May he not, with more reason, assure him
he was not asleep? This is something beyond philosophy; and it
cannot be less than revelation, that discovers to another thoughts
in my mind, when I can find none there myself, And they must needs
have a penetrating sight who can certainly see that I think, when I
cannot perceive it myself, and when I declare that I do not; and yet
can see that dogs or elephants do not think, when they give all the
demonstration of it imaginable, except only telling us that they do
so. This some may suspect to be a step beyond the Rosicrucians; it
seeming easier to make one's self invisible to others, than to make
another's thoughts visible to me, which are not visible to himself.
But it is but defining the soul to be "a substance that always
thinks," and the business is done. If such definition be of any
authority, I know not what it can serve for but to make many men
suspect that they have no souls at all; since they find a good part of
their lives pass away without thinking. For no definitions that I
know, no suppositions of any sect, are of force enough to destroy
constant experience; and perhaps it is the affectation of knowing
beyond what we perceive, that makes so much useless dispute and
noise in the world.
20. No ideas but from sensation and reflection, evident, if we
observe children.
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