396 



ON HUMAN UNDERSTANDING. 



^ Simple ideas consist of such as are limited to a single notion or per- 

 ception ; as those of unity, darkness, hght, sound, hardness, sweetness, 

 simple pain or uneasiness. And in the reception of these the mind is 

 passive, for it can neither make them to itself, nor can it, in any instance, 

 have any idea which does not wholly consist of them : or, in other words, 

 it cannot contemplate any one of them otherwise than in its totality. 

 Thus, on looking at this single sheet of paper, 1 have the idea of unity ; 

 and though I may divide the single sheet of paper into twenty parts, I 

 cannot divide the idea of unity into twenty parts ; for the idea of unity 

 will and must as wholly accompany every part as it accompanies the col- 

 lective sheet. And the same remark will apply to all the rest. 



Complex ideas are formed out of various simple ideas associated to- 

 gether, or contemplated derivatively. And to this class belong the ideas 

 of an army, a battle, a triangle, gratitude, veneration, gold, silver, an 

 apple, an orange : in the formation of all which it must be obvious that 

 the mind is active, for it is the activity of the mind alone that produces 

 the complexity out of such ideas as are simple. And that the ideas I 

 have now referred to are complex must be plain to every one ; for every 

 one must be sensible that the mind cannot form to itself the idea of an 

 orange without uniting into one aggregate the simple ideas of roundness, 

 yellowness, juiciness, and sweetness. In like manner, in contemplating 

 the idea of gold, there must necessarily be present to the mind, and in a 

 complex or aggregate form, the ideas of great weight, sohdity, yellow- 

 ness, lustre ; and if the idea be very accurate, great malleabihty and 



fusibihty. 



Complex ideas are formed out of simple ideas by many operations of 

 the mind ; the principal of which, however, are some combination of 

 them, some abstraction, or some comparison. Let us take a view of each 

 of these : — 



And, first, of complex ideas of combination. Unity, as I have already 

 observed, is a simple idea ; and it is one of the most common simple 

 ideas that can be presented to the mind, for every object without, and 

 every idea within, tend equally to excite it. And, as being a simple idea, 

 the mind, as I have also remarked, is passive on its presentation ; it can 

 neither form such an idea to itself, nor contemplate it otherwise than in 

 its totality ; but it can combine the ideas of as many units as it pleases, 

 and hence produce the complex idea of a hundred, a thousand, or a 

 hundred thousand. So beauty is a complex idea, for the mind, in form- 

 ing it, combines a variety of separate ideas, into one common aggregate. 

 Thus Dryden, in delineating the beautiful Victoria, in his " Love Tri- 

 umphant 



Her eyes, her lips, her cheeks, her shape, her features, 

 Seem to be drawn by Love's own hand ; by Love 

 Himself in love. 



In like manner the mind can produce complex ideas by an opposite 

 process, and that is, by abstraction, or separation. Thus chalk, snow, 

 and milk, though agreeing, perhaps, in no other respect, coincide in the 

 same colour ; and the mind, contemplating this agreement, may abstract 

 or separate it from the other properties of these three objects, and form 

 the idea which is indicated by the term whiteness ; and having thus ac- 

 quired a new idea by the process of abstraction, it may afterwards apply 



