Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous,

G >> George Berkeley >> Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous,

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PHIL. You are therefore, by your principles, forced to deny the
REALITY of sensible things; since you made it to consist in an absolute
existence exterior to the mind. That is to say, you are a downright
sceptic. So I have gained my point, which was to shew your principles led
to Scepticism.

HYL. For the present I am, if not entirely convinced, at least
silenced.

PHIL. I would fain know what more you would require in order to a
perfect conviction. Have you not had the liberty of explaining yourself
all manner of ways? Were any little slips in discourse laid hold and
insisted on? Or were you not allowed to retract or reinforce anything you
had offered, as best served your purpose? Hath not everything you could
say been heard and examined with all the fairness imaginable? In a word
have you not in every point been convinced out of your own mouth? And, if
you can at present discover any flaw in any of your former concessions,
or think of any remaining subterfuge, any new distinction, colour, or
comment whatsoever, why do you not produce it?

HYL. A little patience, Philonous. I am at present so amazed to see
myself ensnared, and as it were imprisoned in the labyrinths you have
drawn me into, that on the sudden it cannot be expected I should find my
way out. You must give me time to look about me and recollect myself.

PHIL. Hark; is not this the college bell?

HYL. It rings for prayers.

PHIL. We will go in then, if you please, and meet here again tomorrow
morning. In the meantime, you may employ your thoughts on this morning's
discourse, and try if you can find any fallacy in it, or invent any new
means to extricate yourself.

HYL. Agreed.

THE SECOND DIALOGUE

HYL. I beg your pardon, Philonous, for not meeting you sooner. All
this morning my head was so filled with our late conversation that I had
not leisure to think of the time of the day, or indeed of anything else.

PHILONOUS. I am glad you were so intent upon it, in hopes if there were
any mistakes in your concessions, or fallacies in my reasonings from
them, you will now discover them to me.

HYL. I assure you I have done nothing ever since I saw you but search
after mistakes and fallacies, and, with that view, have minutely examined
the whole series of yesterday's discourse: but all in vain, for the
notions it led me into, upon review, appear still more clear and evident;
and, the more I consider them, the more irresistibly do they force my
assent.

PHIL. And is not this, think you, a sign that they are genuine, that
they proceed from nature, and are conformable to right reason? Truth and
beauty are in this alike, that the strictest survey sets them both off to
advantage; while the false lustre of error and disguise cannot endure
being reviewed, or too nearly inspected.

HYL. I own there is a great deal in what you say. Nor can any one be
more entirely satisfied of the truth of those odd consequences, so long
as I have in view the reasonings that lead to them. But, when these are
out of my thoughts, there seems, on the other hand, something so
satisfactory, so natural and intelligible, in the modern way of
explaining things that, I profess, I know not how to reject it.

PHIL. I know not what way you mean.

HYL. I mean the way of accounting for our sensations or ideas.

PHIL. How is that?

HYL. It is supposed the soul makes her residence in some part of the
brain, from which the nerves take their rise, and are thence extended to
all parts of the body; and that outward objects, by the different
impressions they make on the organs of sense, communicate certain
vibrative motions to the nerves; and these being filled with spirits
propagate them to the brain or seat of the soul, which, according
to the various impressions or traces thereby made in the brain, is
variously affected with ideas.

PHIL. And call you this an explication of the manner whereby we are
affected with ideas?

HYL. Why not, Philonous? Have you anything to object against it?

PHIL. I would first know whether I rightly understand your hypothesis.
You make certain traces in the brain to be the causes or occasions of our
ideas. Pray tell me whether by the BRAIN you mean any sensible thing.

HYL. What else think you I could mean?

PHIL. Sensible things are all immediately perceivable; and those things
which are immediately perceivable are ideas; and these exist only in the
mind. Thus much you have, if I mistake not, long since agreed to.

HYL. I do not deny it.

PHIL. The brain therefore you speak of, being a sensible thing, exists
only in the mind. Now, I would fain know whether you think it reasonable
to suppose that one idea or thing existing in the mind occasions all
other ideas. And, if you think so, pray how do you account for the origin
of that primary idea or brain itself?

HYL. I do not explain the origin of our ideas by that brain which is
perceivable to sense--this being itself only a combination of sensible
ideas--but by another which I imagine.

PHIL. But are not things imagined as truly IN THE MIND as things
perceived?

HYL. I must confess they are.

PHIL. It comes, therefore, to the same thing; and you have been all
this while accounting for ideas by certain motions or impressions of the
brain; that is, by some alterations in an idea, whether sensible or
imaginable it matters not.

HYL. I begin to suspect my hypothesis.

PHIL. Besides spirits, all that we know or conceive are our own ideas.
When, therefore, you say all ideas are occasioned by impressions in the
brain, do you conceive this brain or no? If you do, then you talk of
ideas imprinted in an idea causing that same idea, which is absurd. If
you do not conceive it, you talk unintelligibly, instead of forming a
reasonable hypothesis.

HYL. I now clearly see it was a mere dream. There is nothing in it.

PHIL. You need not be much concerned at it; for after all, this way of
explaining things, as you called it, could never have satisfied any
reasonable man. What connexion is there between a motion in the nerves,
and the sensations of sound or colour in the mind? Or how is it possible
these should be the effect of that?

HYL. But I could never think it had so little in it as now it seems to
have.

PHIL. Well then, are you at length satisfied that no sensible things
have a real existence; and that you are in truth an arrant sceptic?

HYL. It is too plain to be denied.

PHIL. Look! are not the fields covered with a delightful verdure? Is
there not something in the woods and groves, in the rivers and clear
springs, that soothes, that delights, that transports the soul? At the
prospect of the wide and deep ocean, or some huge mountain whose top is
lost in the clouds, or of an old gloomy forest, are not our minds filled
with a pleasing horror? Even in rocks and deserts is there not an
agreeable wildness? How sincere a pleasure is it to behold the natural
beauties of the earth! To preserve and renew our, relish for them, is not
the veil of night alternately drawn over her face, and doth she not
change her dress with the seasons? How aptly are the elements disposed!
What variety and use in the meanest productions of nature! What
delicacy, what beauty, what contrivance, in animal and vegetable bodies I
How exquisitely are all things suited, as well to their particular ends,
as to constitute opposite parts of the whole I And, while they mutually
aid and support, do they not also set off and illustrate each other?
Raise now your thoughts from this ball of earth to all those glorious
luminaries that adorn the high arch of heaven. The motion and situation
of the planets, are they not admirable for use and order? Were those
(miscalled ERRATIC) globes once known to stray, in their repeated
journeys through the pathless void? Do they not measure areas round the
sun ever proportioned to the times? So fixed, so immutable are the laws
by which the unseen Author of nature actuates the universe. How
vivid and radiant is the lustre of the fixed stars! How magnificent and
rich that negligent profusion with which they appear to be scattered
throughout the whole azure vault! Yet, if you take the telescope, it
brings into your sight a new host of stars that escape the naked eye.
Here they seem contiguous and minute, but to a nearer view immense orbs
of fight at various distances, far sunk in the abyss of space. Now you
must call imagination to your aid. The feeble narrow sense cannot descry
innumerable worlds revolving round the central fires; and in those worlds
the energy of an all-perfect Mind displayed in endless forms. But,
neither sense nor imagination are big enough to comprehend the boundless
extent, with all its glittering furniture. Though the labouring mind
exert and strain each power to its utmost reach, there still stands out
ungrasped a surplusage immeasurable. Yet all the vast bodies that compose
this mighty frame, how distant and remote soever, are by some secret
mechanism, some Divine art and force, linked in a mutual dependence and
intercourse with each other; even with this earth, which was almost slipt
from my thoughts and lost in the crowd of worlds. Is not the whole system
immense, beautiful, glorious beyond expression and beyond thought! What
treatment, then, do those philosophers deserve, who would deprive these
noble and delightful scenes of all REALITY? How should those Principles
be entertained that lead us to think all the visible beauty of the
creation a false imaginary glare? To be plain, can you expect this
Scepticism of yours will not be thought extravagantly absurd by all men
of sense?

HYL. Other men may think as they please; but for your part you have
nothing to reproach me with. My comfort is, you are as much a sceptic as
I am.

PHIL. There, Hylas, I must beg leave to differ from you.

HYL. What! Have you all along agreed to the premises, and do you now
deny the conclusion, and leave me to maintain those paradoxes by myself
which you led me into? This surely is not fair.

PHIL. _I_ deny that I agreed with you in those notions that led to
Scepticism. You indeed said the REALITY of sensible things consisted in
AN ABSOLUTE EXISTENCE OUT OF THE MINDS OF SPIRITS, or distinct from
their being perceived. And pursuant to this notion of reality, YOU are
obliged to deny sensible things any real existence: that is,
according to your own definition, you profess yourself a sceptic. But I
neither said nor thought the reality of sensible things was to be defined
after that manner. To me it is evident for the reasons you allow of, that
sensible things cannot exist otherwise than in a mind or spirit. Whence I
conclude, not that they have no real existence, but that, seeing they
depend not on my thought, and have all existence distinct from being
perceived by me, THERE MUST BE SOME OTHER MIND WHEREIN THEY EXIST. As
sure, therefore, as the sensible world really exists, so sure is there an
infinite omnipresent Spirit who contains and supports it.

HYL. What! This is no more than I and all Christians hold; nay, and all
others too who believe there is a God, and that He knows and comprehends
all things.

PHIL. Aye, but here lies the difference. Men commonly believe that all
things are known or perceived by God, because they believe the being of a
God; whereas I, on the other side, immediately and necessarily conclude
the being of a God, because all sensible things must be perceived by Him.

HYL. But, so long as we all believe the same thing, what matter is it
how we come by that belief?

PHIL. But neither do we agree in the same opinion. For philosophers,
though they acknowledge all corporeal beings to be perceived by God, yet
they attribute to them an absolute subsistence distinct from their being
perceived by any mind whatever; which I do not. Besides, is there no
difference between saying, THERE IS A GOD, THEREFORE HE PERCEIVES ALL
THINGS; and saying, SENSIBLE THINGS DO REALLY EXIST; AND, IF THEY
REALLY EXIST, THEY ARE NECESSARILY PERCEIVED BY AN INFINITE MIND:
THEREFORE THERE IS AN INFINITE MIND OR GOD? This furnishes you with a
direct and immediate demonstration, from a most evident principle, of the
BEING OF A GOD. Divines and philosophers had proved beyond all
controversy, from the beauty and usefulness of the several parts of the
creation, that it was the workmanship of God. But that--setting aside all
help of astronomy and natural philosophy, all contemplation of the
contrivance, order, and adjustment of things--an infinite Mind should be
necessarily inferred from the bare EXISTENCE OF THE SENSIBLE WORLD, is
an advantage to them only who have made this easy reflexion: that the
sensible world is that which we perceive by our several senses; and that
nothing is perceived by the senses beside ideas; and that no idea
or archetype of an idea can exist otherwise than in a mind. You may now,
without any laborious search into the sciences, without any subtlety of
reason, or tedious length of discourse, oppose and baffle the most
strenuous advocate for Atheism. Those miserable refuges, whether in an
eternal succession of unthinking causes and effects, or in a fortuitous
concourse of atoms; those wild imaginations of Vanini, Hobbes, and
Spinoza: in a word, the whole system of Atheism, is it not entirely
overthrown, by this single reflexion on the repugnancy included in
supposing the whole, or any part, even the most rude and shapeless, of
the visible world, to exist without a mind? Let any one of those abettors
of impiety but look into his own thoughts, and there try if he can
conceive how so much as a rock, a desert, a chaos, or confused jumble of
atoms; how anything at all, either sensible or imaginable, can exist
independent of a Mind, and he need go no farther to be convinced of his
folly. Can anything be fairer than to put a dispute on such an issue, and
leave it to a man himself to see if he can conceive, even in thought,
what he holds to be true in fact, and from a notional to allow it a real
existence?

HYL. It cannot be denied there is something highly serviceable to
religion in what you advance. But do you not think it looks very like a
notion entertained by some eminent moderns, of SEEING ALL THINGS IN
GOD?

PHIL. I would gladly know that opinion: pray explain it to me.

HYL. They conceive that the soul, being immaterial, is incapable of
being united with material things, so as to perceive them in themselves;
but that she perceives them by her union with the substance of God,
which, being spiritual, is therefore purely intelligible, or capable of
being the immediate object of a spirit's thought. Besides the Divine
essence contains in it perfections correspondent to each created being;
and which are, for that reason, proper to exhibit or represent them to
the mind.

PHIL. I do not understand how our ideas, which are things altogether
passive and inert, can be the essence, or any part (or like any part) of
the essence or substance of God, who is an impassive, indivisible,
pure, active being. Many more difficulties and objections there are which
occur at first view against this hypothesis; but I shall only add that it
is liable to all the absurdities of the common hypothesis, in making a
created world exist otherwise than in the mind of a Spirit. Besides all
which it hath this peculiar to itself; that it makes that material world
serve to no purpose. And, if it pass for a good argument against other
hypotheses in the sciences, that they suppose Nature, or the Divine
wisdom, to make something in vain, or do that by tedious roundabout
methods which might have been performed in a much more easy and
compendious way, what shall we think of that hypothesis which supposes
the whole world made in vain?

HYL. But what say you? Are not you too of opinion that we see all
things in God? If I mistake not, what you advance comes near it.

PHIL. Few men think; yet all have opinions. Hence men's opinions are
superficial and confused. It is nothing strange that tenets which in
themselves are ever so different, should nevertheless be confounded with
each other, by those who do not consider them attentively. I shall not
therefore be surprised if some men imagine that I run into the enthusiasm
of Malebranche; though in truth I am very remote from it. He builds on
the most abstract general ideas, which I entirely disclaim. He asserts an
absolute external world, which I deny. He maintains that we are deceived
by our senses, and, know not the real natures or the true forms and
figures of extended beings; of all which I hold the direct contrary. So
that upon the whole there are no Principles more fundamentally opposite
than his and mine. It must be owned that I entirely agree with what
the holy Scripture saith, "That in God we live and move and have our
being." But that we see things in His essence, after the manner above set
forth, I am far from believing. Take here in brief my meaning:--It is
evident that the things I perceive are my own ideas, and that no idea can
exist unless it be in a mind: nor is it less plain that these ideas or
things by me perceived, either themselves or their archetypes, exist
independently of my mind, since I know myself not to be their author, it
being out of my power to determine at pleasure what particular ideas I
shall be affected with upon opening my eyes or ears: they must therefore
exist in some other Mind, whose Will it is they should be exhibited
to me. The things, I say, immediately perceived are ideas or sensations,
call them which you will. But how can any idea or sensation exist in, or
be produced by, anything but a mind or spirit? This indeed is
inconceivable. And to assert that which is inconceivable is to talk
nonsense: is it not?

HYL. Without doubt.

PHIL. But, on the other hand, it is very conceivable that they should
exist in and be produced by a spirit; since this is no more than I daily
experience in myself, inasmuch as I perceive numberless ideas; and, by an
act of my will, can form a great variety of them, and raise them up in my
imagination: though, it must be confessed, these creatures of the fancy
are not altogether so distinct, so strong, vivid, and permanent, as those
perceived by my senses--which latter are called RED THINGS. From all
which I conclude, THERE IS A MIND WHICH AFFECTS ME EVERY MOMENT WITH ALL
THE SENSIBLE IMPRESSIONS I PERCEIVE. AND, from the variety, order, and
manner of these, I conclude THE AUTHOR OF THEM TO BE WISE, POWERFUL,
AND GOOD, BEYOND COMPREHENSION. MARK it well; I do not say, I see
things by perceiving that which represents them in the intelligible
Substance of God. This I do not understand; but I say, the things by me
perceived are known by the understanding, and produced by the will of an
infinite Spirit. And is not all this most plain and evident? Is there any
more in it than what a little observation in our own minds, and that
which passeth in them, not only enables us to conceive, but also obliges
us to acknowledge.

HYL. I think I understand you very clearly; and own the proof you give
of a Deity seems no less evident than it is surprising. But, allowing
that God is the supreme and universal Cause of an things, yet, may there
not be still a Third Nature besides Spirits and Ideas? May we not admit a
subordinate and limited cause of our ideas? In a word, may there not for
all that be MATTER?

PHIL. How often must I inculcate the same thing? You allow the things
immediately perceived by sense to exist nowhere without the mind; but
there is nothing perceived by sense which is not perceived immediately:
therefore there is nothing sensible that exists without the mind. The
Matter, therefore, which you still insist on is something intelligible, I
suppose; something that may be discovered by reason, and not by sense.

HYL. You are in the right.

PHIL. Pray let me know what reasoning your belief of Matter is grounded
on; and what this Matter is, in your present sense of it.

HYL. I find myself affected with various ideas, whereof I know I am not
the cause; neither are they the cause of themselves, or of one another,
or capable of subsisting by themselves, as being altogether inactive,
fleeting, dependent beings. They have therefore SOME cause distinct
from me and them: of which I pretend to know no more than that it is THE
CAUSE OF MY IDEAS. And this thing, whatever it be, I call Matter.

PHIL. Tell me, Hylas, hath every one a liberty to change the current
proper signification attached to a common name in any language? For
example, suppose a traveller should tell you that in a certain country
men pass unhurt through the fire; and, upon explaining himself, you found
he meant by the word fire that which others call WATER. Or, if he
should assert that there are trees that walk upon two legs, meaning men
by the term TREES. Would you think this reasonable?

HYL. No; I should think it very absurd. Common custom is the standard
of propriety in language. And for any man to affect speaking improperly
is to pervert the use of speech, and can never serve to a better purpose
than to protract and multiply disputes, where there is no difference in
opinion.

PHIL. And doth not MATTER, in the common current acceptation of the
word, signify an extended, solid, moveable, unthinking, inactive
Substance?

HYL. It doth.

PHIL. And, hath it not been made evident that no SUCH substance can
possibly exist? And, though it should be allowed to exist, yet how can
that which is INACTIVE be a CAUSE; or that which is UNTHINKING be a
CAUSE OF THOUGHT? You may, indeed, if you please, annex to the word
MATTER a contrary meaning to what is vulgarly received; and tell me you
understand by it, an unextended, thinking, active being, which is the
cause of our ideas. But what else is this than to play with words, and
run into that very fault you just now condemned with so much reason? I do
by no means find fault with your reasoning, in that you collect a cause
from the PHENOMENA: BUT I deny that THE cause deducible by reason
can properly be termed Matter.

HYL. There is indeed something in what you say. But I am afraid
you do not thoroughly comprehend my meaning. I would by no means be
thought to deny that God, or an infinite Spirit, is the Supreme Cause of
all things. All I contend for is, that, subordinate to the Supreme Agent,
there is a cause of a limited and inferior nature, which CONCURS in the
production of our ideas, not by any act of will, or spiritual efficiency,
but by that kind of action which belongs to Matter, viz. MOTION.

PHIL. I find you are at every turn relapsing into your old exploded
conceit, of a moveable, and consequently an extended, substance, existing
without the mind. What! Have you already forgotten you were convinced; or
are you willing I should repeat what has been said on that head? In truth
this is not fair dealing in you, still to suppose the being of that which
you have so often acknowledged to have no being. But, not to insist
farther on what has been so largely handled, I ask whether all your ideas
are not perfectly passive and inert, including nothing of action in them.

HYL. They are.

PHIL. And are sensible qualities anything else but ideas?

HYL. How often have I acknowledged that they are not.

PHIL. But is not MOTION a sensible quality?

HYL. It is.

PHIL. Consequently it is no action?

HYL. I agree with you. And indeed it is very plain that when I stir my
finger, it remains passive; but my will which produced the motion is
active.

PHIL. Now, I desire to know, in the first place, whether, motion being
allowed to be no action, you can conceive any action besides volition:
and, in the second place, whether to say something and conceive nothing
be not to talk nonsense: and, lastly, whether, having considered the
premises, you do not perceive that to suppose any efficient or active
Cause of our ideas, other than SPIRIT, is highly absurd and
unreasonable?

HYL. I give up the point entirely. But, though Matter may not be a
cause, yet what hinders its being an INSTRUMENT, subservient to the
supreme Agent in the production of our ideas?

PHIL. An instrument say you; pray what may be the figure, springs,
wheels, and motions, of that instrument?

HYL. Those I pretend to determine nothing of, both the substance and
its qualities being entirely unknown to me.

PHIL. What? You are then of opinion it is made up of unknown
parts, that it hath unknown motions, and an unknown shape?

HYL. I do not believe that it hath any figure or motion at all, being
already convinced, that no sensible qualities can exist in an
unperceiving substance.

PHIL. But what notion is it possible to frame of an instrument void of
all sensible qualities, even extension itself?

HYL. I do not pretend to have any notion of it.

PHIL. And what reason have you to think this unknown, this
inconceivable Somewhat doth exist? Is it that you imagine God cannot act
as well without it; or that you find by experience the use of some such
thing, when you form ideas in your own mind?

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