2p40sc2.md (2150B)
1 From all that has been said above it is clear, that we, in many cases, perceive 2 and form our general notions:– 3 4 1. From particular things represented to our intellect fragmentarily, 5 confusedly, and without order through our senses (II. xxix. Coroll.); I have 6 settled to call such perceptions by the name of knowledge from the mere 7 suggestions of experience.[4] 8 9 [4] A Baconian phrase. Nov. Org. Aph. 100. [Pollock, p. 126, n.] 10 11 2. From symbols, e.g., from the fact of having read or heard certain words we 12 remember things and form certain ideas concerning them, similar to those 13 through which we imagine things (II. xviii. note). I shall call both these 14 ways of regarding things knowledge of the first kind, opinion, or 15 imagination. 16 17 3. From the fact that we have notions common to all men, and adequate ideas of 18 the properties of things (II. xxxviii. Coroll., xxxix. and Coroll. and xl.); 19 this I call reason and knowledge of the second kind. 20 21 Besides these two kinds of knowledge, there is, as I will hereafter show, a 22 third kind of knowledge, which we will call intuition. This kind of knowledge 23 proceeds from an adequate idea of the absolute essence of certain attributes of 24 God to the adequate knowledge of the essence of things. I will illustrate all 25 three kinds of knowledge by a single example. Three numbers are given for 26 finding a fourth, which shall be to the third as the second is to the first. 27 Tradesmen without hesitation multiply the second by the third, and divide the 28 product by the first; either because they have not forgotten the rule which they 29 received from a master without any proof, or because they have often made trial 30 of it with simple numbers, or by virtue of the proof of the nineteenth 31 proposition of the seventh book of Euclid, namely, in virtue of the general 32 property of proportionals. 33 34 But with very simple numbers there is no need of this. For instance, one, two, 35 three, being given, everyone can see that the fourth proportional is six; and 36 this is much clearer, because we infer the fourth number from an intuitive 37 grasping of the ratio, which the first bears to the second. 38 39