Now will I shut my eyes, I will stop my ears, and withdraw all my senses, I will blot out the Images of corporeal things clearly from my mind, or (because that can scarce be accomplish’d) I will give no heed to them, as being vain and false, and by discoursing with my self, and prying more rightly into my own Nature, will endeavour to make my self by degrees more known and familiar to my self.
I am a Thinking Thing, that is to say, doubting, affirming, denying, understanding few things, ignorant of many things, willing, nilling, imagining also, and sensitive. For (as before I have noted) though perhaps whatever I imagine, or am sensible of, as without me, Is not; yet that manner of thinking which I call sense and imagination (as they are only certain Modes of Thinking) I am certain are in Me. So that in these few Words I have mention’d whatever I know, or at least Whatever as yet I perceive my self to know.
Now will I look about me more carefully to see Whether there Be not some other Thing in Me, of Which I have not yet taken Notice. I am sure That I am a Thinking Thing, and therefore Do not I know what is Required to make certain of any Thing? I Answer, that in this My first knowledge ’tis Nothing but a clear, and distinct perception of What I affirm, Which would not be sufficient to make me certain of the Truth of a Thing, if it were Possible that any thing that I so clearly and distinctly Perceive should be false. Wherefore I may lay this Down as a Principle. Whatever I Clearly and Distinctly perceive is certainly True.
But I have formerly Admitted of many Things as very Certain and manifest, Which I afterwards found to be doubtful. Therefore What sort of Things were they? Viz. Heaven, Earth, Stars, and all other things which I perceived by my Senses. But What did I Perceive of These Clearly? Viz. That I had the Ideas or Thoughts of these things in my mind, and at Present I cannot deny that I have these Ideas in Me. But there was some other thing Which I affirm’d, and Which (by Reason of the common Way of Belief) I thought that I Clearly Perceived; Which nevertheless, I did not really Perceive; And that was, that there were Certain Things Without Me from whence these Ideas Proceeded, and to which they were exactly like. And this it was, Wherein I was either Deceived, or if by Chance I Judged truly, yet it Proceeded not from the strength of my Perception.
But When I was exercised about any single and easie Proposition in Arithmetick or Geometry, as that two and three added make five, Did not I Perceive them Clearly enough to make me affirm them True? Truly concerning these I had no other Reason afterwards to Doubt, but That I thought Perhaps there may be a God who might have so created me, that I should be Deceived even in those things which seem’d most Clear to me. And as often as this Pre-conceived opinion of Gods great Power comes into my Mind, I cannot but Confess that he may easily cause me to Err even in those things which I Think I perceive most Evidently with my Mind; yet as often as I Consider the Things themselves, which I Judge my self to perceive so Clearly, I am so fully Perswaded by them, that I easily Break out into these Expressions, Let Who can Deceive Me, yet he shall never Cause me Not to Be whilst I think that I Am, or that it shall ever be True, that I never was, Whilst at Present ’tis True that I am, or Perhaps, that Two and Three added make More or Less then Five; for in These things I Percieve a Manifest Repugnancy; And truely seeing I have no reason to Think any God a Deceiver, Nor as yet fully know Whether there Be any God, or Not, ’Tis but a slight and (as I may say) Metaphysical Reason of Doubt, which depends only on that opinion of which I am not yet Perswaded.
Wherefore That this Hindrance may be taken away, When I have time I ought to Enquire, Whether there Be a God, And if there be One, Whether he can be a Deceiver, For whilst I am Ignorant of this, I cannot possibly be fully Certain of any Other thing.
But now Method seems to Require Me to Rank all My Thoughts under certain Heads, and to search in Which of them Truth or Falshood properly Consists. Some of them are (as it were) the Images of Things, and to these alone the Name of an Idea properly belongs, as When I think upon a Man, A Chimera or Monster, Heaven, an Angel, or God. But there are others of them, that have superadded Forms to them, as when I Will, when I Fear, when I Affirm, when I Deny. I know I have alwayes (when ever I think) some certain Thing as the subject or object of my Thought, but in this last sort of thoughts there is something more which I Think upon then Barely the likeness of the Thing. And of these Thoughts some are called Wills and Affections, and Others of them Judgments.