as their relative definitions make them fit to be so joined; and propositions consisting of such terms, may, with the same clearness, be deduced one from another, as those that convey the most real truths; and all this, without any knowledge of the nature or reality of things existing without us. By this method, one may make demonstrations and undoubted propositions in words, and yet thereby advance not one jot in the knowledge of the truth of things; v. g. he that having learned these following words, with their ordinary mutual relative acceptations annexed to them, v. g. substance, man, animal, form, soul, vegetative, sensitive, rational, may make several undoubted propositions about the soul, without knowing at all what the soul really is; and of this sort, a man may find an infinite number of propositions, reasonings, and conclusions, in books of metaphysics, school divinity, and some sort of natural philosophy; and, after all, know as little of God, spirits, or bodies, as he did before he set out.

§ 10. And why.-He that hath liberty to define, i. e. determine, the signification of his names of substances (as certainly every one does in effect, who makes them stand for his own ideas), and makes their significations at a venture, taking them from his own or other men's fancies, and not from an examination or inquiry into the nature of things themselves, may, with little trouble, demonstrate them one of another, according to those several respects, and mutual relations, he has given

them one to another; wherein, however things agree or disagree in their own nature, he needs mind nothing but his own notions, with the names he hath bestowed upon them; but thereby no more increases his own knowledge, than he does his riches, who taking a bag of counters, calls one in a certain place a pound; another, in another place, a shilling; and a third, in a third place, a penny: and so proceeding, may undoubtedly reckon right, and cast up a great sum, according to his counters so placed, and standing for more or less, as he pleases, without being one jot the richer, or without even knowing, how much a pound, shilling, or penny is, but only that one is contained in the other twenty times, and contains the other twelve; which a man may also do in the signification of words, by making them in respect of one another more or less, or equally comprehensive.

§ 11. Thirdly, using words variously, is trifling with them.Though yet concerning most words used in discourses, especially argumentative and controversial, there is this more to be complained of, which is the worst sort of trifling, and which sets us yet farther from the certainty of knowledge we hope to attain by them, or find in them, viz. that most writers are so far from instructing us in the nature and knowledge of things, that they use their words loosely and uncertainly, and do not, by using them constantly and steadily in the same significations, make plain and clear deductions of words one from another, and make their discourses coherent and clear (how little soever they were instructive), which were not difficult to do, did they not find it convenient to shelter their ignorance or obstinacy under the obscurity and perplexedness of their terms: to which, perhaps, inadvertency and ill custom do in many men much contribute.

§ 12. Marks of verbal propositions.-To conclude: barely verbal propositions may be known by these following marks:

First, predication in abstract.-First, All propositions, wherein two abstract terms are affirmed one of another, are barely about the signification of sounds. For since no abstract idea can be the same with any other but itself, when its abstract name is affirmed of any other term, it can signify no more but this, that it may, or ought to be called by that name; or that these two names signify the same idea. Thus should any one say, that parsimony is frugality; that gratitude is justice; that this or that action is or is not temperate; however specious these and the like propositions may at first sight seem, yet when we come to press them, and examine nicely what they contain, we shall find, that it all amounts to nothing but the signification of those terms.

§ 13. Secondly, a part of the definition predicated of any term.— Secondly, All propositions, wherein a part of the complex idea which any term stands for, is predicated of that term, are only verbal, v. g. to say that gold is a metal, or heavy. And thus all propositions, wherein more comprehensive words, called genera, are affirmed of subordinate, or less comprehensive, called species or individuals, are barely verbal.

When, by these two rules, we have examined the propositions that make up the discourses we ordinarily meet with, both in and out of books, we shall perhaps find, that a greater part of them, than is usually

suspected, are purely about the signification of words, and contain nothing in them, but the use and application of these signs.

This, I think, I may lay down for an infallible rule, that wherever the distinct idea any word stands for, is not known and considered, and something not contained in the idea, is not affirmed, or denied of it, there our thoughts stick wholly in sounds, and are able to attain no real truth or falsehood. This, perhaps, if well heeded, might save us a great deal of useless amusement and dispute; and very much shorten our trouble and wandering in the search of real and true knowledge.

CHAP. IX.

OF OUR KNOWLEDGE OF EXISTENCE.

§ 1. General certain propositions concern not existence.-Hitherto we have only considered the essences of things, which being only abstract ideas, and thereby removed in our thoughts from particular existence (that being the proper operation of the mind, in abstraction, to consider an idea under no other existence but what it has in the understanding), gives us no knowledge of real existence at all. Where, by the way, we may take notice that universal propositions, of whose truth or falsehood we can have certain knowledge, concern not existence; and farther, that all particular affirmations or negations that would not be certain, if they were made general, are only concerning existence; they declaring only the accidental union or separation of ideas in things existing, which, in their abstract natures, have no known necessary union or repugnancy.

§ 2. A three-fold knowledge of existence.-But, leaving the nature of propositions, and different ways of predication, to be considered more at large in another place, let us proceed now to inquire concerning our knowledge of the existence of things, and how we come by it. I say then, that we have the knowledge of our own existence, by intuition; of the existence of God, by demonstration; and of other things, by sensation.

§ 3. Our knowledge of our own existence is intuitive.-As for our own existence, we perceive it so plainly, and so certainly, that it neither needs, nor is capable of, any proof. For nothing can be more evident to us, than our own existence. I think, I reason, I feel pleasure and pain; can any of these be more evident to me, than my own existence? If I doubt of all other things, that very doubt makes me perceive my own existence, and will not suffer me to doubt of that. For if I know I feel pain, it is evident I have as certain perception of my own existence, as of the existence of the pain I feel: or if I know I doubt, I have as certain perception of the existence of the thing doubting, as of that thought which I call doubt. Experience then convinces us, that we have an intuitive knowledge of our own existence, and an internal infallible perception that we are. In every act of sensation, reasoning, or thinking, we are conscious to ourselves of our own being; and, in this matter, come not short of the highest degree of certainty.

CHAP. X.

OF OUR KNOWLEDGE OF THE EXISTENCE OF A GOD.

§1. We are capable of knowing certainly that there is a God.Though God has given us no innate ideas of himself; though he has stamped no original characters in our minds, wherein we may read his being; yet having furnished us with those faculties our minds are endowed with, he hath not left himself without witness; since we have sense, perception, and reason, and cannot want a clear proof of him, as long as we carry ourselves about us. Nor can we justly complain of our ignorance in this great point since he has so plentifully provided us with the means to discover and know him, so far as is necessary, to the end of our being, and the great concernment of our happiness. But though this be the most obvious truth that reason discovers, and though its evidence be (if I mistake not) equal to mathematical certainty; yet it requires thought and attention, and the mind must apply itself to a regular deduction of it from some part of our intuitive knowledge, or else we shall be as uncertain and ignorant of this as of other propositions, which are in themselves capable of clear demonstration. To shew, therefore, that we are capable of knowing, i. e. being certain that there is a God, and how we may come by this certainty, I think we need go no farther than ourselves, and that undoubted knowledge we have of our own existence.

§2. Man knows that he himself is.-I think it is beyond question, that man has a clear idea of his own being; he knows certainly that he exists, and that he is something. He that can doubt, whether he be any thing or no, I speak not to; no more than I would argue with pure nothing, or endeavour to convince non-entity, that it were something. If any one pretends to be so sceptical, as to deny his own existence (for really to doubt of it, is manifestly impossible), let him for me enjoy his beloved happiness of being nothing, until hunger, or some other pain convince him of the contrary. This then, I think, I may take for a truth, which every one's certain knowledge assures him of beyond the liberty of doubting, viz. that he is something that actually exists.

§3. He knows also, that nothing cannot produce a being, therefore something eternal.-In the next place, man knows by an intuitive certainty, that bare nothing can no more produce any real being, than it can be equal to two right angles. If a man knows not that non-entity, or the absence of all being, cannot be equal to two right angles, it is impossible he should know any demonstration in Euclid. If therefore we know there is some real being, and that non-entity cannot produce any real being, it is an evident demonstration, that from eternity there has been something; since what was not from eternity, had a beginning; and what had a beginning, must be produced by something else.

§4. That eternal being must be most powerful.-Next, it is evident, that what had its being and beginning from another, must also have all that which is in, and belongs to its being from another too.

All the

powers it has must be owing to, and received from, the same source.. This eternal source, then, of all being, must also be the source and original of all power; and so this eternal being must be also the most powerful.

§ 5. And most knowing.—Again, a man finds in himself perception and knowledge. We have then got one step farther; and we are certain now, that there is not only some being, but some knowing intelligent being, in the world.

There was a time then, when there was no knowing being, and when knowledge began to be; or else, there has been also a knowing being from eternity. If it be said, there was a time when no being had any knowledge, when that eternal being was void of all understanding; I reply, that then it was impossible there should ever have been any knowledge. It being as impossible that things wholly void of knowledge, and operating blindly, and without any perception, should produce a knowing being; as it is impossible, that a triangle should make itself three angles bigger than two right ones. For it is as repugnant to the idea of senseless matter, that it should put into itself sense, perception, and knowledge; as it is repugnant to the idea of a triangle, that it should put into itself greater angles than two right ones.

§ 6. And therefore God. Thus from the consideration of ourselves, and what we infallibly find in our own constitutions, our reason leads us to the knowledge of this certain and evident truth, that there is an eternal, most powerful, and most knowing Being; which, whether any one will please to call God, it matters not. The thing is evident; and from this idea duly considered, will easily be deduced all those other attributes which we ought to ascribe to this eternal Being. If, nevertheless, any one should be found so senselessly arrogant, as to suppose man alone, knowing and wise, but yet the product of mere ignorance and chance; and that all the rest of the universe acted only by that blind hap-hazard; I shall leave with him that very rational and emphatical rebuke of Tully, 1. 2. de Leg. to be considered at his leisure: "What can be more sillily arrogant and misbecoming, than for a man to think that he has a mind and understanding in him, but yet in all the universe beside, there is no such thing? Or that those things, which with the utmost stretch of his reason he can scarce comprehend, should be moved and managed without any reason at all?” “Quid est enim verius, quam neminem esse oportere tam stulte arrogantem, ut in se mentem et rationem putet inesse, in cœlo mundoque non putet? Aut ea quæ vix summa ingenii ratione comprehendat, nulla ratione moveri putet?"

From what has been said, it is plain to me we have a more certain knowledge of the existence of a God, than of any thing our senses have not immediately discovered to us. Nay, I presume I may say that we may more certainly know that there is a God, than that there is any thing else without us. When I say we know, I mean there is such a knowledge within our reach, which we cannot miss, if we will but apply our minds to that, as we do to several other inquiries.

$7. Our idea of a most perfect being, not the sole proof of a God. -How far the idea of a most perfect being, which a man may frame