3. Of the sorts of substances. An obscure and relative idea of
substance in general being thus made we come to have the ideas of
particular sorts of substances, by collecting such combinations of
simple ideas as are, by experience and observation of men's senses,
taken notice of to exist together; and are therefore supposed to
flow from the particular internal constitution, or unknown essence
of that substance. Thus we come to have the ideas of a man, horse,
gold, water, &c.; of which substances, whether any one has any other
clear idea, further than of certain simple ideas co-existent together,
I appeal to every one's own experience. It is the ordinary qualities
observable in iron, or a diamond, put together, that make the true
complex idea of those substances, which a smith or a jeweller commonly
knows better than a philosopher; who, whatever substantial forms he
may talk of, has no other idea of those substances, than what is
framed by a collection of those simple ideas which are to be found
in them: only we must take notice, that our complex ideas of
substances, besides all those simple ideas they are made up of, have
always the confused idea of something to which they belong, and in
which they subsist: and therefore when we speak of any sort of
substance, we say it is a thing having such or such qualities; as body
is a thing that is extended, figured, and capable of motion; spirit, a
thing capable of thinking; and so hardness, friability, and power to
draw iron, we say, are qualities to be found in a loadstone.
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