since universal consent, which is the only one produced, will scarcely prove a sufficient mark to direct my choice.

CHAPTER IV.

Other Considerations concerning the innate Principles, both speculative and practical.

Had those who contend for innate principles, considered the parts out of which those propositions are made, they would not have been so ready to believe they were innate; since if the ideas were not, the propositions made up of them could not be innate. For if the ideas be not innate, there was a time when the mind was without those principles; for where there are no ideas, there cannot be any propositions about them.

We have little reason to think that children bring many ideas into the world with them; for except some faint ideas of hunger and thirst, and warmth and pain, there is not any appearance of ideas in them; and one may perceive that they get no other than those with which they are furnished by experience. It is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be,' is certainly, if there be any such, an innate principle; but will any one say that impossibility and identity are ideas, that men bring into the world with them, and are antecedent to all others? Is it the knowlege of this maxim that makes a child distinguish between its mother and a stranger? The names impossibility' and identity' stand for ideas so far from being innate, that it requires attention to form them in the understanding; and so remote from the thoughts of children, that many grown men are found to want them.

If identity be a native impression and known to us from our cradles, I would gladly be resolved, by one of seven or 70 years old, 'Whether a man, consisting of

soul and body, be the same man when his body is changed? Whether Euphorbus and Pythagoras, having had the same soul, were the same man, though they lived ages asunder? Whether the cock too, which had the same soul, were not the same with both of them?" Whereby it will appear that our ideas of identity are not so clear as to be thought innate; for if innate ideas be not universally known and agreed on, they cannot be the subject of universal truths. For, I suppose, every one's idea of identity will not be the same as that of Pythagoras and his followers. Which then shall be true?

Nor let any one think, that the questions here proposed are empty speculations, though, even then, they would show that the idea of identity is not innate. He that shall reflect on the resurrection, and consider that the same persons shall be happy or miserable in the other according to their conduct in this life, will find it not easy to resolve wherein identity consists, and will not think that children have a clear idea of it.

The axiom, that the whole is bigger than a part,' has as good a title as any to be thought innate; which nobody can think it to be when he considers that whole' and 'part' are relative ideas, and belong to the positive ideas extension' and number.' So that if whole and part are innate ideas, extension and number must be innate too.

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That God is to be worshipped,' is a great truth, and deserves the first place amongst practical principles, but cannot be thought innate unless the ideas of God and worship are innate. That the idea of worship is not in the understanding of children, will be granted by any one who considers how few grown men have a distinct idea of it.

If any idea can be imagined innate, that of God may of all others be thought so, since it is hard to conceive how there should be innate moral principles

without an innate idea of a Deity. Without a notion of a law-maker, it is impossible to have a notion of a law, and an obligation to observe it. Besides the ancient atheists, branded on the records of history, navigation has discovered, in these later ages, whole nations without any notion of a God, or any religion. Even the Jesuits, the great encomiasts of the Chinese, agree that the learned, keeping to the old religion and the ruling party there, are all of them atheists. And though in more civilised countries only some profligate wretches own it barefacedly now, yet, perhaps, we should hear more of it than we do from others, did not the fear of the magistrate's sword, or their neighbors censure, tie up people's tongues.1

But had all mankind a notion of God, it would not follow that the idea was innate; for though no nation were found without a name or some notions of him, it would not prove them to be natural impressions any more than the names of sun,'' fire,' &c. prove the ideas they stand for to be innate. Nor would the absence of such a name or notion be an argument against the being of a God, any more than it would

1 This reasoning against innate ideas has been blamed as invalidating an argument used to prove the being of a God, viz. universal consent: to which our author answers, 'I think that the universal consent of mankind as to the being of a God amounts to this; that the majority have actually believed it, and that the majority of the remaining part have not actually disbelieved it, and very few have actually opposed the belief: so that as incomparably the greater majority have believed, it may be said to be the universal consent of mankind. But if a general consent of every individual should be contended for, this would make it no argument, or a useless one; for one denial would destroy it; and if no one deny a God, what need of arguments to convince atheists? I would ask, Were there ever any atheists in the world, or no? If not, what need of any question about the being of a God? If there have been, then the universal consent reduces itself to a great majority, and I have not said a word to invalidate this argument. My argument was to show that the idea of God is not innate; and to my purpose it was sufficient if there were one exception; for whatsoever is innate must be universal, in the strictest sense.'

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be a proof that there was no loadstone in the world because a great part of mankind had no name or notion of it. For men being furnished with words can scarcely avoid having some ideas of the things whose names they frequently mention and if these carry with them the notion of something extraordinary, if the fear of absolute power impress them on the mind, the idea is likely to sink deeper and spread farther, especially if it be agreeable to the common light of reason. For the marks of wisdom and power appear so plainly in the creation, that a rational and reflecting creature cannot miss the discovery of a Deity; and the influence which such a discovery must have on the mind is so great, that it seems stranger that a whole nation of men should be found so brutish as to want the notion of God, than that they should have no notion of numbers or fire. The name of God being once mentioned to express a superior and almighty Being, the reasonableness of such a notion, and the interest men have to mention it often, must necessarily spread it wide, and continue it down to all generations; though the general reception of the name proves not the idea to be innate, but that they who made the discovery made a right use of their reason, tracing things to their original, from whom others having once received the notion, it could not easily be lost again. This is all that could be inferred from the notion of a God were it universal; for the general acknowleging of God extends no farther; which if it prove the idea of God innáte, will prove the idea of fire to be innate. If a colony of children should be placed in an island where no fire was, they would neither have any notion of it nor any name for it, and they would be as far removed from any notion or name of God till some one amongst them had employed his thoughts to inquire into the causes of things, which would lead him to a notion of

God, which being taught to others, reason would continue it amongst them.

It is urged, that it is suitable to God's goodness to imprint on the minds of men notions of himself to secure their homage and veneration, therefore he has done it. This argument, if it be of any force, will prove too much. For if we conclude that God hath done what men judge best for them, because it is suitable to his goodness, it will prove not only that God hath impressed on the mind an idea of himself, but that he hath stamped there all that men ought to do, and hath given them will and affections conformable.

The Romanists say, it is best for man, and suitable to the goodness of God, that there should be an infallible judge of controversies on earth, and therefore there is one;' and I, by the same reason, say, it is better for man, that every man himself should be infallible.' I leave them to consider whether they shall therefore think that he is so. It is good argument to say," the infinitely wise God hath made it so, and therefore it is best;' but it shows too much confidence in our own wisdom to say, 'I think it best, and therefore God hath made it so:' and it is vain to argue that God hath done what experience shows he hath not. But the goodness of God hath not been wanting to man, since he hath furnished him with faculties, by the right use of which he may attain the knowlege of God; and having endowed man with these faculties, he was no more obliged, by his goodness, to implant innate notions in his mind, than having given him hands and materials, he should build him houses and bridges, which some people totally want, or are but ill provided with, as others are either without ideas of God and duty, or have but very ill ones; the reason in both cases being, that they employed not their faculties that way, but contented themselves with the opinions and fashions of their country as they found them.