8o ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book II. 



difference of this principle, thole Bodies have different motions, be- 

 ing fometimes moved upwards, fometimcs downwards, fometimcs 

 to one another, fometimes from one another; and, from the fame 

 principle, I fay, come, not only their Motions, but all their other 

 qualities. The notion, therefore, of this principle, is what I call 

 the Idea of fuch Subftances ; and it is an Idea, which even the favage 

 nations have, who, in that refpedt, are, I think, much better phi- 

 lofophers than our Matcrialifts ; for thofe nations believe that there 

 is a fpirit in all thofe Bodies, which makes them operate in the man- 

 ner they do *. And fo much for the Idea of Subftances. 



I am now to fpeak of our notions of Accidents or Qualities : 

 Thefe, though they be perceived by the Senfe, and thefe perceptions 

 retained by the Phantafia, and likewife generalized by the InteHed, 

 fo that we conceive them to be produced by many different objeds, 

 yet, if we know nothing more of them, we have no Idea of them, 

 becaufe we know nothing of their nature and effence ; for that every 

 quality of any material objedt has a certain Nature by which it ads 

 upon one Senfe, and not upon another, and produces one kind of 

 Senfation, and not another, muft be evident to every one. Now, 

 unlefs we can diftinguifh the different Senfes upon which thefe diffe- 

 rent qualities operate, and have fome notion, however obfcure and 

 impcrfed, of the manner in which they operate upon different Sen- 

 fes we cannot be faid to have any Idea of them. 



• This is a fafl well attefted by an author, from whom we have the befl account 

 of the natives of North America, and the earlieft, before they were infetled with 

 our vices and opinions. The author, I mean, is Gabriel Sagarde, a religious of the 

 order of St Francois, who was for feveral years a mifiionary among the Hurons, a- 

 bout the middle of the laft century, and is, I believe, the firft who has publiflied any 

 thing concerning them. He is an author that I have made much ufe of in my work 

 upon the Origin and Progrefs of Language ; and from him, and from another mif- 

 fionary among another tribe of thofe favages, the Albinoquois, who, I believe, is 

 yet alive, and with whom I converfcd much, (his name is Roubaud), I have learned 

 more concerning thofe nations than from any other authors or living perions. 



