PART III.

have given them more, if they had been more capable; but because they were wanting to themselves, these sufficient [Isai. v. 4.] means were not efficacious. "I looked for grapes," saith God; how could God "look for grapes," if He had not given them sufficient means to bring forth grapes? yet these sufficient means were not efficacious.

These things being premised, do answer whatsoever he saith; as this, "The Bishop thinks two horses may be sufficient to draw a coach, though they will not draw," &c. I say they "may be sufficient" in point of power and ability, though they will not draw." Many men have sufficient power to do what they will not do. And if the production of the effect do depend upon their wills, or upon their contingent and uncertain endeavours, or if their sufficiency be but conditional, as he maketh it,-" if they be not lame or restye," -then the production of the effect is free or contingent, and cannot be antecedently necessary. For otherwise all these conditions and suppositions are vain.

Where he chargeth me to say, that "the cause of a monster is unsufficient to produce a monster," he doth me wrong, and 843 himself more. I never said any such thing. I hope I may have leave to speak to him in his own words :-"I must take it for an untruth, until he cite the places," where I have said So. I have said, and I do say, that the cause of a monster was unsufficient to produce a man, which nature and the free agent intended, but it was sufficient to produce a monster, otherwise a monster had not been produced. When an agent doth not produce what he and nature intend, but produceth a monster instead of a man, it is proof enough of his insufficiency to produce what he should, and would have produced, if he could. Where he addeth,-that "that which is sufficient to produce a monster, is not therefore to be called an insufficient cause to produce a man, no more than that which is sufficient to produce a man is to be called an insufficient cause to produce a monster","-is even as good sense, as if a man should say, he who hath skill sufficient to hit the white, is insufficient to miss the white.

say

II.

[T. H.'s

He pretendeth, that sensus divisus and compositus "is non- DISCOURSE sense" (though they be logical terms of art); and what I of" the power of the will to forbear willing," or "the domi- mistakes.] nion of the will over its own acts," or "the power of the will in actu primok,” he saith "are as wild words as ever were spoken within the walls of Bedlam';" though they be as sad truths as the founders of Bedlam themselves could have uttered, and the authors who used them the greatest wits of the world, and so many that ten Bedlams could not hold them. But it may be he would have the scene changed, and have the wisest sort of men thrust into Bedlam, that he might vent his paradoxes more freely. So Festus accused Saint Paul of madness,-" Paul, Paul, much learning hath made [Acts xxvi. thee mad."

In the definition of a free agent,-" which, when all things needful to the production of the effect are present, can nevertheless not produce it","-they understood all things needful in point of ability, not will.

He telleth us gravely, that "act and power differ in nothing but in this, that the former signifieth the time present, the latter the time to come"." As if he should tell us, that the cause and the effect differ nothing, but that the effect signifieth the time present, and the cause the time to come.

Lastly, he saith, that except I shew him "the place where” he "shuffled out effects producible and thrust into their place effects produced," he will "take it for an untruth." To content him, I shall do it readily, without searching far for it. My words were these ;-"The question is, whether effects producible be free from necessity; he shuffles out 'effects producible,' and thrusts in their places 'effects produced.'" Now, that he doth this, I prove out of his own words in the section preceding;-"Hence it is manifest, that whatsoever is produced, is produced necessarily; for whatsoever is produced, hath had a sufficient cause to produce it, or else it had not been." Let the reader judge, if he have not here

21.]

III.

PART shuffled "effects producible" out of the question, and thrust into their places "effects produced." The question is, whether effects producible be necessarily produced; he concludeth, in the place of the contradictory, that effects actually produced

are necessary.

Our conceptions

touchstone

of truth.

CASTIGATIONS OF THE ANIMADVERSIONS;-NUMBER XXXIII.

He saith, that "to define what spontaneity, deliberation, are not the will, propension, appetite, a free agent, and liberty, is, and to prove that they are well defined, there can be no other proof offered but every man's own experience and memory, what he meaneth by such words'." I do readily believe all this to be true in order to his own opinions ;—that there neither is nor can be any proof of them but imagination. But his reason was shot at random;-"For definitions, being the beginning of all demonstration, cannot themselves be demonstrated, that is, proved to another mans." Doth he take all his particular imaginations to be so many definitions or demonstrations? He hath one conception of spontaneity, of deliberation, of a free agent, of liberty; I have another. My conception doth not prove my opinion to be true, nor his conception prove his opinion to be true; but our conceptions being contrary, it proveth either his, or mine, or both, to be false. Truth is a conformity or congruity of the conceptions of the mind with the things themselves, which are without the mind, and of the exterior speech as the sign, with the things and conceptions as the things signified. So there is a threefold truth: the first is objective, in the things themselves; the second is conformative, in the conceptions of the mind; the third is signative or significative, in speech or writing. It is a good proceeding, to prove the truth of the inward conceptions of the mind from their conformity with the things themselves; but it is vain and ridiculous, to prove 844 the truth of things from their agreement with the conceptions of my mind or his mind. The clocks may differ, but the course of the sun is certain. A man's words may not agree r [Qu., Animadv. upon Numb. ' [Ibid.]

xxxiii. p. 306.]

with his thoughts, nor his thoughts agree with the things DISCOURSE themselves.

But I commend his prudence in this, and in this only, that he hath chosen out a way of proof that cannot be confuted without his own consent, because no man knoweth another man's inward conceptions but himself. And the better to secure himself, he maketh his English reader judge of Latin words, and his ignorant readers judge of words of art. These are the fittest judges for his purpose. But what if the terms be obscure? He answereth, "If the words be unusual," the way must be "to make the definition" of "their signification" by "mutual consentt." What "mutual consent?" The signification of these words was settled by universal consent and custom; and must they be unsettled again, to satisfy the humour of every odd paradoxical person, who could find no way to get himself reputation but by blundering all things? He telleth us, that "the Schoolmen use not to argue by rule, but as fencers use to handle weapons, by quickness of the hand and eye"." The poor Schoolmen cannot rest quietly in their graves for him, but he is still persecuting their ashes, because they durst presume to soar a pitch above his capacity. The Schoolmen were the most exact observers of rules in the whole world, as if they had been composed altogether of rules. But they observed not his rule,—that whatsoever any man imagineth a word to be, that it is. Much good may his Lesbian rule do him, which he may bend this way or that way at his pleasure. It is just such another rule as the parish-clerk's rule of the time, who preferred the clock before a dial, because he set it according to his own imagination.

He asketh me (for he is much better at making knots than loosing them), "what" I "will answer, if" he "shall ask” me how I " will judge of the causes of things, whereof" I "have no idea or conception in" mine "own mind?" As if there were no mean, but either a man must want all inward notions and conceptions, or else he must make his own imaginations to be the touchstone of truth. "Nulla lux" and

II.

t[Qu., Animadv. upon Numb. xxxiii. pp. 306, 307.]

х

[Ibid., p. 307.]
Ibid.]

III.

"nimia lux❞—no light and too much light-are both enemies to the sight; so, to take away all inward conceptions, and to ground the true being and nature of things upon our fallible conceptions, are both enemies to the truth.

Albeit he "dare" say (as he is bold enough, whilst the danger is but in words), that if one should "ask an ordinary person" whether our antipodes should have their heads upwards or downwards, they would "tell him as significantly as any scholar," that their heads were upwards, because they are "towards heaven ;" and that when they say there is nobody in that room, they mean no more but "there is nobody that can be seen;" or when they say that vessel is "empty," they do apprehend it to be full of air; yet neither I, nor these "ordinary persons" themselves, do believe him. How should they apprehend such things rightly, until they be better informed both of the figure of the earth, and the nature of the air, than they are by their senses? He saith, "the question is not, whether such and such tenets be true, but whether such and such words can be well defined without thinking on the things they signify z." I should be glad to find him once stating of a question truly. The question is not, "whether such and such words can be well defined without thinking on the things they signify;" but whether every thought or every imagination of every odd fantastic person, or of the common people, be a right determination of the true sense and signification of every word. They who do not understand the distinct natures of things signified, cannot understand the right significations of words, which are but signs of things.

"Right discipline," or learning and good instruction, doth not only enable a man to "reason truly in more numerous or various matters"," but to reason more truly and exactly in all matters; yea, even in those things which we have learned from our own "senses and memories"." As I shewed him before in the instance of the sun; which sense judgeth to be no greater than a ball, but learning and reason do convince us, that it is many times greater than the globe of the earth. If

y [Qu., Animadv. upon Numb. xxxiii. p. 307.]

* [Ibid.]

a

[Ibid., p. 308.]

b [In the Defence, T. H. Numb. xxxiii. above p. 175.]