1803. ] 
UIRER, that other things are percepti- 
ble befide ideas, for that fenfations are 
perceptible, can have no influence on this 
quettion ; for fexfations are primary per- 
€eptions, ideas are fecondary perceptions. 
Both appear to have their exiftence and 
caufe in MIND. And inftead of fenfations 
being a proof of an external material 
univerfe, as no fuch univerfe zs or can be 
perceived, they are a proof only of a /ez- 
fible aniverfe: or of a combination of 
phenomena, created By mind, and aéting 
ON mind, and referable to mind alone. 
In the 9th propofition the ENQUIRER 
is obliged to deny the definition of MAT- 
TER, which is not only BERKLEJAN ‘but 
NEWTONIAN, ARISTOTELIC, and PLa- 
TONIC: inert fenfelefs fubfiances in which 
exift extenfion and figure (1 exclude mo- 
tion, that being a mere accident refulting 
from fuperadded gravitation.) 
The EnQurirer in vain urges the opi- 
nion, either on ancient or on modern au- 
thority, either from HippccraTEs or 
from OKELEY, of matter effentially per- 
cipient. There cannot be two fubftances, 
one effentially percipient, and the other 
effentially impercipient, which can both 
be properly included under one name, 
Either a/] matter muft be effentially per- 
cipient, or percipiency muft be effentially 
Joreign to matter. And it is eafy to fee 
which muft be the truth. If matter were 
percipient, this perception mult be in aif 
its parts: being as much a property as 
figurability and extenfion. A grain of 
fand muft therefore confit of an infinite 
number of independent percipients :. the 
fame of a log of wood, a grate, a chair, 
or a table. And if matter were perci- 
pient, it muft have wILL: and neither 
motion, nor weight, nor impul/e, could an- 
tecedently be calculated upon any given 
laws: for this wil/, inherent in every 
particle, might and suf perpetually give 
2 refult contrary to the gezeral laws of 
nature; all of which, if matter exitts, 
neceflarily depend on its want of per- 
ception, will, and fpontaniety, But 
the ENQUIRER feems to doubt, not only 
whether zzertuefs be predicable of matter, 
but whether any thing can be predicated 
of it but refftivene/s: which refitivenefs 
the Enquirer defines to be the ** capa- 
bility of becoming an objec of fenfation.” 
But the capability of becoming an obje& of 
fenfation does not feem to depend on re- 
fiftivenefs: this is not properly an objec 
of fenfation, it is only, if matter has ex- 
iftence, the means of exciting it: and the 
capability of becoming an objeét of fenfa- 
Monruiy Maa. No. 98. 
Mr. Lofft on the Syftem of Idealifm. 
125 
tion may, and moft probably does, refult 
folely from this: that mind being effex- 
tially percipient, is capable, according to 
certain modes of agency, eftablifhed by 
the SUPREME MIND, to excite percep- 
tions in other minds: and that the su- 
PREME MIND gives to fome of thefe per- 
ceptions permanence and an external cha- 
racter: that is, accompanies them with 
fuch circumftances as prove them not to 
be perceptions which we originally exe 
cite in ourfelves. And it is remarkable 
that we haye no perceptions which are: 
not at firft thus excited in us by external 
agency. And it is further remarkable, 
that in every poffible hypothefts nothing 
appears to act or exift which muft not be 
ultimately referred to mind for all its 
powers, and all indications it can give of 
exiftence. 
The ENQUIRER goes farther: fo as to 
fuppofe, that, although extenfion, figure, 
and motion, in the abfrad, exilt only in 
mind, yet they have a complete particu. 
lar exiftence in matter. But let the Ene 
QUIRER confider, whether zzotzon, other- 
wife than as a perception or idea, can exilt 
without fuppofing the reality of /pace. 
Let the ENQUIRER further confider, whe- 
ther the dificulties of fuppofing {pace to 
be a real fubffance be not much greater 
than the nece‘fity or convenience of fup-— 
pofing it to exift at all, otherwife than as 
an abftraét modification of our thoughts. 
Time is no real fubfiance: and why 
fhould /pace, motion, or matter, have any 
more reality ? Why fhould they not all be 
alike modifications of mind and its per- 
ceptions ; inftead of being of a different 
and contrary nature? The ENQUIRER is 
indeed compelled to fuppofe time to have 
a fubftantial reality ; and /peczjic colour to 
have a fubftantial reality in like manner. 
T fuppofe thefe, and matter alfo, to be 
modes of perception oly; and to exift only 
in mind. And if he had been feeing how 
analogous time and /pace are, the one re- 
lating to the arrangement of fenfations 
and ideas, confidered as fimultanzous or 
co-exiftent, and the other to their arrange- 
ment, confidered as fuccefive, and that 
fince matter cannot be fuppofed to exift 
in time /ubftantially, as in a fubftratum, 
it is probable it no otherwife exifts in 
pace thao in time ; intellectually in both ; 
‘and if it had been farther noticed, that the 
qualities we call primary have no more 
proof of their being material fubftances, 
or parts of fuch, than the /fecondary, 
which have been long acknowledged to be 
only in the mind ; the whole of this quef- 
R tion 
