appear, and that they are variously connected with each other, which is the foundation of memory or recollection. We also fee, that our ideas are variously combined and divided, and can perceive the other relations that they bear to each other, which is the foundation of judgment, and confequently of reasoning. And laftly, we perceive, that various bodily motions depend upon ideas, and trains of ideas, from which arifes, what is called a voluntary power over our actions.

These particulars, I apprehend, comprize all that we are properly confcious of; and with respect to thefe, it is hardly poffible we can be mistaken. But every thing that we pretend to know, that is really more than these, must be by way of inference from them; and in drawing these inferences or conclufions, we are liable to mistakes, as well as in other inferences. In fact, there is, perhaps, no fubject whatever with refpect to which we have more need of caution, from the danger we are in of imagining, that our knowledge of things relating to ourselves is in the first instance, when, in reality, it is in the fecond, or perhaps the third or fourth.

If then, as I have obferved, all that we are really conscious of be our ideas, and the various affections of our ideas, which, when reduced to general heads, we call the powers of thought, as memory, judgment, and will, all our knowledge of the fubject of thought within us, or what we call ourselves, must be by way

of inference. What we feel, and what we do, we may be faid to know by intuition; but what we are, we know only by deduction, or inference from intuitive obfervations. If, therefore, it be afferted, that the fubject of thought is fomething that is fimple, indivifible, immaterial, or naturally immortal, it can only be by way of conclufion from given premifes. Confequently, it is a decifion for which nó man's word is to be taken. We may fancy that it is fomething that we feel; or are confcious of, but, from the nature of the thing, it can only be that a man reafons himself into that belief, and therefore he may, without having been aware of it, have impofed upon himself by fome fallacy in the argument.

Feeling and thinking are allowed to be properties; and though all that we can know of any thing are its properties, we agree to say, that all properties inhere in, or belong to, fome fubject or fubfiance; but what this fubftance is, farther than its being poffeffed of thofe very properties by which it is known to us, it is impoffible for us to fay, except we can prove, that thofe known properties neceffarily imply others. If, therefore, any perfon fay he is confcious that his mind (by which we mean the fubject of thought) is fimple, or indivifible, and if he fpeak properly, he can only mean, that he is one thinking perfon, or being, and not feveral, which will be univerfally acknowledged. But if he means any thing more than this, as that the fubftance

to

to which the property of thinking belongs is incapable of divifion, either having no extenfion, or parts, or that thofe parts cannot be removed from each other, I do not admit his affertion, without hearing what reafons he has to advance for it; being fenfible, that in this he goes beyond a proper confcioufnefs. I may think it more probable, that every thing that exifts must have extenfion, and that (except fpace, and the divine effence, which fills all space) whatever is extended may be divided, though that divifion might be attended with the lofs of properties peculiar to the undivided fubftance.

Much farther muft a man go beyond the bounds of proper confcioufnefs, into those of reafoning, to fay that the fubject of his thinking powers is immaterial, or fomething different from the matter of which his body, and especially his brain, confifts. For admitting all that he can know by experience, or intuition, I may think it more probable, that all the powers or properties of man inhere in one kind of fubftance; and fince we are agreed, that man confifts, in part at least, of matter, I may conclude, that he is wholly material, and may refuse to give up this opinion, till I be shown, that the properties neceffarily belonging to matter, and those of feeling and thinking, are incompatible. And before this can be determined, the reafons for and against it must be attended to. It is a queftion that cannot be decided by fimple feeling.

K 4

Lefs

Lefs ftill can it be determined by consciousness, that the fubject of thought is naturally immortal, fo that a man will continue to think and act after he has ceafed to breathe and move. We are certainly conscious of the same things with respect to ourfelves, but what one man may think to be very clear on this fubject, another may think to be very doubtful, or exceedingly improbable; drawing different conclufions from the fame premises.

Again, that man is an agent, meaning by it, that he has a power of beginning motion, independently of any mechanical laws to which the author of his nature has fubjected him, is a thing that is fo far from being evident from consciousness, that, if we attend properly to what we really do feel, we fhall, as I conceive, be fatisfied that we have no fuch power. What we really do feel, or may be fenfible of, if we attend to our feelings, is, that we never come to any resolution, form any deliberate purpose, or determine upon any thing whatever, without fome motive, arifing from the ftate of our minds, and the ideas prefent to them; and, therefore, we ought to conclude that we have no power of refolving, or determining upon any thing, without fome motive. Confequently, in the proper philofophical language, motives ought to be denominated the causes of all our determinations, and therefore of all our actions.

All

All that men generally mean by a consciousnefs of freedom, is a confciousness of their having a power to do what they previously will, or please. This is allowed, and that it is a thing of which we are properly conscious. But to will without a motive, or contrary to the influence of all motives prefented to the mind, is a thing of which no man can be confcious. Nay, every juft obfervation concerning ourselves, or others, appears to me very clearly to lead to the oppofite conclufion, viz. that our wills, as well as our judgments, are determined by the appearances of things prefented to us; and, therefore, that the determinations of both are equally guided by certain invariable laws; and, confequently, that every determination of the will, or judgment, is just what the being who made us fubject to thofe laws, and who always had, and ftill has, the abfolute difpofal of us, muft have intended that they should be. If, however, this conclufion be denied, it must be controverted by argument, and the question muft not be decided by consciousness, or any pretended feeling of the contrary.

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