f of
different dimensions?

HYL. That were absurd to imagine.

PHIL. But, from what you have laid down it follows that both the
extension by you perceived, and that perceived by the mite itself, as
likewise all those perceived by lesser animals, are each of them the true
extension of the mite's foot; that is to say, by your own principles you
are led into an absurdity.

HYL. There seems to be some difficulty in the point.

PHIL. Again, have you not acknowledged that no real inherent property
of any object can be changed without some change in the thing itself?

HYL. I have.

PHIL. But, as we approach to or recede from an object, the visible
extension varies, being at one distance ten or a hundred times greater
than another. Doth it not therefore follow from hence likewise that it is
not really inherent in the object?

HYL. I own I am at a loss what to think.

PHIL. Your judgment will soon be determined, if you will venture to
think as freely concerning this quality as you have done concerning the
rest. Was it not admitted as a good argument, that neither heat nor cold
was in the water, because it seemed warm to one hand and cold to the
other?

HYL. It was.

PHIL. Is it not the very same reasoning to conclude, there is no
extension or figure in an object, because to one eye it shall seem
little, smooth, and round, when at the same time it appears to the other,
great, uneven, and regular?

HYL. The very same. But does this latter fact ever happen?

PHIL. You may at any time make the experiment, by looking with one eye
bare, and with the other through a microscope.

HYL. I know not how to maintain it; and yet I am loath to give up
EXTENSION, I see so many odd consequences following upon such a
concession.

PHIL. Odd, say you? After the concessions already made, I hope you will
stick at nothing for its oddness. But, on the other hand, should it not
seem very odd, if the general reasoning which includes all other
sensible qualities did not also include extension? If it be allowed that
no idea, nor anything like an idea, can exist in an unperceiving
substance, then surely it follows that no figure, or mode of extension,
which we can either perceive, or imagine, or have any idea of, can be
really inherent in Matter; not to mention the peculiar difficulty there
must be in conceiving a material substance, prior to and distinct from
extension to be the SUBSTRATUM of extension. Be the sensible qual