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can how matter should think. Whether the complex idea of body or of spirit, be clearest, the simple ideas that compose them are only received from sensation or reflection; as is our idea of God himself: for having got the ideas of existence and duration, of knowledge and power, of pleasure and happiness, with several other qualities and powers which it is better to have than be without, we enlarge each with the idea of infinity, and putting them together make our complex idea of God.

CHAP. XXIV.

OF THE COLLECTIVE IDEAS OF SUBSTANCES.

THE mind by its power of composition, uniting several distinct substances into one idea, forms complex collective ideas; such are our ideas of an army, a swarm, a city, a fleet, &c. each of which collective ideas is as easily conceived to be one particular idea as our complex idea of any substance.-Almost all artificial things, at least such as are made up of distinct substances, are collective ideas; and if we rightly consider these collective ideas, army, constellation, universe, we shall find them to be artificial draughts of the mind, bringing remote and indepen

dent things into one view, uniting them in one conception, and signifying them by one name, in order the better to contemplate and discourse of them.

CHAP. XXV.

OF RELATION.

THE understanding, in considering any thing, is not confined to that precise object; but can look beyond it to see how it stands in conformity to any other. The bringing two distinct things together, and carrying your view from one to the other is rela tion: the denominations given to positive things, indicating the respect they bear to each other, are called relatives; and the things compared are called related.

My idea of Caius merely as a man is positive; when I call him husband, I produce the idea of relation to some other person: if I call him white, the idea is merely positive; but if I name him whiter it is relative. As any idea may occasion the mind to compare two things together, any idea may be the foundation of relation.

Relations when expressed by correlative terms, are very obvious; as, father and son,-bigger and

less,-cause and effect: where correlative terms are wanting, relations are not so easily perceived; hence many names which evidently include relation have been considered as external denominations: concubine is no doubt a relative name as well as wife. Every name expresses either some idea existing in the thing denominated, and is then positive; or the idea the mind has of it compared with something distinct from it, and then is relative.

Some terms which seem to signify something absolute in the subject, yet conceal a tacit relation; as old, great, imperfect. Ideas of relation may be the same in men who have very different ideas of the things related; for they who have very different ideas of a man may agree in the notion of a father. A change of relation may take place without any change in the subject; thus Caius whom to day I consider as a father, ceases to be so to morrow only by the death of his son.-Our ideas of relations are often clearer than of the subjects related: the notion we have of a father is more distinct than that of a man; the notion of a friend more distinct than of God: because the knowledge of one action, or one simplé idea, is often sufficient to give me the notion of a relation; but an accurate collection of sundry ideas is necessary to the knowing of any substantial be ing,

CHAP. XXVI.

OF CAUSE AND EFFECT AND OTHER RELA-TIONS.

IN the notice our senses take of the constant vicissitude of things, we cannot but observe that several qualities and substances begin to exist; and that they receive this their existence from the due application and operation of some other being:-hence we get our ideas of cause and effect. What produces any idea, we call cause; and what is produced effect: thus finding that a certain degree of heat produces fluidity in wax, we call the simple idea heat the cause, and fluidity the effect, each in relation to the other.

When any thing is wholly made new, which had before no existence, it is called creation: When any substance is produced by the insensible operation of particles of matter which all existed before, it is called generation: When the cause is extrinsical, and the effect produced by a sensible separation, or juxta-position of discernible parts, we call it making; such are all artificial things: and when any simple idea is produced which was not in a subject before, we call it alteration: thus, a Man is generated, a Picture made, and either is altered when any new sensible quality or simple idea is produced in them.

Time and Place are the foundations of very large relations thus all words answering to the questions how long? when? express relations; importing the relation of one duration to some other, or shewing the distance of any point of time from the period of a longer duration, from which we measure, and to which we thereby consider it as related.-Young and Old are ordinarily thought to stand for positive ideas, though in fact they intimate the relation any thing has to a certain length of duration' whereof we have an idea in our minds; thus having the idea of the ordinary duration of a man to be 70 years, we say a man is young, when he has lived but a small part of that time, and old, when his duration has almost reached the end of that which men do not usually exceed :— We call a man young at 20 years, very young at 7; but a horse old at 20 years, and a dog old at 7; because we compare their ages to different ideas of duration, which are settled in our minds as belonging to these animals in the ordinary course of nature.-There are also many obvious relations of Place and Extension, with many others; as, far and near, great and little, weak and strong, which we signify by names called Positive. Abundance of words in ordinary speech stand for relations which at first sight seem to have no such signification; as when we say, The ship has necessary stores; where necessary and stores are relative words; the first having relation to

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