43 



trated in their writings, with such force and preci- 

 sion. It cannot so much as be said, that the mo- 

 derns have given a new turn to these opinions, for 

 they not only reason upon the same principles, but 

 employ the very same comparisons in proof of them. 



5. Democritus was the first who'disarrayed body of its 

 sensible qualities. That great man, who admitted 

 only of atoms and space as the principles of things, 

 differed from all who had preceded him in that opu 

 nion, in thai he affirmed, atoms were void of qualities, 

 and in this, he was followed by Epicurus. He de- 

 rived qualities from the different order and disposition 

 of the atoms among themselves, as well as from their 

 diversity of figure, which according to him was 

 the cause of all the various changes aud modifications 

 in nature, some of them being round, others angular, 

 some straight, some pointed, some crooked, &c. 

 " Thus the first elements of things having in them 

 neither whiteness nor blackness, sweetness nor bitter- 

 ness, heat nor cold, nor any other quality, it follows, 

 that colour for example, exists only in our percep. 

 tion of it, as also that bitterness and sweetness,whicli 

 exist only in being perceived, are the consequences 

 of the different manners in which we ourselves are af- 

 fected by the bodies surrounding us, there being 

 nothing in its own nature yellow, or white, or red ; 

 sweet, or bitter." 



6. Sextus Empiricus, explaining the doctrine of 

 Democritus says, " that sensible qualities," according 

 to that philosopher, u have nothing of reality but in 

 the opinion of those who are differently affected by 

 them, according to the different dispositions .of their 

 organs, and that from this difference of disposition 

 arise the perceptions of sweet and bitter, h at and 

 cold, and also that we do not deceive ourselves in 

 affirming that we feel such impressions ; but in con. 

 eluding that exterior objects, must have in them 

 something analogous to our feelings/' 



