ON HUMAN Understanding. 



395 



light where it does not shine, nor judge where it has no principles to judge 

 upon."* 



External objects first impress or operate upon the outward senses, and 

 these senses, by means hitherto unexplained, and, perhaps, altogether 

 inexplicable, immediately impress or operate upon the mind, or excite ni 

 it perceptions or ideas of the presence and qiTalities of such objects ; the 

 word idea being employed in the system before us, not as we have already 

 hinted at, in any of the significations of the schools, but in its broad and 

 popular meaning, as importing whatever a man observes and is conscious 

 to himself he has in his mind ; "t whatever was formerly intended by the terms 

 archetype, phantasm, species, thought, notion, conception, or whatever 

 else it may be, which we can be employed about in thinking. | And to 

 these effects, without puzzling himself with the inquiry how external objects 

 operate upon the senses, or the senses upon the mind, Mr. Locke gave 

 the name of ideas o/" sensation, in allusion to the source from which they 

 are derived. 



But the mind, as we have already observed, has various powers or facul- 

 ties as well as the body ; and they are quite as active and lively in their 

 respective functions. In consequence of which the ideas of external ob- 

 jects are not only perceived, but retained, thought of, compared, com- 

 pounded, abstracted, doubted, believed, desired ; and hence another foun- 

 tain, and of a very capacious flow, from which we also derive ideas, 

 namely, a reflex act or perception of the niind's own operations ; whence 

 the ideas derived from this fountain are denominated ideas q/" reflexion. 

 The ideas, then, derived from these two sources, and which have some- 

 times been called objective and subjective, § constitute all our experi- 

 ence, and consequently all our knowledge. Whatever stock of information 

 a man may be possest of, however richly he may be stored with taste, 

 learning, or science, if he turnliis attention inwards and diligently examine 

 his own thoughts, he will find that he has not a single idea in his mind but 

 what has been derived from the one or the other of these two channels. 

 But let not this important observation be forgotten by any one ; that the 

 ideas the mind possesses will be fewer or more numerous, simpler or more 

 diversified, clear or confused, according to the number of the objects or 

 subjects presented to it, and the extent of its reflection and examination. 

 Thus, a clock or a landscape may be for ever before our eyes, but unless 

 we direct our attention to them, and study their difl^eren|; parts, although 

 we cannot be deceived in their being a clock or a landscape, we can have 

 but a very confused idea of their character and composition. The ideas 

 presented to the mind, from which of these two sources soever derived, or 

 in other words, whether objective or subjective, are of two kinds, simple 

 and COMPLEX. 



* Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, Part i. ch. v. Part ii. Conclusion. 



t Locke, Book i. ch. i. § 3. I lb. § 8. 



§ " On appelle, dans la philosophie AUemande, idees subjectives celles que naissent de ia 

 nature de notre intelligence et deses facultes, et idees objectives toutes celles que sent exci^ 

 tees paries sensations."— Mad. de Stael Holstein, de I'Allemagne, torn. iii. p. 76. 



Mad. de Stael, however, has fallen into the common error of the French pliilosophers, from 

 whom she appears to have generally informed herself of the principles of Locke's system, in 

 supposing that he derived all ideas from sensation. *' A I'epo^ae ou parut la Critique de la 

 Rahon pure, iln'existoit que deux systemes surl'entenderoent huraain parmi lespenseurs ; 

 I'une, celui de Locke, aitribuoit toutes nos idees a nos sensations ; I'antre, celui de Descartes 

 et de Leibnitz, s'attachoit a dewontrer la spirjtoalite et I'activitede Fame, de libre arbilre, 

 ^nfiintouteia doctrine idealiste." — Id. p. 70. 



