ition can be perceived; which is the last thing they mean.

The same thing may be said on every article of the division. For if they
say that they see clearly the things about which they are arguing, and
they cannot be hindered by any similarity of appearance, then they will
confess that they are able to comprehend those things. But if they affirm
that true perceptions cannot be distinguished from false ones, how can
they go any further? For the same objections will be made to them which
have been made already; for an argument cannot be concluded, unless the
premises which are taken to deduce the conclusion from are so established
that nothing of the same kind can be false.

Therefore, if reason, relying on things comprehended and perceived, and
advancing in reliance on them, establishes the point that nothing can be
comprehended, what can be found which can be more inconsistent with
itself? And as the very nature of an accurate discourse professes that it
will develop something which is not apparent, and that, in order the more
easily to succeed in its object, it will employ the senses and those
things which are evident, what sort of discourse is that which is uttered
by those men who insist upon it that everything has not so much an
existence as a mere appearance?

But they are convicted most of all when they assume, as consistent with
each other, these two propositions which are so utterly incompatible:
first of all,--That there are some false perceptions;--and in asserting this
they declare also that there are some which are true: and secondly, they
add at the same time,--That there is no difference between true perceptions
and false ones. But you assumed the first proposition as if there were
some difference; and so the latter proposition is inconsistent with the
former, and the former with the latter.

But let us proceed further, and act so as in no respect to seem to be
flattering ourselves; and let us follow up what is said by them, in such a
manner as to allow nothing to be passed over.

In the first place, then, that evidentness which we have mentioned has
sufficiently great power of itself to point out to us the things which are
just as they are. But still, in order that we may remain with firmness and
constancy in our trust in what is evident, we have need of a greater
degree of either skill or diligence, in order not, by some sort of
juggling or trick, to be driven away from those things which are clear