THE COLLECTED MAJOR WORKS OF GEORGE BERKELEY [Authoritative and Unabridged Nook Edition] Greatest Works of Philosophy and Science by GEORGE BERKELEY incl. Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous

THE COLLECTED MAJOR WORKS OF GEORGE BERKELEY
[Authoritative and Unabridged Nook Edition]

Greatest Works of Philosophy and Science by GEORGE BERKELEY

Including Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous


TABLE OF CONTENTS

AN ESSAY TOWARDS A NEW THEORY OF VISION

A TREATISE CONCERNING THE PRINCIPLES OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE
DEDICATION
PREFACE
INTRODUCTION
THE TREATISE
THREE DIALOGUES BETWEEN HYLAS AND PHILONOUS: IN OPPOSITION TO SCEPTICS AND ATHEISTS
THE FIRST DIALOGUE
THE SECOND DIALOGUE
THE THIRD DIALOGUE
THE ANALYST: A DISCOURSE ADDRESSED TO AN INFIDEL MATHEMATICIAN

THE QUERIST
PART I
PART II
PART III

A DEFENCE OF FREE - THINKING IN MATHEMATICS
A DEFENCE OF FREE - THINKING IN MATHEMATICS
AN APPENDIX CONCERNING MR.WALTON’S VINDICATION OF SIR ISAAC NEWTON’S PRINCIPLES OF FLUXIONS


EXCERPT

Philosophy being nothing else but the study of wisdom and truth, it may with reason be expected that those who have spent most time and pains in it should enjoy a greater calm and serenity of mind, a greater clearness and evidence of knowledge, and be less disturbed with doubts and difficulties than other men. Yet so it is, we see the illiterate bulk of mankind that walk the high-road of plain common sense, and are governed by the dictates of nature, for the most part easy and undisturbed. To them nothing that is familiar appears unaccountable or difficult to comprehend. They complain not of any want of evidence in their senses, and are out of all danger of becoming Sceptics. But no sooner do we depart from sense and instinct to follow the light of a superior principle, to reason, meditate, and reflect on the nature of things, but a thousand scruples spring up in our minds concerning those things which before we seemed fully to comprehend. Prejudices and errors of sense do from all parts discover themselves to our view; and, endeavouring to correct these by reason, we are insensibly drawn into uncouth paradoxes, difficulties, and inconsistencies, which multiply and grow upon us as we advance in speculation, till at length, having wandered through many intricate mazes, we find ourselves just where we were, or, which is worse, sit down in a forlorn Scepticism.

The cause of this is thought to be the obscurity of things, or the natural weakness and imperfection of our understandings. It is said, the faculties we have are few, and those designed by nature for the support and comfort of life, and not to penetrate into the inward essence and constitution of things. Besides, the mind of man being finite, when it treats of things which partake of infinity, it is not to be wondered at if it run into absurdities and contradictions, out of which it is impossible it should ever extricate itself, it being of the nature of infinite not to be comprehended by that which is finite.

But, perhaps, we may be too partial to ourselves in placing the fault originally in our faculties, and not rather in the wrong use we make of them. It is a hard thing to suppose that right deductions from true principles should ever end in consequences which cannot be maintained or made consistent. We should believe that God has dealt more bountifully with the sons of men than to give them a strong desire for that knowledge which he had placed quite out of their reach. This were not agreeable to the wonted indulgent methods of Providence, which, whatever appetites it may have implanted in the creatures, doth usually furnish them with such means as, if rightly made use of, will not fail to satisfy them. Upon the whole, I am inclined to think that the far greater part, if not all, of those difficulties which have hitherto amused philosophers, and blocked up the way to knowledge, are entirely owing to ourselves- that we have first raised a dust and then complain we cannot see."