o,--to clear my way to those foundations which I
conceive are the only true ones, whereon to establish those notions we
can have of our own knowledge,--it hath been necessary for me to give an
account of the reasons I had to doubt of innate principles. And since
the arguments which are against them do, some of them, rise from common
received opinions, I have been forced to take several things for
granted; which is hardly avoidable to any one, whose task is to show the
falsehood or improbability of any tenet;--it happening in controversial
discourses as it does in assaulting of towns; where, if the ground be
but firm whereon the batteries are erected, there is no further inquiry
of whom it is borrowed, nor whom it belongs to, so it affords but a fit
rise for the present purpose. But in the future part of this Discourse,
designing to raise an edifice uniform and consistent with itself, as far
as my own experience and observation will assist me, I hope to erect
it on such a basis that I shall not need to shore it up with props and
buttresses, leaning on borrowed or begged foundations: or at least, if
mine prove a castle in the air, I will endeavour it shall be all of
a piece and hang together. Wherein I warn the reader not to expect
undeniable cogent demonstrations, unless I may be allowed the privilege,
not seldom assumed by others, to take my principles for granted; and
then, I doubt not, but I can demonstrate too. All that I shall say for
the principles I proceed on is, that I can only appeal to men's own
unprejudiced experience and observation whether they be true or not; and
this is enough for a man who professes no more than to lay down candidly
and freely his own conjectures, concerning a subject lying somewhat
in the dark, without any other design than an unbiassed inquiry after
truth.

BOOK II

OF IDEAS

CHAPTER I.

OF IDEAS IN GENERAL, AND THEIR ORIGINAL.

1. Idea is the Object of Thinking.

Every man being conscious to himself that he thinks; and that which his
mind is applied about whilst thinking being the IDEAS that are there, it
is past doubt that men have in their minds several ideas,--such as are
those expressed by the words whiteness, hardness, sweetness, thinking,
motion, man, elephant, army, drunkenness, and others: it is in the first
place then to be inquired, HOW HE COMES BY THEM?

I know it is a received doctrine, that men have native ideas, and
original characters, stamped upon th