4i8 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book V. 



we have a phantafuh in which things, that have no real exiftence, are 

 pidured in the mofl: lively manner, and have not only fliape and co- 

 lour, but voice and adion given to them, is a fa6t that cannot be de- 

 nied. 



Thus, It appears, that the arguments hitherto ufed to prove the ex- 

 iftence of a material world are not fatisfadtory ; and the reafon may be, 

 what is fomewhere obferved by Ariftotle, that the nearer any thing is 

 to a firft principle, and a felf-evident truth, the more difficult it is to 

 be proved, though it be that which every body believes. But, as it is 

 the bufinefs of metaphyfics to explain the firft principles of fcience, fo 

 it belongs alfo to it to prove the truth of the moft immediate deduc- 

 tions from thofe principles, efpecially if they be controverted. 



But, before I begin this proof, I cannot help obferving, that it is 

 moft extraordinary that Mr Hume, who denies the exiftence of the 

 human mind, or of any mind in the univerfe, fhould deny, at the 

 fame time, the exiftence of matter \ for, if he had admitted the ex- 

 iftence of m'lnd^ it might have appeared poflible that our minds fhould 

 have produced all thofe illufions that we call objet-^s of fenfe, and be- 

 lieve to be real, in the fame manner as it a(5lually does produce them 

 in our fleep ; and it might have been faid, with fome colour of rea- 

 fon, that our whole life was but a dream. But how fuch illufions 

 fhould be produced, without either matter or mind^ is to me altogether 

 inconceivable : Nor, do I think, can it be believed by any man, who 

 does not, at the fame time, believe that any thing may be produced 

 without a caufe. There were, no doubt, antient philofophers, as well 

 as there are modern, who denied the exiftence of mind^ and therefore 

 were called matcr'ialijls. There have been others who, admitting the 

 exiftence of mind, denied the exiftence of matter. Such was Dr 

 Berkeley. Nor does it appear that Pyrrho, however fceptical he was 

 in other things, ever called in queftion the exiftence of his own mind, 



or 



