An Essay Concerning Human Understanding / Ein Versuch über den menschlichen Verstand. Auswahlausgabe. John Locke
An Essay Concerning Human Understanding / Ein Versuch über den menschlichen Verstand. Auswahlausgabe
the Nipple, hath not the same Taste, that it used to receive from thence? Is it the actual Knowledge of impossibile est idem esse, et non esse, that makes a Child distinguish between its Mother and a Stranger; or, that makes it fond of the one, and fly the other? […] The Names Impossibility and Identity, stand for two Ideas, so far from being innate, or born with us, that I think it requires great Care and Attention, to form them right in our Understandings. […]
§ 4. If Identity (to instance that alone) be a native Impression; and consequently so clear and obvious to us, that we must needs know it even from our Cradles; I would gladly be resolved, by one of Seven, or Seventy Years old, Whether a Man, being a Creature, 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 several Ages asunder? Nay, Whether the Cock too, which had the same Soul, were not the same with both of them? Whereby, perhaps, it will appear, that our Idea of sameness, is not so settled and clear, as to deserve to be thought innate in us. For if those innate Ideas, are not clear and distinct, so as to be universally known, and naturally agreed [74]on, they cannot be Subjects of universal, and undoubted Truths; but will be the unavoidable Occasion of perpetual Uncertainty. For, I suppose, every one’s Idea of Identity, will not be the same, that Pythagoras, and Thousands others of his Followers, have: And which then shall be true? Which innate? Or are there two different Ideas of Identity, both innate?
§ 5. Nor let any one think, that the Questions, I have here proposed, about the Identity of Man, are bare, empty Speculations; which if they were, would be enough to shew, That there was in the Understandings of Men no innate Idea of Identity. He, that shall, with a little Attention, reflect on the Resurrection, and consider, that Divine Justice shall bring to Judgment, at the last Day, the very same Persons, to be happy or miserable in the other, who did well or ill in this Life, will find it, perhaps, not easy to resolve with himself, what makes the same Man, or wherein Identity consists: And will not be forward to think he, and every one, even Children themselves, have naturally a clear Idea of it.
§ 6. Let us examine that Principle of Mathematicks, viz. That the whole is bigger than a part. This, I take it, is reckon’d amongst innate Principles. I am sure it has as good a Title, as any, to be thought so; which yet, no Body can think it to be, when he considers the Ideas it comprehends in it, Whole and Part, are perfectly Relative; but the Positive Ideas, to which they properly and immediately belong, are Extension and Number, of which alone, Whole and Part, are Relations. So that if Whole and Part are innate Ideas, Extension and Number must be so too, it being impossible to have an Idea of a [76]Relation, without having any at all of the thing to which it belongs, and in which it is founded. Now, Whether the Minds of Men have naturally imprinted on them the Ideas of Extension and Number, I leave to be considered by those, who are the Patrons of innate Principles.
§ 7. That God is to be worshipped, is, without doubt, as great a Truth as any that can enter into the mind of Man, and deserves the first place amongst all practical Principles. But yet, it can by no means be thought innate, unless the Ideas of God and Worship, are innate. That the Idea, the Term Worship stands for, is not in the Understanding of Children, and a Character stamped on the Mind in its first Original, I think, will be easily granted, by any one, that considers how few there be, amongst grown Men, who have a clear and distinct Notion of it. […]
§ 8. If any Idea can be imagin’d innate, the Idea of God may, of all others, for many Reasons 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 Atheists, taken notice of amongst the Ancients, and left branded upon the Records of History, hath not Navigation discovered, in these latter Ages, whole Nations, […] amongst whom there was to be found no Notion of a God, no Religion. […] These are Instances of Nations where uncultivated Nature has been left to it self, without the help of Letters, and Discipline, and the Improvements of Arts and Sciences. But there are others to be found, who have enjoy’d [78]these in a very great measure, who yet, for want of a due application of their thoughts this way, want the Idea, and Knowledge of God. […] And, perhaps, if we should, with attention, mind the Lives, and Discourses of People not so far off, we should have too much Reason to fear, that many, in more civilized Countries, have no very strong, and clear Impressions of a Deity upon their Minds; and that the Complaints of Atheism, made from the Pulpit, are not without Reason. […]
§ 9. But had all Mankind, every where, a Notion of a God, (whereof yet History tells us the contrary) it would not from thence follow, that the Idea of him was innate. For, though no Nation were to be found without a Name, and some few dark Notions of him; yet that would not prove them to be natural Impressions on the Mind, no more than the Names of Fire, or the Sun, Heat, or Number, do prove the Ideas they stand for, to be innate, because the Names of those things, and the Ideas of them, are so universally received, and known amongst Mankind. Nor, on the contrary, is the want of such a Name, or the absence of such a Notion out of Men’s Minds, any Argument against the Being of a God, any more, than it would be a Proof, that there was no Load-stone in the World, because a great part of Mankind, had neither a Notion of any such thing, nor a Name for it; […]
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§ 12. Indeed it is urged, That it is suitable to the goodness of God, to imprint, upon the Minds of Men, Characters and Notions of himself, and not to leave them in the dark, and [80]doubt, in so grand a Concernment; and also by that means, to secure to himself the Homage and Veneration, due from so intelligent a Creature as Man; and therefore he has done it.
This Argument, if it be of any Force, will prove much more than those, who use it in this case, expect from it. For if we may conclude, that God hath done for Men, all that Men shall judge is best for them, because it is suitable to his goodness so to do, it will prove, not only, that God has imprinted on the Minds of Men an Idea of himself; but that he hath plainly stamp’d there, in fair Characters, all that Men ought to know, or believe of him, all that they ought to do in obedience to his Will; and that he hath given them a Will and Affections conformable to it. This, no doubt, every one will think it better for Men, than that they should, in the dark, grope after Knowledge. […] But the Goodness of God hath not been wanting to Men without such Original Impressions of Knowledge, or Ideas stamped on the Mind: since he hath furnished Man with those Faculties, which will serve for the sufficient discovery of all things requisite to the end of such a Being; and I doubt not but to shew, that a Man by the right use of his natural Abilities, may, without any innate Principles, attain the Knowledge of a God, and other things that concern him. God having endued Man with those Faculties of knowing which he hath, was no more obliged by his Goodness, to implant those innate Notions in his Mind, than that having given him Reason, Hands, and Materials, he should build him Bridges, or Houses; which [82]some People in the World, however of good parts, do either totally want, or are but ill provided of, as well as others are wholly without Ideas of God, and Principles of Morality; or at least have but very ill ones. The reason in both cases being, That they never employ’d their Parts, Faculties, and Powers, industriously that way, but contented themselves with the Opinions, Fashions, and Things of their Country, as they found them, without looking any farther. […]
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§ 14. Can it be thought, that the Ideas Men have of God, are the Characters, and Marks of Himself, engraven in their minds by his own finger, when we see, that in the same Country, under one and the same Name, Men have far different, nay, often contrary and inconsistent Ideas, and conceptions of him? Their agreeing in a Name, or Sound, will scarce prove an innate Notion of Him.
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§ 16. […] ’Tis as certain, that there is a God, as that the opposite Angles, made by the intersection of two strait Lines, are equal. There was never any rational Creature, that set himself sincerely to examine the truth of these Propositions, that could fail to assent to them: Though yet