Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan (1651)
The First Part: Of Man
Chapter i. Of Sense
CONCERNING the thoughts
of man, I will consider them first singly, and afterwards in train or
dependence upon one another. Singly, they are everyone a representation or appearance
of some quality, or other accident of a body without us, which is commonly
called an object. Which object worketh on the eyes, ears, and other parts of
man's body, and by diversity of working produceth diversity of appearances.
The original of them all is that which we call sense, (for there is no conception in a
man's mind which hath not at first, totally or by parts, been begotten upon the
organs of sense). The rest are derived from that original.
To know the natural cause of sense is not very necessary to the
business now in hand; and I have elsewhere written of the same at large.
Nevertheless, to fill each part of my present method, I will briefly deliver
the same in this place.
The cause of sense is the external body, or object, which presseth
the organ proper to each sense, either immediately, as in the taste and touch;
or mediately, as in seeing, hearing, and smelling: which pressure, by the
mediation of nerves and other strings and membranes of the body, continued
inwards to the brain and heart, causeth there a resistance, or
counter-pressure, or endeavour of the heart to deliver itself: which endeavour,
because outward, seemeth to be some matter without. And this seeming, or fancy,
is that which men call sense; and consisteth, as to the eye, in a light, or
colour figured; to the ear, in a sound; to the nostril, in an odour; to the
tongue and palate, in a savour; and to the rest of the body, in heat, cold,
hardness, softness, and such other qualities as we discern by feeling. All
which qualities called sensible are in the object that causeth them but so many
several motions of the matter, by which it presseth our organs diversely.
Neither in us that are pressed are they anything else but diverse motions (for
motion produceth nothing but motion). But their appearance to us is fancy, the
same waking that dreaming. And as pressing, rubbing, or striking the eye makes
us fancy a light, and pressing the ear produceth a din; so do the bodies also
we see, or hear, produce the same by their strong, though unobserved action.
For if those colours and sounds were in the bodies or objects that cause them,
they could not be severed from them, as by glasses and in echoes by reflection
we see they are: where we know the thing we see is in one place; the appearance,
in another. And though at some certain distance the real and very object seem
invested with the fancy it begets in us; yet still the object is one thing, the
image or fancy is another. So that sense in all cases is nothing else but
original fancy caused (as I have said) by the pressure that is, by the motion
of external things upon our eyes, ears, and other organs, thereunto ordained.
But the philosophy schools, through all the universities of
Christendom, grounded upon certain texts of Aristotle, teach another doctrine;
and say, for the cause of vision, that the thing seen sendeth forth on every
side a visible species, (in English) a visible show, apparition, or aspect, or
a being seen; the receiving whereof into the eye is seeing. And for the cause
of hearing, that the thing heard sendeth forth an audible species, that is, an
audible aspect, or audible being seen; which, entering at the ear, maketh
hearing. Nay, for the cause of understanding also, they say the thing
understood sendeth forth an intelligible species, that is, an intelligible
being seen; which, coming into the understanding, makes us understand. I say
not this, as disapproving the use of universities: but because I am to speak
hereafter of their office in a Commonwealth, I must let you see on all
occasions by the way what things would be amended in them; amongst which the
frequency of insignificant speech is one.
Chapter ii. Of Imagination
THAT when a thing lies
still, unless somewhat else stir it, it will lie still forever, is a truth that
no man doubts of. But that when a thing is in motion, it will eternally be in
motion, unless somewhat else stay it, though the reason be the same (namely,
that nothing can change itself), is not so easily assented to. For men measure,
not only other men, but all other things, by themselves: and because they find
themselves subject after motion to pain and lassitude, think everything else
grows weary of motion, and seeks repose of its own accord; little considering
whether it be not some other motion wherein that desire of rest they find in
themselves consisteth. From hence it is that the schools say, heavy bodies fall
downwards out of an appetite to rest, and to conserve their nature in that
place which is most proper for them; ascribing appetite, and knowledge of what
is good for their conservation (which is more than man has), to things
inanimate, absurdly.
When a body is once in motion, it moveth (unless something else
hinder it) eternally; and whatsoever hindreth it, cannot in an instant, but in time,
and by degrees, quite extinguish it: and as we see in the water, though the
wind cease, the waves give not over rolling for a long time after; so also it
happeneth in that motion which is made in the internal parts of a man, then,
when he sees, dreams, etc. For after the object is removed, or the eye shut, we
still retain an image of the thing seen, though more obscure than when we see
it. And this is it the Latins call imagination,
from the image made in seeing, and apply the same, though improperly, to all
the other senses. But the Greeks call it fancy,
which signifies appearance, and is as proper to one sense as to another.
Imagination, therefore, is nothing but decaying sense; and is found in men and
many other living creatures, as well sleeping as waking.
The decay of sense in men waking is not the decay of the motion
made in sense, but an obscuring of it, in such manner as the light of the sun
obscureth the light of the stars; which stars do no less exercise their virtue
by which they are visible in the day than in the night. But because amongst
many strokes which our eyes, ears, and other organs receive from external
bodies, the predominant only is sensible; therefore the light of the sun being
predominant, we are not affected with the action of the stars. And any object
being removed from our eyes, though the impression it made in us remain, yet
other objects more present succeeding, and working on us, the imagination of
the past is obscured and made weak, as the voice of a man is in the noise of
the day. From whence it followeth that the longer the time is, after the sight
or sense of any object, the weaker is the imagination. For the continual change
of man's body destroys in time the parts which in sense were moved: so that
distance of time, and of place, hath one and the same effect in us. For as at a
great distance of place that which we look at appears dim, and without
distinction of the smaller parts, and as voices grow weak and inarticulate: so
also after great distance of time our imagination of the past is weak; and we
lose, for example, of cities we have seen, many particular streets; and of
actions, many particular circumstances. This decaying sense, when we would
express the thing itself (I mean fancy itself), we call imagination, as I said
before. But when we would express the decay, and signify that the sense is
fading, old, and past, it is called memory. So that imagination and memory are but one thing, which for
diverse considerations hath diverse names.
Much memory, or memory of many things, is called experience. Again, imagination being
only of those things which have been formerly perceived by sense, either all at
once, or by parts at several times; the former (which is the imagining the
whole object, as it was presented to the sense) is simple imagination, as when
one imagineth a man, or horse, which he hath seen before. The other is
compounded, when from the sight of a man at one time, and of a horse at
another, we conceive in our mind a centaur. So when a man compoundeth the image
of his own person with the image of the actions of another man, as when a man
imagines himself a Hercules or an Alexander (which happeneth often to them that
are much taken with reading of romances), it is a compound imagination, and
properly but a fiction of the mind. There be also other imaginations that rise
in men, though waking, from the great impression made in sense: as from gazing
upon the sun, the impression leaves an image of the sun before our eyes a long
time after; and from being long and vehemently attent upon geometrical figures,
a man shall in the dark, though awake, have the images of lines and angles
before his eyes; which kind of fancy hath no particular name, as being a thing
that doth not commonly fall into men's discourse.
The imaginations of them that sleep are those we call dreams. And these also (as all other
imaginations) have been before, either totally or by parcels, in the sense. And
because in sense, the brain and nerves, which are the necessary organs of
sense, are so benumbed in sleep as not easily to be moved by the action of
external objects, there can happen in sleep no imagination, and therefore no
dream, but what proceeds from the agitation of the inward parts of man's body;
which inward parts, for the connexion they have with the brain and other
organs, when they be distempered do keep the same in motion; whereby the
imaginations there formerly made, appear as if a man were waking; saving that
the organs of sense being now benumbed, so as there is no new object which can
master and obscure them with a more vigorous impression, a dream must needs be
more clear, in this silence of sense, than are our waking thoughts. And hence
it cometh to pass that it is a hard matter, and by many thought impossible, to
distinguish exactly between sense and dreaming. For my part, when I consider
that in dreams I do not often nor constantly think of the same persons, places,
objects, and actions that I do waking, nor remember so long a train of coherent
thoughts dreaming as at other times; and because waking I often observe the
absurdity of dreams, but never dream of the absurdities of my waking thoughts,
I am well satisfied that, being awake, I know I dream not; though when I dream,
I think myself awake.
And seeing dreams are caused by the distemper of some of the
inward parts of the body, diverse distempers must needs cause different dreams.
And hence it is that lying cold breedeth dreams of fear, and raiseth the
thought and image of some fearful object, the motion from the brain to the
inner parts, and from the inner parts to the brain being reciprocal; and that
as anger causeth heat in some parts of the body when we are awake, so when we
sleep the overheating of the same parts causeth anger, and raiseth up in the
brain the imagination of an enemy. In the same manner, as natural kindness when
we are awake causeth desire, and desire makes heat in certain other parts of
the body; so also too much heat in those parts, while we sleep, raiseth in the
brain an imagination of some kindness shown. In sum, our dreams are the reverse
of our waking imaginations; the motion when we are awake beginning at one end,
and when we dream, at another.
The most difficult discerning of a man's dream from his waking
thoughts is, then, when by some accident we observe not that we have slept:
which is easy to happen to a man full of fearful thoughts; and whose conscience
is much troubled; and that sleepeth without the circumstances of going to bed,
or putting off his clothes, as one that noddeth in a chair. For he that taketh
pains, and industriously lays himself to sleep, in case any uncouth and
exorbitant fancy come unto him, cannot easily think it other than a dream. We
read of Marcus Brutus (one that had his life given him by Julius Caesar, and
was also his favorite, and notwithstanding murdered him), how at Philippi, the
night before he gave battle to Augustus Caesar, he saw a fearful apparition,
which is commonly related by historians as a vision, but, considering the
circumstances, one may easily judge to have been but a short dream. For sitting
in his tent, pensive and troubled with the horror of his rash act, it was not
hard for him, slumbering in the cold, to dream of that which most affrighted
him; which fear, as by degrees it made him wake, so also it must needs make the
apparition by degrees to vanish: and having no assurance that he slept, he
could have no cause to think it a dream, or anything but a vision. And this is
no very rare accident: for even they that be perfectly awake, if they be
timorous and superstitious, possessed with fearful tales, and alone in the
dark, are subject to the like fancies, and believe they see spirits and dead
men's ghosts walking in churchyards; whereas it is either their fancy only, or
else the knavery of such persons as make use of such superstitious fear to pass
disguised in the night to places they would not be known to haunt.
From this ignorance of how to distinguish dreams, and other strong
fancies, from vision and sense, did arise the greatest part of the religion of
the Gentiles in time past, that worshipped satyrs, fauns, nymphs, and the like;
and nowadays the opinion that rude people have of fairies, ghosts, and goblins,
and of the power of witches. For, as for witches, I think not that their
witchcraft is any real power, but yet that they are justly punished for the
false belief they have that they can do such mischief, joined with their
purpose to do it if they can, their trade being nearer to a new religion than
to a craft or science. And for fairies, and walking ghosts, the opinion of them
has, I think, been on purpose either taught, or not confuted, to keep in credit
the use of exorcism, of crosses, of holy water, and other such inventions of
ghostly men. Nevertheless, there is no doubt but God can make unnatural
apparitions: but that He does it so often as men need to fear such things more
than they fear the stay, or change, of the course of Nature, which he also can
stay, and change, is no point of Christian faith. But evil men, under pretext
that God can do anything, are so bold as to say anything when it serves their
turn, though they think it untrue; it is the part of a wise man to believe them
no further than right reason makes that which they say appear credible. If this
superstitious fear of spirits were taken away, and with it prognostics from
dreams, false prophecies, and many other things depending thereon, by which
crafty ambitious persons abuse the simple people, men would be would be much
more fitted than they are for civil obedience.
And this ought to be the work of the schools, but they rather
nourish such doctrine. For (not knowing what imagination, or the senses are)
what they receive, they teach: some saying that imaginations rise of
themselves, and have no cause; others that they rise most commonly from the
will; and that good thoughts are blown (inspired) into a man by God, and evil
thoughts, by the Devil; or that good thoughts are poured (infused) into a man
by God, and evil ones by the Devil. Some say the senses receive the species of
things, and deliver them to the common sense; and the common sense delivers
them over to the fancy, and the fancy to the memory, and the memory to the
judgement, like handing of things from one to another, with many words making
nothing understood.
The imagination that is raised in man (or any other creature
endued with the faculty of imagining) by words, or other voluntary signs, is
that we generally call understanding, and is common to man and beast. For a dog
by custom will understand the call or the rating of his master; and so will
many other beasts. That understanding which is peculiar to man is the
understanding not only his will, but his conceptions and thoughts, by the
sequel and contexture of the names of things into affirmations, negations, and
other forms of speech: and of this kind of understanding I shall speak
hereafter.
Chapter iii. Of the Consequence or Train
of Imaginations
BY CONSEQUENCE, or train of thoughts, I understand that
succession of one thought to another which is called, to distinguish it from
discourse in words, mental discourse.
When a man thinketh on anything whatsoever, his next thought after
is not altogether so casual as it seems to be. Not every thought to every
thought succeeds indifferently. But as we have no imagination, whereof we have
not formerly had sense, in whole or in parts; so we have no transition from one
imagination to another, whereof we never had the like before in our senses. The
reason whereof is this. All fancies are motions within us, relics of those made
in the sense; and those motions that immediately succeeded one another in the
sense continue also together after sense: in so much as the former coming again
to take place and be predominant, the latter followeth, by coherence of the matter
moved, in such manner as water upon a plain table is drawn which way any one
part of it is guided by the finger. But because in sense, to one and the same
thing perceived, sometimes one thing, sometimes another, succeedeth, it comes
to pass in time that in the imagining of anything, there is no certainty what
we shall imagine next; only this is certain, it shall be something that
succeeded the same before, at one time or another.
This train of thoughts, or mental discourse, is of two sorts. The
first is unguided, without design,
and inconstant; wherein there is no passionate thought to govern and direct
those that follow to itself as the end and scope of some desire, or other
passion; in which case the thoughts are said to wander, and seem impertinent
one to another, as in a dream. Such are commonly the thoughts of men that are
not only without company, but also without care of anything; though even then
their thoughts are as busy as at other times, but without harmony; as the sound
which a lute out of tune would yield to any man; or in tune, to one that could
not play. And yet in this wild ranging of the mind, a man may oft-times
perceive the way of it, and the dependence of one thought upon another. For in
a discourse of our present civil war, what could seem more impertinent than to
ask, as one did, what was the value of a Roman penny? Yet the coherence to me
was manifest enough. For the thought of the war introduced the thought of the
delivering up the King to his enemies; the thought of that brought in the
thought of the delivering up of Christ; and that again the thought of the 30
pence, which was the price of that treason: and thence easily followed that
malicious question; and all this in a moment of time, for thought is quick.
The second is more constant, as being regulated by some desire and design. For the impression made by
such things as we desire, or fear, is strong and permanent, or (if it cease for
a time) of quick return: so strong it is sometimes as to hinder and break our
sleep. From desire ariseth the thought of some means we have seen produce the
like of that which we aim at; and from the thought of that, the thought of
means to that mean; and so continually, till we come to some beginning within
our own power. And because the end, by the greatness of the impression, comes
often to mind, in case our thoughts begin to wander they are quickly again
reduced into the way: which, observed by one of the seven wise men, made him
give men this precept, which is now worn out: respice finem; that is to say, in
all your actions, look often upon what you would have, as the thing that
directs all your thoughts in the way to attain it.
The train of regulated thoughts is of two kinds: one, when of an
effect imagined we seek the causes or means that produce it; and this is common
to man and beast. The other is, when imagining anything whatsoever, we seek all
the possible effects that can by it be produced; that is to say, we imagine
what we can do with it when we have it. Of which I have not at any time seen
any sign, but in man only; for this is a curiosity hardly incident to the
nature of any living creature that has no other passion but sensual, such as
are hunger, thirst, lust, and anger. In sum, the discourse of the mind, when it
is governed by design, is nothing but seeking, or the faculty of invention,
which the Latins call sagacitas, and solertia; a hunting out of the causes of
some effect, present or past; or of the effects of some present or past cause.
Sometimes a man seeks what he hath lost; and from that place, and time, wherein
he misses it, his mind runs back, from place to place, and time to time, to
find where and when he had it; that is to say, to find some certain and limited
time and place in which to begin a method of seeking. Again, from thence, his
thoughts run over the same places and times to find what action or other
occasion might make him lose it. This we call remembrance, or calling to mind:
the Latins call it reminiscentia, as it were a re-conning of our former
actions.
Sometimes a man knows a place determinate, within the compass
whereof he is to seek; and then his thoughts run over all the parts thereof in
the same manner as one would sweep a room to find a jewel; or as a spaniel
ranges the field till he find a scent; or as a man should run over the alphabet
to start a rhyme.
Sometimes a man desires to know the event of an action; and then
he thinketh of some like action past, and the events thereof one after another,
supposing like events will follow like actions. As he that foresees what will
become of a criminal re-cons what he has seen follow on the like crime before,
having this order of thoughts; the crime, the officer, the prison, the judge,
and the gallows. Which kind of thoughts is called foresight, and prudence,
or providence, and sometimes wisdom; though such conjecture, through
the difficulty of observing all circumstances, be very fallacious. But this is
certain: by how much one man has more experience of things past than another;
by so much also he is more prudent, and his expectations the seldomer fail him.
The present only has a being in nature; things past have a being in the memory
only; but things to come have no being at all, the future being but a fiction
of the mind, applying the sequels of actions past to the actions that are
present; which with most certainty is done by him that has most experience, but
not with certainty enough. And though it be called prudence when the event
answereth our expectation; yet in its own nature it is but presumption. For the
foresight of things to come, which is providence, belongs only to him by whose
will they are to come. From him only, and supernaturally, proceeds prophecy.
The best prophet naturally is the best guesser; and the best guesser, he that
is most versed and studied in the matters he guesses at, for he hath most signs
to guess by.
A sign is the event antecedent of the consequent; and contrarily,
the consequent of the antecedent, when the like consequences have been observed
before: and the oftener they have been observed, the less uncertain is the
sign. And therefore he that has most experience in any kind of business has
most signs whereby to guess at the future time, and consequently is the most
prudent: and so much more prudent than he that is new in that kind of business,
as not to be equalled by any advantage of natural and extemporary wit, though
perhaps many young men think the contrary.
Nevertheless, it is not prudence that distinguisheth man from
beast. There be beasts that at a year old observe more and pursue that which is
for their good more prudently than a child can do at ten.
As prudence is a presumption of the future, contracted from the
experience of time past: so there is a presumption of things past taken from
other things, not future, but past also. For he that hath seen by what courses
and degrees a flourishing state hath first come into civil war, and then to
ruin; upon the sight of the ruins of any other state will guess the like war
and the like courses have been there also. But this conjecture has the same
uncertainty almost with the conjecture of the future, both being grounded only
upon experience.
There is no other act of man's mind, that I can remember,
naturally planted in him, so as to need no other thing to the exercise of it
but to be born a man, and live with the use of his five senses. Those other
faculties, of which I shall speak by and by, and which seem proper to man only,
are acquired and increased by study and industry, and of most men learned by
instruction and discipline, and proceed all from the invention of words and
speech. For besides sense, and thoughts, and the train of thoughts, the mind of
man has no other motion; though by the help of speech, and method, the same
faculties may be improved to such a height as to distinguish men from all other
living creatures.
Whatsoever we imagine is finite. Therefore there is no idea or
conception of anything we call infinite. No man can have in his mind an image
of infinite magnitude; nor conceive infinite swiftness, infinite time, or
infinite force, or infinite power. When we say anything is infinite, we signify
only that we are not able to conceive the ends and bounds of the thing named,
having no conception of the thing, but of our own inability. And therefore the
name of God is used, not to make us conceive Him (for He is incomprehensible,
and His greatness and power are unconceivable), but that we may honour Him.
Also because whatsoever, as I said before, we conceive has been perceived first
by sense, either all at once, or by parts, a man can have no thought
representing anything not subject to sense. No man therefore can conceive
anything, but he must conceive it in some place; and endued with some
determinate magnitude; and which may be divided into parts; nor that anything
is all in this place, and all in another place at the same time; nor that two
or more things can be in one and the same place at once: for none of these
things ever have or can be incident to sense, but are absurd speeches, taken
upon credit, without any signification at all, from deceived philosophers and
deceived, or deceiving, Schoolmen.
Chapter iv. Of Speech
THE INVENTION of
printing, though ingenious, compared with the invention of letters is no great
matter. But who was the first that found the use of letters is not known. He
that first brought them into Greece, men say, was Cadmus, the son of Agenor,
King of Phoenicia. A profitable invention for continuing the memory of time
past, and the conjunction of mankind dispersed into so many and distant regions
of the earth; and withal difficult, as proceeding from a watchful observation
of the diverse motions of the tongue, palate, lips, and other organs of speech;
whereby to make as many differences of characters to remember them. But the most
noble and profitable invention of all other was that of speech, consisting of names or appellations, and their connexion;
whereby men register their thoughts, recall them when they are past, and also
declare them one to another for mutual utility and conversation; without which
there had been amongst men neither Commonwealth, nor society, nor contract, nor
peace, no more than amongst lions, bears, and wolves. The first author of
speech was God himself, that instructed Adam how to name such creatures as He
presented to his sight; for the Scripture goeth no further in this matter. But
this was sufficient to direct him to add more names, as the experience and use
of the creatures should give him occasion; and to join them in such manner by
degrees as to make himself understood; and so by succession of time, so much
language might be gotten as he had found use for, though not so copious as an
orator or philosopher has need of. For I do not find anything in the Scripture
out of which, directly or by consequence, can be gathered that Adam was taught
the names of all figures, numbers, measures, colours, sounds, fancies,
relations; much less the names of words and speech, as general, special,
affirmative, negative, interrogative, optative, infinitive, all which are
useful; and least of all, of entity, intentionality, quiddity, and other
insignificant words of the school.
But all this language
gotten, and augmented by Adam and his posterity, was again lost at the tower of
Babel, when by the hand of God every man was stricken for his rebellion with an
oblivion of his former language. And being hereby forced to disperse themselves
into several parts of the world, it must needs be that the diversity of tongues
that now is, proceeded by degrees from them in such manner as need, the mother
of all inventions, taught them, and in tract of time grew everywhere more
copious.
The general use of
speech is to transfer our mental discourse into verbal, or the train of our
thoughts into a train of words, and that for two commodities; whereof one is
the registering of the consequences of our thoughts, which being apt to slip
out of our memory and put us to a new labour, may again be recalled by such
words as they were marked by. So that the first use of names is to serve for
marks or notes of remembrance. Another is when many use the same words to
signify, by their connexion and order one to another, what they conceive or
think of each matter; and also what they desire, fear, or have any other
passion for. And for this use they are called signs. Special uses of speech are
these: first, to register what by cogitation we find to be the cause of
anything, present or past; and what we find things present or past may produce,
or effect; which, in sum, is acquiring of arts. Secondly, to show to others
that knowledge which we have attained; which is to counsel and teach one
another. Thirdly, to make known to others our wills and purposes that we may
have the mutual help of one another. Fourthly, to please and delight ourselves,
and others, by playing with our words, for pleasure or ornament, innocently.
To these uses, there are
also four correspondent abuses. First, when men register their thoughts wrong
by the inconstancy of the signification of their words; by which they register
for their conceptions that which they never conceived, and so deceive
themselves. Secondly, when they use words metaphorically; that is, in other
sense than that they are ordained for, and thereby deceive others. Thirdly, when
by words they declare that to be their will which is not. Fourthly, when they
use them to grieve one another: for seeing nature hath armed living creatures,
some with teeth, some with horns, and some with hands, to grieve an enemy, it
is but an abuse of speech to grieve him with the tongue, unless it be one whom
we are obliged to govern; and then it is not to grieve, but to correct and
amend.
The manner how speech
serveth to the remembrance of the consequence of causes and effects consisteth
in the imposing of names, and the connexion of them.
Of names, some are
proper, and singular to one only thing; as Peter, John, this man, this tree:
and some are common to many things; as man, horse, tree; every of which, though
but one name, is nevertheless the name of diverse particular things; in respect
of all which together, it is called a universal, there being nothing in the
world universal but names; for the things named are every one of them
individual and singular.
One universal name is
imposed on many things for their similitude in some quality, or other accident:
and whereas a proper name bringeth to mind one thing only, universals recall
any one of those many.
And of names universal,
some are of more and some of less extent, the larger comprehending the less
large; and some again of equal extent, comprehending each other reciprocally.
As for example, the name body is of larger signification than the word man, and
comprehendeth it; and the names man and rational are of equal extent,
comprehending mutually one another. But here we must take notice that by a name
is not always understood, as in grammar, one only word, but sometimes by
circumlocution many words together. For all these words, He that in his actions
observeth the laws of his country, make but one name, equivalent to this one
word, just.
By this imposition of
names, some of larger, some of stricter signification, we turn the reckoning of
the consequences of things imagined in the mind into a reckoning of the
consequences of appellations. For example, a man that hath no use of speech at
all, (such as is born and remains perfectly deaf and dumb), if he set before
his eyes a triangle, and by it two right angles (such as are the corners of a
square figure), he may by meditation compare and find that the three angles of
that triangle are equal to those two right angles that stand by it. But if
another triangle be shown him different in shape from the former, he cannot
know without a new labour whether the three angles of that also be equal to the
same. But he that hath the use of words, when he observes that such equality
was consequent, not to the length of the sides, nor to any other particular
thing in his triangle; but only to this, that the sides were straight, and the
angles three, and that that was all, for which he named it a triangle; will
boldly conclude universally that such equality of angles is in all triangles
whatsoever, and register his invention in these general terms: Every triangle
hath its three angles equal to two right angles. And thus the consequence found
in one particular comes to be registered and remembered as a universal rule;
and discharges our mental reckoning of time and place, and delivers us from all
labour of the mind, saving the first; and makes that which was found true here,
and now, to be true in all times and places.
But the use of words in
registering our thoughts is in nothing so evident as in numbering. A natural
fool that could never learn by heart the order of numeral words, as one, two,
and three, may observe every stroke of the clock, and nod to it, or say one,
one, one, but can never know what hour it strikes. And it seems there was a
time when those names of number were not in use; and men were fain to apply
their fingers of one or both hands to those things they desired to keep account
of; and that thence it proceeded that now our numeral words are but ten, in any
nation, and in some but five, and then they begin again. And he that can tell
ten, if he recite them out of order, will lose himself, and not know when he
has done: much less will he be able to add, and subtract, and perform all other
operations of arithmetic. So that without words there is no possibility of
reckoning of numbers; much less of magnitudes, of swiftness, of force, and
other things, the reckonings whereof are necessary to the being or well-being
of mankind.
When two names are
joined together into a consequence, or affirmation, as thus, A man is a living
creature; or thus, If he be a man, he is a living creature; if the latter name
living creature signify all that the former name man signifieth, then the
affirmation, or consequence, is true; otherwise false. For true and false are
attributes of speech, not of things. And where speech is not, there is neither
truth nor falsehood. Error there may be, as when we expect that which shall not
be, or suspect what has not been; but in neither case can a man be charged with
untruth.
Seeing then that truth
consisteth in the right ordering of names in our affirmations, a man that
seeketh precise truth had need to remember what every name he uses stands for,
and to place it accordingly; or else he will find himself entangled in words,
as a bird in lime twigs; the more he struggles, the more belimed. And therefore
in geometry (which is the only science
that it hath pleased God hitherto to bestow on mankind), men begin at settling
the significations of their words; which settling of significations, they call
definitions, and place them in the beginning of their reckoning.
By this it appears how
necessary it is for any man that aspires to true knowledge to examine the
definitions of former authors; and either to correct them, where they are
negligently set down, or to make them himself. For the errors of definitions
multiply themselves, according as the reckoning proceeds, and lead men into
absurdities, which at last they see, but cannot avoid, without reckoning anew
from the beginning; in which lies the foundation of their errors. From whence
it happens that they which trust to books do as they that cast up many little
sums into a greater, without considering whether those little sums were rightly
cast up or not; and at last finding the error visible, and not mistrusting
their first grounds, know not which way to clear themselves, spend time in
fluttering over their books; as birds that entering by the chimney, and finding
themselves enclosed in a chamber, flutter at the false light of a glass window,
for want of wit to consider which way they came in. So that in the right
definition of names lies the first use of speech; which is the acquisition of
science: and in wrong, or no definitions, lies the first abuse; from which
proceed all false and senseless tenets; which make those men that take their
instruction from the authority of books, and not from their own meditation, to
be as much below the condition of ignorant men as men endued with true science
are above it. For between true science and erroneous doctrines, ignorance is in
the middle. Natural sense and imagination are not subject to absurdity. Nature
itself cannot err: and as men abound in copiousness of language; so they become
more wise, or more mad, than ordinary. Nor is it possible without letters for
any man to become either excellently wise or (unless his memory be hurt by
disease, or ill constitution of organs) excellently foolish. For words are wise
men's counters; they do but reckon by them: but they are the money of fools,
that value them by the authority of an Aristotle, a Cicero, or a Thomas, or any
other doctor whatsoever, if but a man.
Subject to names is
whatsoever can enter into or be considered in an account, and be added one to
another to make a sum, or subtracted one from another and leave a remainder.
The Latins called accounts of money rationes,
and accounting, ratiocinatio: and that
which we in bills or books of account call items, they called nomina; that is, names: and thence it
seems to proceed that they extended the word ratio to the faculty of reckoning
in all other things. The Greeks have but one word, logos, for both speech and reason; not that they thought there was
no speech without reason, but no reasoning without speech; and the act of
reasoning they called syllogism; which signifieth summing up of the
consequences of one saying to another. And because the same things may enter
into account for diverse accidents, their names are (to show that diversity)
diversely wrested and diversified. This diversity of names may be reduced to
four general heads.
First, a thing may enter
into account for matter, or body; as living, sensible, rational, hot, cold,
moved, quiet; with all which names the word matter, or body, is understood; all
such being names of matter.
Secondly, it may enter
into account, or be considered, for some accident or quality which we conceive to
be in it; as for being moved, for being so long, for being hot, etc.; and then,
of the name of the thing itself, by a little change or wresting, we make a name
for that accident which we consider; and for living put into the account life;
for moved, motion; for hot, heat; for long, length, and the like: and all such
names are the names of the accidents and properties by which one matter and
body is distinguished from another. These are called names abstract, because
severed, not from matter, but from the account of matter.
Thirdly, we bring into
account the properties of our own bodies, whereby we make such distinction: as
when anything is seen by us, we reckon not the thing itself, but the sight, the
colour, the idea of it in the fancy; and when anything is heard, we reckon it
not, but the hearing or sound only, which is our fancy or conception of it by
the ear: and such are names of fancies.
Fourthly, we bring into
account, consider, and give names, to names themselves, and to speeches: for,
general, universal, special, equivocal, are names of names. And affirmation,
interrogation, commandment, narration, syllogism, sermon, oration, and many
other such are names of speeches. And this is all the variety of names
positive; which are put to mark somewhat which is in nature, or may be feigned
by the mind of man, as bodies that are, or may be conceived to be; or of
bodies, the properties that are, or may be feigned to be; or words and speech.
There be also other
names, called negative; which are notes to signify that a word is not the name
of the thing in question; as these words: nothing, no man, infinite, indocible,
three want four, and the like; which are nevertheless of use in reckoning, or
in correcting of reckoning, and call to mind our past cogitations, though they
be not names of anything; because they make us refuse to admit of names not
rightly used.
All other names are but
insignificant sounds; and those of two sorts. One, when they are new, and yet
their meaning not explained by definition; whereof there have been abundance
coined by Schoolmen and puzzled philosophers.
Another, when men make a
name of two names, whose significations are contradictory and inconsistent; as
this name, an incorporeal body, or, which is all one, an incorporeal substance,
and a great number more. For whensoever any affirmation is false, the two names
of which it is composed, put together and made one, signify nothing at all. For
example, if it be a false affirmation to say a quadrangle is round, the word
round quadrangle signifies nothing, but is a mere sound. So likewise if it be
false to say that virtue can be poured, or blown up and down, the words
inpoured virtue, inblown virtue, are as absurd and insignificant as a round
quadrangle. And therefore you shall hardly meet with a senseless and
insignificant word that is not made up of some Latin or Greek names. Frenchman
seldom hears our Saviour called by the name of Parole, but by the name of Verbe
often; yet Verbe and Parole differ no more but that one is Latin, the other
French.
When a man, upon the
hearing of any speech, hath those thoughts which the words of that speech, and
their connexion, were ordained and constituted to signify, then he is said to
understand it: understanding being nothing else but conception caused by
speech. And therefore if speech be peculiar to man, as for ought I know it is,
then is understanding peculiar to him also. And therefore of absurd and false
affirmations, in case they be universal, there can be no understanding; though
many think they understand then, when they do but repeat the words softly, or
con them in their mind.
What kinds of speeches
signify the appetites, aversions, and passions of man's mind, and of their use
and abuse, I shall speak when I have spoken of the passions.
The names of such things
as affect us, that is, which please and displease us, because all men be not
alike affected with the same thing, nor the same man at all times, are in the
common discourses of men of inconstant signification. For seeing all names are imposed
to signify our conceptions, and all our affections are but conceptions; when we
conceive the same things differently, we can hardly avoid different naming of
them. For though the nature of that we conceive be the same; yet the diversity
of our reception of it, in respect of different constitutions of body and
prejudices of opinion, gives everything a tincture of our different passions.
And therefore in reasoning, a man must take heed of words; which, besides the
signification of what we imagine of their nature, have a signification also of
the nature, disposition, and interest of the speaker; such as are the names of
virtues and vices: for one man calleth wisdom what another calleth fear; and
one cruelty what another justice; one prodigality what another magnanimity; and
one gravity what another stupidity, etc. And therefore such names can never be
true grounds of any ratiocination. No more can metaphors and tropes of speech:
but these are less dangerous because they profess their inconstancy, which the
other do not.
Chapter v. Of Reason and Science
WHEN man reasoneth, he does nothing else but conceive a sum total, from addition of parcels; or conceive a remainder, from subtraction of one sum from another: which, if it be done by words, is conceiving of the consequence of the names of all the parts, to the name of the whole; or from the names of the whole and one part, to the name of the other part. And though in some things, as in numbers, besides adding and subtracting, men name other operations, as multiplying and dividing; yet they are the same: for multiplication is but adding together of things equal; and division, but subtracting of one thing, as often as we can. These operations are not incident to numbers only, but to all manner of things that can be added together, and taken one out of another. For as arithmeticians teach to add and subtract in numbers, so the geometricians teach the same in lines, figures (solid and superficial), angles, proportions, times, degrees of swiftness, force, power, and the like; the logicians teach the same in consequences of words, adding together two names to make an affirmation, and two affirmations to make a syllogism, and many syllogisms to make a demonstration; and from the sum, or conclusion of a syllogism, they subtract one proposition to find the other. Writers of politics add together pactions to find men's duties; and lawyers, laws and facts to find what is right and wrong in the actions of private men. In sum, in what matter soever there is place for addition and subtraction, there also is place for reason; and where these have no place, there reason has nothing at all to do.
Out of all which we may define (that is to say determine) what that
is which is meant by this word reason when we reckon it amongst the faculties
of the mind. For reason, in this
sense, is nothing but reckoning (that is, adding and subtracting) of the
consequences of general names agreed upon for the marking and signifying of our
thoughts; I say marking them, when we reckon by ourselves; and signifying, when
we demonstrate or approve our reckonings to other men.
And as in arithmetic unpractised men must, and professors
themselves may often, err, and cast up false; so also in any other subject of
reasoning, the ablest, most attentive, and most practised men may deceive
themselves, and infer false conclusions; not but that reason itself is always
right reason, as well as arithmetic is a certain and infallible art: but no one
man's reason, nor the reason of any one number of men, makes the certainty; no
more than an account is therefore well cast up because a great many men have
unanimously approved it. And therefore, as when there is a controversy in an
account, the parties must by their own accord set up for right reason the
reason of some arbitrator, or judge, to whose sentence they will both stand, or
their controversy must either come to blows, or be undecided, for want of a
right reason constituted by Nature; so is it also in all debates of what kind
soever: and when men that think themselves wiser than all others clamour and
demand right reason for judge, yet seek no more but that things should be
determined by no other men's reason but their own, it is as intolerable in the
society of men, as it is in play after trump is turned to use for trump on
every occasion that suit whereof they have most in their hand. For they do
nothing else, that will have every of their passions, as it comes to bear sway
in them, to be taken for right reason, and that in their own controversies:
bewraying their want of right reason by the claim they lay to it.
The use and end of reason is not the finding of the sum and truth
of one, or a few consequences, remote from the first definitions and settled
significations of names; but to begin at these, and proceed from one
consequence to another. For there can be no certainty of the last conclusion
without a certainty of all those affirmations and negations on which it was
grounded and inferred. As when a master of a family, in taking an account,
casteth up the sums of all the bills of expense into one sum; and not regarding
how each bill is summed up, by those that give them in account, nor what it is
he pays for, he advantages himself no more than if he allowed the account in
gross, trusting to every of the accountant's skill and honesty: so also in
reasoning of all other things, he that takes up conclusions on the trust of
authors, and doth not fetch them from the first items in every reckoning (which
are the significations of names settled by definitions), loses his labour, and
does not know anything, but only believeth.
When a man reckons without the use of words, which may be done in
particular things, as when upon the sight of any one thing, we conjecture what
was likely to have preceded, or is likely to follow upon it; if that which he
thought likely to follow follows not, or that which he thought likely to have
preceded it hath not preceded it, this is called error; to which even the most
prudent men are subject. But when we reason in words of general signification,
and fall upon a general inference which is false; though it be commonly called
error, it is indeed an absurdity, or senseless speech. For error is but a
deception, in presuming that somewhat is past, or to come; of which, though it
were not past, or not to come, yet there was no impossibility discoverable. But
when we make a general assertion, unless it be a true one, the possibility of
it is inconceivable. And words whereby we conceive nothing but the sound are
those we call absurd, insignificant, and nonsense. And therefore if a man
should talk to me of a round quadrangle; or accidents of bread in cheese; or
immaterial substances; or of a free subject; a free will; or any free but free
from being hindered by opposition; I should not say he were in an error, but
that his words were without meaning; that is to say, absurd.
I have said before, in the second chapter, that a man did excel
all other animals in this faculty, that when he conceived anything whatsoever,
he was apt to enquire the consequences of it, and what effects he could do with
it. And now I add this other degree of the same excellence, that he can by
words reduce the consequences he finds to general rules, called theorems, or
aphorisms; that is, he can reason, or reckon, not only in number, but in all
other things whereof one may be added unto or subtracted from another.
But this privilege is allayed by another; and that is by the
privilege of absurdity, to which no living creature is subject, but men only.
And of men, those are of all most subject to it that profess philosophy. For it
is most true that Cicero saith of them somewhere; that there can be nothing so
absurd but may be found in the books of philosophers. And the reason is
manifest. For there is not one of them that begins his ratiocination from the
definitions or explications of the names they are to use; which is a method
that hath been used only in geometry, whose conclusions have thereby been made
indisputable.
1. The first cause of absurd conclusions I ascribe to the want of
method; in that they begin not their ratiocination from definitions; that is,
from settled significations of their words: as if they could cast account
without knowing the value of the numeral words, one, two, and three.
And whereas all bodies enter into account upon diverse
considerations, which I have mentioned in the precedent chapter, these
considerations being diversely named, diverse absurdities proceed from the
confusion and unfit connexion of their names into assertions. And therefore,
2. The second cause of absurd assertions, I ascribe to the giving
of names of bodies to accidents; or of accidents to bodies; as they do that
say, faith is infused, or inspired; when nothing can be poured, or breathed
into anything, but body; and that extension is body; that phantasms are
spirits, etc.
3. The third I ascribe to the giving of the names of the accidents
of bodies without us to the accidents of our own bodies; as they do that say, the
colour is in the body; the sound is in the air, etc.
4. The fourth, to the giving of the names of bodies to names, or
speeches; as they do that say that there be things universal; that a living
creature is genus, or a general thing, etc.
5. The fifth, to the giving of the names of accidents to names and
speeches; as they do that say, the nature of a thing is its definition; a man's
command is his will; and the like.
6. The sixth, to the use of metaphors, tropes, and other
rhetorical figures, instead of words proper. For though it be lawful to say,
for example, in common speech, the way goeth, or leadeth hither, or thither;
the proverb says this or that (whereas ways cannot go, nor proverbs speak); yet
in reckoning, and seeking of truth, such speeches are not to be admitted.
7. The seventh, to names that signify nothing, but are taken up
and learned by rote from the Schools, as hypostatical, transubstantiate,
consubstantiate, eternal-now, and the like canting of Schoolmen.
To him that can avoid these things, it is not easy to fall into
any absurdity, unless it be by the length of an account; wherein he may perhaps
forget what went before. For all men by nature reason alike, and well, when
they have good principles. For who is so stupid as both to mistake in geometry,
and also to persist in it, when another detects his error to him?
By this it appears that reason is not, as sense and memory, born
with us; nor gotten by experience only, as prudence is; but attained by
industry: first in apt imposing of names; and secondly by getting a good and
orderly method in proceeding from the elements, which are names, to assertions
made by connexion of one of them to another; and so to syllogisms, which are
the connexions of one assertion to another, till we come to a knowledge of all
the consequences of names appertaining to the subject in hand; and that is it,
men call science. And whereas sense and memory are but knowledge of fact, which
is a thing past and irrevocable, science is the knowledge of consequences, and
dependence of one fact upon another; by which, out of that we can presently do,
we know how to do something else when we will, or the like, another time:
because when we see how anything comes about, upon what causes, and by what
manner; when the like causes come into our power, we see how to make it produce
the like effects.
Children therefore are not endued with reason at all, till they
have attained the use of speech, but are called reasonable creatures for the
possibility apparent of having the use of reason in time to come. And the most
part of men, though they have the use of reasoning a little way, as in
numbering to some degree; yet it serves them to little use in common life, in
which they govern themselves, some better, some worse, according to their
differences of experience, quickness of memory, and inclinations to several
ends; but specially according to good or evil fortune, and the errors of one
another. For as for science, or certain rules of their actions, they are so far
from it that they know not what it is. Geometry they have thought conjuring:
but for other sciences, they who have not been taught the beginnings, and some
progress in them, that they may see how they be acquired and generated, are in
this point like children that, having no thought of generation, are made
believe by the women that their brothers and sisters are not born, but found in
the garden.
But yet they that have no science are in better and nobler
condition with their natural prudence than men that, by misreasoning, or by
trusting them that reason wrong, fall upon false and absurd general rules. For
ignorance of causes, and of rules, does not set men so far out of their way as
relying on false rules, and taking for causes of what they aspire to, those
that are not so, but rather causes of the contrary.
To conclude, the light of humane minds is perspicuous words, but
by exact definitions first snuffed, and purged from ambiguity; reason is the
pace; increase of science, the way; and the benefit of mankind, the end. And,
on the contrary, metaphors, and senseless and ambiguous words are like ignes fatui; and reasoning upon them is
wandering amongst innumerable absurdities; and their end, contention and
sedition, or contempt.
As much experience is prudence, so is much science sapience. For
though we usually have one name of wisdom for them both; yet the Latins did
always distinguish between prudentia
and sapientia; ascribing the former
to experience, the latter to science. But to make their difference appear more
clearly, let us suppose one man endued with an excellent natural use and
dexterity in handling his arms; and another to have added to that dexterity an
acquired science of where he can offend, or be offended by his adversary, in
every possible posture or guard: the ability of the former would be to the
ability of the latter, as prudence to sapience; both useful, but the latter
infallible. But they that, trusting only to the authority of books, follow the
blind blindly, are like him that, trusting to the false rules of a master of
fence, ventures presumptuously upon an adversary that either kills or disgraces
him.
The signs of science are some certain and infallible; some,
uncertain. Certain, when he that pretendeth the science of anything can teach
the same; that is to say, demonstrate the truth thereof perspicuously to
another: uncertain, when only some particular events answer to his pretence,
and upon many occasions prove so as he says they must. Signs of prudence are
all uncertain; because to observe by experience, and remember all circumstances
that may alter the success, is impossible. But in any business, whereof a man
has not infallible science to proceed by, to forsake his own natural judgment,
and be guided by general sentences read in authors, and subject to many
exceptions, is a sign of folly, and generally scorned by the name of pedantry.
And even of those men themselves that in councils of the Commonwealth love to
show their reading of politics and history, very few do it in their domestic
affairs where their particular interest is concerned, having prudence enough
for their private affairs; but in public they study more the reputation of
their own wit than the success of another's business.