Secondly, When a thing is made up of particles, which did all of
them before exist; but that very thing, so constituted of pre-existing
particles, which, considered all together, make up such a collection
of simple ideas, had not any existence before, as this man, this
egg, rose, or cherry, &c. And this, when referred to a substance,
produced in the ordinary course of nature by internal principle, but
set on work by, and received from, some external agent, or cause,
and working by insensible ways which we perceive not, we call
generation. When the cause is extrinsical, and the effect produced
by a sensible separation, or juxta-position of discernible parts, we
call it making; and such are all artificial things. When any simple
idea is produced, which was not in that subject before, we call it
alteration. Thus a man is generated, a picture made; and either of
them altered, when any new sensible quality or simple idea is produced
in either of them, which was not there before: and the things thus
made to exist, which were not there before, are effects; and those
things which operated to the existence, causes. In which, and all
other cases, we may observe, that the notion of cause and effect has
its rise from ideas received by sensation or reflection; and that this
relation, how comprehensive soever, terminates at last in them.
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