fpace without body, as whether there were fpace without fpace, or body without body, fince thefe were but, different names of the fame idea.

§ 25. Extenfion being infeparable from Body, proves it

not the fame.

Ir is true, the idea of extenfion joins itself so infeparably with all vifible and most tangible qualities, that it fuffers us to fee no one, or feel very few external objects, without taking in impreffions of extension too. This readiness of extenfion to make itself be taken notice of fo conftantly with other ideas, has been the occafion, I guefs, that fome have made the whole effence of body to confift in extenfion; which is not much to be wondered at, fince fome have had their minds, by their eyes and touch (the busieft of all our fenfes), fo filled. with the idea of extenfion, and as it were wholly poffeffed with it, that they allowed no existence to any thing that had nu extenfion. I fhall not now argue with thofe men who take the measure and poffibility of all being only from their narrow and grofs imaginations; but having here to do only with those who conclude the effence of body to be extenfion, because they fay they cannot imagine any fenfible quality of any body without extenfion, I fhall defire them to confider, that had they reflected on their ideas of taftes and smells as much as on thofe of fight and touch, nay, had they examined their ideas of hunger and thirst, and feveral other pains, they would have found that they included in them no idea of extension at all, which is but an affection of body as well as the reft, difcoverable by our fenfes, which are fcarce acute enough to look into the pure effences of things. § 26.

IF thofe ideas, which are conftantly joined to all others, must therefore be concluded to be the effence of those things which have conftantly thofe ideas joined to them, and are infeparable from them, then unity is without doubt the effence of every thing; for there is not any object of fenfation or reflection which does not. carry

with it the idea of one. But the weakness of this kind of argument we have already fhown fufficiently.

§ 27. Ideas of Space and Solidity distinct.

To conclude, whatever men fhall think concerning the existence of a vacuum, this is plain to me, that we have as clear an idea of space diftinct from folidity, as we have of folidity diftinct from motion, or motion from space. We have not any two more diftinct ideas; and we can as easily conceive space without folidity, as we can conceive body or space without motion, though it be ever fo certain that neither body nor motion can exist without space. But whether any one will take space to be only a relation refulting from the existence of other beings at a distance, or whether they will think the words of the most knowing king Solomon, the heaven, and the heaven of heavens cannot contain thee, or those more emphatical ones of the infpired philofopher, St. Paul, In him we live, move, and have nr being, are to be understood in a literal fenfe, I leave every one to confider; only our idea of space is, I think, fuch as I have mentioned, and distinct from that of body. For whether we confider in matter itself the distance of its coherent folid parts, and call it, in refpect of those folid parts, extenfion; or whether, confidering it as lying between the extremities of any body in its feveral dimenfions, we call it length, breadth, and thickness ; or elfe confidering it as lying between any two bodies or pofitive beings, without any confideration whether there be any matter or no between, we call it diftance; however named or confidered, it is always the fame uniform fimple idea of space, taken from objects about which our fenfes have been converfant; whereof having fettled ideas in our minds, we can revive, repeat, and add them one to another as often as we will, and confider the space or diftance fo imagined, either as filled with folid parts, fo that another body cannot come there without difplacing and thrusting out the body that was there before, or elfe as void of folidity, fo that a body of equal dimensions. to that empty or pure space may be placed in it,

155 without the removing or expulfion of any thing that was there. But to avoid confufion in difcourfes concerning this matter, it were poffibly to be wished that the name extenfion were applied only to matter, or the diftance of the extremities of particular bodies, and the term expansion to space in general, with or without folid matter poffefling it, fo as to fay space is expanded, and body extended. But in this every one has his liberty; I propofe it only for the more clear and diftinct way of fpeaking.

§ 28. Men differ little in clear fimple Ideas. THE knowing precisely what our words ftand for, would, I imagine, in this, as well as a great many other cafes, quickly end the difpute; for I am apt to think that men, when they come to examine them, find their fimple ideas all generally to agree, though in discourse with one another they perhaps confound one another with different names. I imagine that men who abstract their thoughts, and do well examine the ideas of their own minds, cannot much differ in thinking, however they may perplex themselves with words, according to the way of fpeaking of the feveral schools or fects they have been bred up in; though amongst unthinking men, who examine not fcrupuloufly and carefully their own ideas, and ftrip them not from the marks men use for them, but confound them with words, there must be endlefs difpute, wrangling, and jargon, especially if they be learned bookish men, devoted to fome fect, and accustomed to the language of it, and have learned to talk after others. But if it fhould happen that any two thinking men should really have different ideas, I do not fee how they could difcourfe or argue one with another. Here I must not be mistaken to think that every floating imagination in mens brains is presently of that fort of ideas I fpeak of. It is not eafy for the mind to put off thofe confufed notions and prejudices it has imbibed from cuftom, inadvertency, and common conversation; it requires pains and affiduity to examine its ideas, till it refolves them into those clear and distinct fimple ones out of which they are com

pounded, and to fee which amongst its fimple ones have or have not a neceffary conection and dependence one upon another. Till a man doth this in the primary and original notions of things, he builds upon floating and uncertain principles, and will often find himself at a lofs.

TH

CHAP. XIV.

OF DURATION, AND ITS SIMPLE MODES.

1. Duration is fleeting Extenfion.

HERE is another fort of diftance or length, the idea whereof we get not from the permanent parts of space, but from the fleeting and perpetually perishing parts of fucceffion. This we call duration, the fimple modes whereof are any different lengths of it, whereof we have diftinct ideas, as hours, days, years, &c. time and eternity.

§ 2. Its Idea from Reflection on the Train of our Ideas. THE anfwer of a great man to one who asked what time was, Si non rogas intelligo (which amounts to this, the more I set myself to think of it, the lefs I underftand it), might perhaps perfuade one that time, which reveals all other things, is itself not to be difcovered. Duration, time, and eternity, are, not without reason, thought to have fomething very abftrufe in their nature; but however remote thefe may feem from our comprehenfion, yet if we trace them right to their originals, I doubt not but one of thofe fources of all our knowledge, viz. fenfation and reflection, will be able to furnish us with thefe ideas, as clear and diftinct as many other which are thought much lefs obfcure; and we fhall find, that the idea of eternity itself is derived from the fame common original with the rest of our ideas.

$3.

To understand time and eternity aright, we ought with attention to confider what idea it is we have of duration, and how we came by it. It is evident to any one,

who will but obferve what paffes in his own mind, that there is a train of ideas, which conftantly fucceed one another in his understanding, as long as he is awake. Reflection on thefe appearances of feveral ideas, one after another, in our minds, is that which furnishes us with the idea of fucceffion; and the diftance between any parts of that fucceffion, or between the appearance of any two ideas in our minds, is that we call duration: For whilft we are thinking, or whilst we receive fucceffively feveral ideas in our minds, we know that we do exist; and fo we call the existence, or the continuation of the existence of ourselves, or any thing else commenfurate to the fucceflion of any ideas in our minds, the duration of ourselves, or any fuch other thing co-existing with our thinking.

§4.

THAT we have our notion of fucceffion and duration from this original, viz. from reflection on the train of ideas which we find to appear one after another in our minds, feems plain to me, in that we have no perception of duration, but by confidering the train of ideas that take their turns in our understandings. When that fucceffion of ideas ceafes, our perception of duration ceases with it; which every one clearly experiments in himfelf, whilft he fleeps foundly, whether an hour or a day, a month or a year; of which duration of things, whilft he fleeps or thinks not, he has no perception at all, but it is quite lost to him; and the moment wherein he leaves off to think, till the moment he begins to think again, seems to him to have no distance. And fo I doubt not, it would be to a waking man, if it were poffible for him to keep only one idea in his mind, without variation and the fucceffion of others; and we fee, that one who fixes his thoughts very intently on one thing, so as to take but little notice of the fucceffion of ideas that pafs in his mind, whilft he is taken up with. that earnest contemplation, lets flip out of his account a good part of that duration, and thinks that time shorter than it is. But if fleep commonly unites the distant parts of duration, it is becaufe during that time we have