:

given to positive things, intimating that respect, and serving as marks to lead the thoughts beyond the subject itself denominated, to something distinct from it, are what we call relatives and the things so brought together, related. Thus, when the mind considers Caius as such a positive being, it takes nothing into that idea but what really exists in Caius; v. g. when I consider him as a man, I have nothing in my mind but the complex idea of the species, man. So likewise, when I say Caius is a white man, I have nothing but the bare consideration of a man, who hath that white colour. But when I give Caius the name husband, I intimate some other person: and when I give him the name whiter, I intimate some other thing. In both cases, my thought is led to something beyond Caius, and there are two things brought into consideration. And since any idea, whether simple or complex, may be the occasion why the mind thus brings two things together, and, as it were, takes a view of them at once, though still considered as distinct; therefore, any of our ideas may be the foundation of relation. As in the above-mentioned instance, the contract and ceremony of marriage with Sempronia, is the occasion of the denomination or relation of husband; and the colour white, the occasion why he is said to be whiter than free-stone.

§. 2. Relations without correlative terms, not easily perceived. -These, and the like relations, expressed by relative terms, that have others answering them, with a reciprocal intimation, as father and son, bigger and less, cause and effect, are very obvious to every one, and every body at first sight perceives the relation. For father and son, husband and wife, and such other correlative terms, seems so nearly to belong one to another, and, through custom, do so readily chime, and answer one another, in people's memories, that upon the naming of either of them, the thoughts are presently carried beyond the thing so named; and nobody overlooks, or doubts of, a relation, where it is so plainly intimated. But where languages have failed to give correlative names, there the relation is not always so easily taken notice of. Concubine is, no doubt, a relative name, as well as wife but in languages where this, and the like words, have not a correlative term, there people are not so apt to take them to be so, as wanting that evident mark of relation which is between correlatives, which seem to explain one another, and not to be able to exist, but together. Hence it is, that many of those names, which, duly considered, do include evident relations, have been called external denominations. But all names that are more than empty sounds, must signify some idea, which is either in the thing to which the name is applied; and

then it is positive, and is looked on as united to, and existing in, the thing to which the denomination is given or else it arises from the respect the mind finds in it, to something distinct from it, with which it considers it; and then it concludes a relation.

§. 3. Some seemingly absolute terms contain relations.— Another sort of relative terms there is, which are not looked on to be either relative, or so much as external, denominations; which yet, under the form and appearance of signifying something absolute in the subject, do conceal a tacit, though less observable, relation. Such are the seemingly positive terms of old, great, imperfect, &c., whereof I shall have occasion to speak more at large in the following chapters.

§. 4. Relation different from the things related.—This farther may be observed, that the ideas of relation may be the same in men, who have far different ideas of the things that are related, or that are thus compared; v. g. those who have far different ideas of a man, may yet agree in the notion of a father: which is a notion superinduced to the substance, or man, and refers only to an act of that thing called man; whereby he contributes to the generation of one of his own kind, let man be what it will.

§. 5. Change of relation may be without any change in the subject. The nature, therefore, of relation, consists in the referring or comparing two things one to another; from which comparison, one or both comes to be denominated. And if either of those things be removed, or cease to be, the relation ceases, and the denomination consequent to it, though the other receive in itself no alteration at all: v. g. Caius, whom I consider to day as a father, ceases to be so to-morrow, only by the death of his son, without any alteration made in himself. Nay, barely by the mind's changing the object to which it compares any thing, the same thing is capable of having contrary denominations at the same time: v. g. Caius, compared to several persons, may be truly said to be older and younger, stronger and weaker, &c.

8. 6. Relation only betwixt two things.-Whatsoever doth, or can exist, or be considered as one thing, is positive: and so not only simple ideas, and substances, but modes also, are positive beings; though the parts of which they consist, are very often relative one to another; but the whole together considered as one thing, producing in us the complex idea of one thing, which idea is in our minds, as one picture, though an aggregate of divers parts, and under one name, it is a positive or absolute thing, or idea. Thus a triangle, though the parts thereof, com

pared one to another, be relative, yet the idea of the whole is a positive absolute idea. The same may be said of a family, a tune, &c. for there can be no relation but betwixt two things, considered as two things. There must always be in relation two ideas, or things, either in themselves really separate, or considered as distinct, and then a ground or occasion for their comparison.

§. 7. All things capable of relation.-Concerning relation in general, these things may be considered:

First, That there is no one thing, whether simple idea, substance, mode, or relation, or name of either of them, which is not capable of almost an infinite number of considerations, in reference to other things; and, therefore, this makes no small part of men's thoughts and words: v. g. one single man may at once be concerned in, and sustain, all these following relations, and many more, viz. father, brother, son, grandfather, grandson, father-in-law, son-in-law, husband, friend, enemy, subject, general, judge, patron, client, professor, European, Englishman, islander, servant, master, possessor, captain, superior, inferior, bigger, less, older, younger, contemporary, like, unlike, &c., to an almost infinite number: he being capable of as many relations, as there can be occasions of comparing him to other things, in any manner of agreement, disagreement, or respect whatsoever for, as I said, relation is a way of comparing, or considering, two things together; and giving one, or both of them, some appellation from that comparison, and sometimes giving even the relation itself a name.

§. 8. The ideas of relations clearer often, than of the subjects related. Secondly, This farther may be considered concerning relation, that though it be not contained in the real existence of things, but something extraneous and super-induced; yet the ideas which relative words stand for, are often clearer, and more distinct, than of those substances to which they do belong. The notion we have of a father, or brother, is a great deal clearer, and more distinct, than that we have of a man; or, if you will, paternity is a thing whereof it is easier to have a clearer idea, than of humanity; and I can much easier conceive what a friend is, than what God; because the knowledge of one action, or one simple idea, is oftentime sufficient to give me notion of a relation; but to the knowing of any substantial being, an accurate collection of sundry ideas is necessary. A man, if he compares two things together, can hardly be supposed not to know what it is wherein he compares them; so that when he compares any things together, he. cannot but have a very clear idea of that relation. The ideas then of relations, are capable

at least of being more perfect and distinct in our minds, than those of substances; because it is commonly hard to know all the simple ideas which are really in any substance, but for the most part easy enough to know the simple ideas that make up any relation I think on, or have a name for; v. g. comparing two men, in reference to one common parent, it is very easy to frame the ideas of brothers, without having yet the perfect idea of a man. For significant relative words, as well as others, standing only for ideas; and those being all either simple, or made up of simple, ones, it suffices, for the knowing the precise idea the relative term stands for, to have a clear conception of that which is the foundation of the relation; which may be done without having a perfect and clear idea of the thing it is attributed to. Thus having the notion that one laid the egg out of which the other was hatched, I have a clear idea of the relation of dam and chick, between the two cassiowaries in St. James's Park; though, perhaps,. I have but a very obscure and imperfect idea of those birds themselves.

§. 9. Relations all terminate in simple ideas.-Thirdly, Though there be a great number of considerations wherein things may be compared one with another, and so a multitude of relations; yet they all terminate in, and are concerned about, those simple ideas, either of sensation or reflection, which I think to be the whole materials of all our knowledge. To clear this, I shall show it in the most considerable relations that we have any notion of; and in some that seem to be the most remote from sense or reflection; which yet will appear to have their ideas from thence, and leave it past doubt, that the notions we have of them are but certain simple ideas, and so originally derived from sense or reflection.

§. 10. Terms leading the mind beyond the subject denominated, are relative.-Fourthly, That relation being the considering of one thing with another, which is extrinsical to it, it is evident, that all words that necessarily lead the mind to any other ideas than are supposed really to exist in that thing to which the word is applied, are relative words; v. g. a man black, merry, thoughtful, thirsty, angry, extended; these, and the like, are all absolute, because they neither signify nor intimate any thing, but what does, or is supposed really to, exist, in the man thus denominated; but father, brother, king, husband, blacker, merrier, &c. are words, which, together with the thing they denominate, imply also something else separate, and exterior to the existence of that thing.

§. 11. Conclusion.-Having laid down these premises concerning relation in general, I shall now proceed to show, in some

instances, how all the ideas we have of relation are made up, as the others are, only of simple ideas; and that they all, how refined or remote from sense soever they seem, terminate at last in simple ideas. I shall begin with the most comprehensive relation, wherein all things that do or can exist, are concerned, and that is the relation of cause and effect. The idea whereof, how derived from the two fountains of all our knowledge, sensation and reflection, I shall in the next place consider.

CHAPTER XXVI.

OF CAUSE AND EFFECT, AND OTHER RELATIONS.

§. 1. Whence their ideas got.-In the notice that our senses take of the constant vicissitude of things, we cannot but observe, that several particular, both qualities and substances, begin to exist; and that they receive this their existence from the due application and operation of some other being. From this observation we get our ideas of cause and effect. That which produces any simple or complex idea, we denote by the general name cause; and that which is produced, effect. Thus finding, that in that substance which we call wax, fluidity, which is a simple idea, that was not in it before, is constantly produced by the application of a certain degree of heat, we call the simple idea of heat, in relation to fluidity in wax, the cause of it, and fluidity, the effect. So also finding that the substance of wood, which is a certain collection of simple ideas so called, by the application of fire, is turned into another substance, called ashes; i. e. another complex idea, consisting of a collection of simple ideas, quite different from that complex idea which we call wood; we consider fire, in relation to ashes, as cause, and the ashes, as effect. So that whatever is considered by us to conduce or operate to the producing any particular simple idea, or collection of simple ideas, whether substance, or mode, which did not before exist, hath thereby in our minds the relation of a cause, and so is denominated by us.

§. 2. Creation, generation, making alteration. Having thus, from what our senses are able to discover in the operations of bodies on one another, got the notion of cause and effect, viz. that a cause is that which makes any other thing, either simple idea, substance, or mode, begin to be; and an effect is that which had its beginning from some other thing; the mind finds no great difficulty to distinguish the several originals of things