Their observable qualities,
actions, and powers are owing to something without them; and there
is not so complete and perfect a part that we know of nature, which
does not owe the being it has, and the excellences of it, to its
neighbours; and we must not confine our thoughts within the surface of
any body, but look a great deal further, to comprehend perfectly those
qualities that are in it.
12. Our nominal essences of substances furnish few universal
propositions about them that are certain. If this be so, it is not
to be wondered that we have very imperfect ideas of substances, and
that the real essences, on which depend their properties and
operations, are unknown to us. We cannot discover so much as that
size, figure, and texture of their minute and active parts, which is
really in them; much less the different motions and impulses made in
and upon them by bodies from without, upon which depends, and by which
is formed the greatest and most remarkable part of those qualities
we observe in them, and of which our complex ideas of them are made
up. This consideration alone is enough to put an end to all our
hopes of ever having the ideas of their real essences; which whilst we
want, the nominal essences we make use of instead of them will be able
to furnish us but very sparingly with any general knowledge, or
universal propositions capable of real certainty.
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