fpirits, a cruel mafter, a proud beggar, a man seven feet high.

Imaginary ideas, which are alfo called fantastical, or chimerical, are fuch as are made by enlarging, diminishing, uniting, dividing real ideas in the mind, in fuch a manner as no objects or exemplars did or ever will exift, according to the prefent courfe of nature, though the feveral parts of thefe ideas are borrowed from real objects; fuch are thefe conceptions we have of a centaur, a fatyr, a golden mountain, a flying horfe, a dog without a head, a bull lefs than a moufe, or a moufe as big as a bull, and a man twenty feet high.

Some of thefe fantaftical ideas are poffible, that is they are not utterly inconfiftent in the nature of things, and therefore it is within the reach of divine power to make fuch objects; fuch are most of the inftances already given; but impoffibles carry an utter inconfift ence in the ideas which are joined: fuch are self-active matter, and infinite or eternal men, a pious man without honesty, or heaven without holiness.

SECT. IV.

The Divifion of Ideas, with regard to their Qualities.

DEAS, with regard to their qualities, afford us these several divifions of them. 1. They are either clear and diftinct, or obfcure and confused. They are vulgar or learned. 3. They are perfect or imperfect. 4 They are true or falfe.

2.

I. OUR ideas are either clear and diftinct, or obfcure and confufed.

Several writers have distinguished the clear ideas from thofe that are diftinct; and the confufed ideas from thofe that are obfcure; and it must be acknowledged, there may be fome difference between them; for it is the clearness of ideas for the most part makes

them diftinct; and the obfcurity of ideas is one thing that will always bring a fort of confusion into them. Yet when these writers come to talk largely upon this fubject, and to explain and adjust their meaning with great nicety, I have generally found that they did not keep up the diftinction they first defigned, but they confound the one with the other. I fhall therefore treat of clear or diftinct ideas, as one and the fame fort, and obfcure or confufed ideas, as another.

A clear and diftinct idea is that which reprefents the object of the mind with full evidence and ftrength, and plainly distinguishes it from all other objects whatfoever.

An obfcure and confufed idea represents the object either fo faintly, fo imperfectly, or fo mingled with other ideas, that the object of it doth not appear plain to the mind, not purely in its own nature, nor fufficiently diftinguished from other things.

When we see the fea and fky nearer at hand, we have a clear and distinct idea of each; but when we look far toward the horizon, efpecially in a mifty day, our ideas of both are but obfcure and confused; for we know not which is fea and which is fky. So when we look at the colours of the rainbow, we have a clear idea of the red, the blue, the green in the middle of their feveral arches; and a distinct idea too, while the eye fixes there; but when we confider the border of thofe colours, they fo run into one another, that it renders their ideas confufed and obfcure. So the idea which we have of our brother, or our friend, whom we fee daily, is clear and distinct; but when the absence of many years has injured the idea, it becomes obfcure and confused.

Note here, that some of our ideas may be very clear and diftinct in one respect, and very obfcure and confused in another. So when we fpeak of a chiliagenum, or a figure of a thousand angles, we may have a clear and diftinct rational idea of the number one thousand angles; for we can demonftrate various properties concerning it by reafon; but the image, or fenfible idea, which we have of the figure is but confufed and obfcure; for we cannot precifely diftinguish it by fancy

from the image of a figure that has nine hundred angles, or nine hundred and ninety. So when we fpeak of the infinite divifibility of matter, we always keep in our minds a very clear and diftinct idea of division and divifibility. But after we have made a littl progrefs in dividing, and come to parts that are far tc fmall for the reach of our fenfes, then our ideas, o fenfible images of thefe little bodies, become obscu and indistinct, and the idea of infinite is very obfcure imperfect, and confufed.

II. IDEAS are either vulgar or learned. A vulgar idea represents to us the most obvious and fenfible appearances that are contained in the object of them; but a learned idea penetrates farther into the nature, properties, reafons, caufes and effects of things. This is beft illuftrated by fome examples.

It is a vulgar idea that we have of a rainbow, when we conceive a large arch in the clouds, made up of various colours parallel to each other; but it is a learned idea which a philofopher has when he confiders it as the various reflections and refractions of fun-beams in drops of falling rain. So it is a vulgar idea which we have of the colours of folid bodies, when we perceive them to be, as it were, a red, or blue, or green tincture of the furface of those bodies; but it is a philofophical idea when we confider the various colours to be nothing else but different fenfations excited in us by the varioufly refracted rays of light reflected on our eyes in a different manner, according to the different fize, or shape, or fituation of the particles of which the furfaces of those bodies are compofed. It is a vulgar idea, which we have of a watch or clock, when we conceive of it as a pretty inftrument made to fhew us the hour of the day; but it is a learned idea which the watchmaker has of it, who knows all the feveral parts of it, the fpring, the balance, the chain, the wheels, their axles, &c. together with the various connections and adjustments of each part, whence the exact and uniform motion of the index is derived, which points to the minute or the hour. So when a common understanding reads Virgil's Æneid, he has but a vulgar

idea of that poem; yet his mind is naturally entertained with the ftory, and his ears with the verse; but when a critic, or a man who has skill in poefy, reads it, he has a learned idea of its peculiar beauties; he taftes and relishes a fuperior pleafure; he admires the Roman poet, and wishes he had known the chriftian theology, which would have furnished him with nobler materials and machines than all the heathen idols.

It is with a vulgar idea that the world beholds the cartoons of Raphael at Hampton-court, and every one feels his fhare of pleafure and entertainment; but a painter contemplates the wonders of that Italian pencil, and fees a thousand beauties in them which the vulgar eye neglected his learned ideas give him a tranfcendent delight, and yet, at the fame time, difcover the blemishes which the common gazer never observed.

III. IDEAS are either perfect or imperfect, which are otherwife called adequate or inadequate.

Thofe are adequate ideas which perfectly represent their archetypes or objects. Inadequate ideas are but a partial or incomplete reprefentation of thofe archetypes to which they are referred.

All our fimple ideas are in fome fenfe adequate or perfect; because fimple ideas, confidered merely as our firft perceptions, have no parts in them; fo we may be faid to have a perfect idea of white, black, fweet, four, length, light, motion, reft, &c. We have alfo a perfect idea of various figures, as a triangle, a fquare, a cylinder, a cube, a fphere, which are complex ideas; but our idea or image of a figure of a thousand fides, our idea of the city of London, or the powers of a loadstone, are very imperfect, as well as all our ideas of infinite length or breadth, infinite power, wifdom, or duration; for the idea of infinite is endless and ever growing, and can never be completed.

Note 1. WHEN we have a perfect idea of any thing in all its parts, it is called a complete idea; when in all its properties, it is called comprehenfive. But when we have but an inadequate and imperfect idea, we are only faid to apprehend it; therefore ufe the term ap

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prehenfion, when we fpeak of our knowledge of God, who can never be comprehended by his creatures.

Note 2. Though there are a multitude of ideas which may be called perfect or adequate, in a vulgar sense, yet there are scarce any ideas which are adequate, comprehensive, and complete in a philofophical sense; for there is scarce any thing in the world that we know, as to all the parts, and powers, and properties of it, in perfection. Even fo plain an idea as that of a triangle, has perhaps infinite properties belonging to it, of which we know but a few. Who can tell what are the fhapes and pofitions of thofe particles, which caufe all the variety of colours that appear on the surface of things? Who knows what are the figures of the little corpuicles that compofe and diftinguish different bodies? The ideas of brafs, iron, gold, wood, ftone, hyffop, and rosemary, have an infinite variety of hidden mysteries contained in the fhape, fize, motion, and pofition of the little particles of which they are compofed; and perhaps alfo infinite unknown properties and powers And if we arife to that may be derived from them. the animal world, or the world of fpirits, our knowledge of them muft be amazingly imperfect, when. there is not the leaft grain of fand, or empty space, but has too many queftions and difficulties belonging to it, for the wifeft philofopher upon earth to answer and refolve.

IV. OUR ideas are either true or false; for an idea being the representation of a thing in the mind, it must be either a true or a falfe reprefentation of it. If the idea be conformable to the object or archetype of it, it Sometimes our is a true idea; if not, it is a false one.

ideas are referred to things really existing without us as their archetypes. If I fee bodies in their proper colours, I have a true idea; but when a man under the jaundice fees all bodies yellow, he has a falfe idea of them. So if we see the fun or moon rising or setting, our idea represents them bigger than what they are on the meridian; and in this fenfe it is a falfe idea, because thofe heavenly bodies are all day and all night of the fame bignefs. Or when I see a straight staff appear