Four different ways of seeing things

Four different ways of seeing things

In order to shorten and clarify the sentiment I have just established concerning the manner in which the mind perceives all the different objects of its knowledge, it is necessary that I distinguish in it four ways of knowing.

The first is to know things by themselves; The second, to know them by their ideas—that is to say, as I understand it here, by something that is different from them; The third, to know them by consciousness, or by inner feeling; The fourth, to know them by conjecture.

One knows things by themselves and without ideas, when they are intelligible by themselves—that is to say, when they can act upon the mind, and thereby disclose themselves to it. For the understanding is a faculty of the soul that is purely passive, and activity is found only in the will. Its desires themselves are not the true causes of ideas; they are only the occasional or natural causes of their presence, in consequence of the general laws of the union of our soul with universal reason, as I will explain elsewhere. One knows things by their ideas when they are not intelligible by themselves, either because they are corporeal, or because they cannot affect the mind or disclose themselves to it. One knows by consciousness all the things that are not distinguished from oneself. Finally, one knows by conjecture things that are different from oneself, and from those that one knows in themselves and by ideas—as when one thinks that certain things are similar to some others that one knows.

How one knows God

There is only God whom one knows by Himself; for although there are other spiritual beings besides Him and that seem to be intelligible by their nature, there is only He alone who can act in the mind and disclose Himself to it. There is only God whom we see by an immediate and direct view; there is only He who can enlighten the mind by His own substance. Finally, in this life, it is only by the union we have with Him that we are capable of knowing what we know, as we have explained in the preceding chapter; for it is our only master who presides over our mind, according to Saint Augustine, without the mediation of any creature [31].

One cannot conceive that anything created can represent the infinite, that being without restriction, immense being, universal being can be perceived by an idea—that is to say, by a particular being, by a being different from universal and infinite being; but, for particular beings, it is not difficult to conceive that they can be represented by infinite being, who contains them in His very efficacious and consequently very intelligible substance. Thus it is necessary to say that one knows God by Himself, although the knowledge one has of Him in this life is very imperfect; and that one knows corporeal things by their ideas—that is to say, in God—since there is only God who contains the intelligible world, where the ideas of all things are found.

But although one can see all things in God, it does not follow that one sees them all there: one sees in God only the things of which one has ideas, and there are things that one sees without ideas.

How one knows bodies

All the things that are in this world, of which we have some knowledge, are bodies or spirits: properties of bodies, properties of spirits. One cannot doubt that one sees bodies with their properties by their ideas, because not being intelligible by themselves, we can see them only in the being who contains them in an intelligible manner. Thus it is in God and by their ideas that we see bodies with their properties, and it is for this reason that the knowledge we have of them is very perfect: I mean that the idea we have of extension suffices to make us know all the properties of which extension is capable, and that we cannot desire to have a more distinct and more fruitful idea of extension, figures, and motions than that which God gives us of it. As the ideas of things that are in God contain all their properties, whoever sees the ideas can see successively all their properties; for when one sees things as they are in God, one always sees them in a very perfect manner, and it would be infinitely perfect if the mind that sees them there were infinite. What is lacking in the knowledge we have of extension, figures, and motions is not a defect of the idea that represents it, but of our mind that considers it.

How one knows one’s soul

It is not the same with the soul: we do not know it by its idea; we do not see it in God; we know it only by consciousness, and it is for this reason that the knowledge we have of it is imperfect; we know of our soul only what we feel passing within us. If we had never felt pain, heat, light, etc., we could not know whether our soul would be capable of them, because we do not know it by its idea [32]. But if we saw in God the idea that corresponds to our soul, we would know at the same time, or we could know, all the properties of which it is capable; just as we know, or can know, all the properties of which extension is capable, because we know extension by its idea.

It is true that we know sufficiently by our consciousness, or by the inner feeling we have of ourselves, that our soul is something great, but it may be that what we know of it is almost nothing of what it is in itself. If one knew of matter only twenty or thirty figures with which it had been modified, certainly one would know almost nothing of it, in comparison with what one knows of it by the idea that represents it. It is not enough, therefore, to know the soul perfectly to know what we know of it by inner feeling alone, since the consciousness we have of ourselves perhaps shows us only the least part of our being.

One can conclude from what we have just said that although we know the existence of our soul more distinctly than the existence of our body and of those that surround us, nevertheless we do not have as perfect a knowledge of the nature of the soul as of the nature of bodies, and this can serve to reconcile the different sentiments of those who say that there is nothing one knows better than the soul, and of those who affirm that there is nothing they know less.

This can also serve to prove that the ideas that represent to us something outside us are not modifications of our soul; for if the soul saw all things by considering its own modifications, it should know its essence or its nature more clearly than that of bodies, and all the sensations or modifications of which it is capable more clearly than the figures or modifications of which bodies are capable. However, it does not know that it is capable of such a sensation by the view it has of itself, but only by experience; whereas it knows that extension is capable of an infinite number of figures by the idea it has of extension. There are even certain sensations, such as colors and sounds, that most men cannot recognize as being or not being modifications of the soul, and there is no figure that all men, by the idea they have of extension, do not recognize as being modifications of bodies.

What I have just said also shows the reason why one cannot give a definition that makes known the modifications of the soul; for since one knows neither the soul nor its modifications by ideas, but only by feelings, and since such feelings of pleasure, for example, of pain, of heat, etc., are not attached to words, it is clear that if someone had never seen color or felt heat, one could not make him know these sensations by all the definitions one might give him. Now, men having their feelings only because of the body, and their body not being disposed in the same way in all, it often happens that words are equivocal, that those one uses to express the modifications of one’s soul mean the very opposite of what one intends, and that often one makes one think of bitterness, for example, when one believes one is making one think of sweetness.

Although we do not have a complete knowledge of our soul, that which we have of it by consciousness or inner feeling suffices to demonstrate its immortality, its spirituality, its freedom, and some other attributes that it is necessary for us to know, and it is for this reason that God does not make us know it by its idea as He makes us know bodies. The knowledge we have of our soul by consciousness is imperfect, it is true, but it is not false; the knowledge, on the contrary, that we have of bodies by feeling or by consciousness—if one can call consciousness the feeling of what passes in our body—is not only imperfect, but it is false. We therefore needed an idea of bodies to correct the feelings we have of them; but we have no need of the idea of our soul, since the consciousness we have of it does not lead us into error, and that in order not to be mistaken in its knowledge it suffices not to confuse it with the body, which we can do by reason. Finally, if we had an idea of the soul as clear as that which we have of the body, this idea would have made us consider it too much as separated from it. Thus it would have diminished the union of our soul with our body, by preventing us from regarding it as spread throughout all our members, which I do not explain further.

How one knows the souls of other men and pure spirits

Of all the objects of our knowledge, there remain to us only the souls of other men and pure intelligences, and it is manifest that we know them only by conjecture. We do not know them presently either in themselves or by their ideas; and as they are different from us, it is not possible that we know them by consciousness. We conjecture that the souls of other men are of the same species as our own. What we feel in ourselves, we claim that they feel; and even when these feelings have no relation to the body, we are assured that we are not mistaken, because we see in God certain ideas and certain immutable laws according to which we know with certainty that God acts equally in all minds.

I know that two times two make four, that it is better to be just than to be rich, and I am not mistaken in believing that others know these truths as well as I; I love good and pleasure, I hate evil and pain, I wish to be happy, and I am not mistaken in believing that men, angels, and even demons have these inclinations. I even know that God will never make minds that do not desire to be happy or that could desire to be unhappy; but I know this with evidence and certainty, because it is God who teaches it to me; for who other than God could make me know the designs and wills of God? But when the body has some part in what passes in me, I am almost always mistaken if I judge others by myself. I feel heat, I see such a size, such a color; I taste such or such a flavor at the approach of certain bodies; I am mistaken if I judge others by myself; I am subject to certain passions; I have friendship or aversion for such or such a thing, and I judge that others resemble me; my conjecture is often false. Thus the knowledge we have of other men is very subject to error if we judge of it only by the feelings we have of ourselves.

If there are some beings different from God, from ourselves, from bodies, and from pure spirits, that is unknown to us. We have difficulty persuading ourselves that there are any; and after having examined the reasons of certain philosophers who claim the contrary, we have found them false; which has confirmed us in the sentiment we had, that being all men of the same nature, we all have the same ideas, because we all have need to know the same things.