An Essay Concerning Human Understanding / Ein Versuch über den menschlichen Verstand. Auswahlausgabe. John Locke
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proved by the Examples before cited: […] it was a familiar, and uncondemned Practice amongst the Greeks and Romans, to expose, without pity or remorse, their innocent Infants. Secondly, That it is an innate Truth, known to all Men, is also false. For, Parents preserve your Children, is so far from an innate Truth, that it is no Truth at all; it being a Command, and not a Proposition, and so not capable of Truth or Falshood. To make it capable of being assented to as true, it must be reduced to some such Proposition as this: It is the Duty of Parents to preserve their Children. But what Duty is, cannot be understood without a Law; nor a Law be known, or supposed without a Law-maker, or without Reward and Punishment: So that it is impossible, that this, or any other practical Principle should be innate; i. e. be imprinted on the Mind as a Duty, without supposing the Ideas of God, of Law, of Obligation, of Punishment, of a Life after this, [62]innate. […] But these Ideas […] are so far from being innate, that ’tis not every studious or thinking Man, much less every one that is born, in whom they are to be found clear and distinct. […]
§ 13. […] I would not be here mistaken, as if, because I deny an innate Law, I thought there were none but positive Laws. There is a great deal of difference between an innate Law, and a Law of Nature; between something imprinted on our Minds in their very original, and something that we being ignorant of may attain to the knowledge of, by the use and due application of our natural Faculties. And I think they equally forsake the Truth, who, running into contrary extreams, either affirm an innate Law, or deny that there is a Law, knowable by the light of Nature, i. e. without the help of positive Revelation.
§ 14. […] But in truth, were there any such innate Principles, there would be no need to teach them. Did Men find such innate Propositions stamped on their Minds, they would easily be able to distinguish them from other Truths, that they afterwards learned, and deduced from them; and there would be nothing more easy, than to know what, and how many they were. There could be no more doubt about their number, than there is about the number of our Fingers. […] But since no body, that I know, has ventured yet to give a Catalogue of them, they cannot blame those who doubt of these innate Principles; since even they who require Men to believe, that there are such innate Propositions, do not tell us what they are. […] Nay, a great part of Men are so far from finding any such innate Moral Principles in themselves, that by denying [64]freedom to Mankind; and thereby making Men no other than bare Machins, they take away not only innate, but all Moral Rules whatsoever, and leave not a possibility to believe any such, to those who cannot conceive, how any thing can be capable of a Law, that is not a free Agent: And upon that ground, they must necessarily reject all Principles of Vertue, who cannot put Morality and Mechanism together; which are not very easy to be reconciled, or made consistent.
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§ 20. Nor will it be of much moment here, to offer that very ready, but not very material Answer, (viz.) That the innate Principles of Morality, may, by Education, and Custom, and the general Opinion of those, amongst whom we converse, be darkned, and at last quite worn out of the Minds of Men. Which assertion of theirs, if true, quite takes away the Argument of universal Consent, by which this Opinion of innate Principles is endeavoured to be proved; […] concerning innate Principles, I desire these Men to say, whether they can, or cannot, by Education and Custom, be blurr’d and blotted out: If they cannot, we must find them in all Mankind alike, and they must be clear in every body: And if they may suffer variation from adventitious Notions, we must then find them clearest and most perspicuous, nearest the Fountain, in Children and illiterate People, who have received least impression from foreign Opinions. Let them take which side they please, they will certainly find it inconsistent with visible matter of fact, and daily observation.
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§ 22. […] Doctrines, that have been derived from no better original, than the Superstition of a Nurse, or the Authority of an old Woman; may, by length of time, and consent of Neighbours, grow up to the dignity of Principles in Religion or Morality. For such, who are careful (as they call it) to principle Children well, (and few there be who have not a set of those Principles for them, which they believe in) instil into the unwary, and, as yet unprejudiced Understanding, (for white Paper receives any Characters) those Doctrines they would have them retain and profess. These being taught them as soon as they have any apprehension; and still as they grow up, confirmed to them, either by the open Profession, or tacit Consent, of all they have to do with; or at least by those, of whose Wisdom, Knowledge, and Piety, they have an Opinion, who never suffer those Propositions to be otherwise mentioned, but as the Basis and Foundation, on which they build their Religion or Manners, come, by these means, to have the reputation of unquestionable, self-evident, and innate Truths.
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§ 25. […] Custom, a greater power than Nature, seldom failing to make them worship for Divine, what she hath inured them to bow their Minds, and submit their Understandings to, it is no wonder, that grown Men, either perplexed in the necessary affairs of Life, or hot in the pursuit of Pleasures, should not [68]seriously sit down to examine their own Tenets; especially when one of their Principles is, That Principles ought not to be questioned. […]
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§ 27. […] And, indeed, if it be the privilege of innate Principles, to be received upon their own Authority, without examination, I know not what may not be believed, or how any one’s Principles can be questioned. If they may, and ought to be examined, and tried, I desire to know how first and innate Principles can be tried; or at least it is reasonable to demand the marks and characters, whereby the genuine, innate Principles, may be distinguished from others; […] When this is done, I shall be ready to embrace such welcome, and useful, Propositions; and till then I may with modesty doubt, since I fear universal Consent, which is the only one produced, will scarce prove a sufficient mark to direct my Choice, and assure me of any innate Principles. From what has been said, I think it is past doubt, that there are no practical Principles wherein all Men agree; and therefore none innate.
Other Considerations concerning innate Principles, both speculative and practical
§ 1. HAD those, who would perswade us, that there are innate Principles, not taken them together in gross; but considered, separately, the parts, out of which those Propositions are made, [70]they would not, perhaps, have been so forward to believe they were innate. Since, if the Ideas, which made up those Truths, were not, it was impossible, that the Propositions, made up of them, should be innate, or our Knowledge of them be born with us. For if the Ideas be not innate, there was a time, when the Mind was without those Principles; and then, they will not be innate, but be derived from some other Original. For, where the Ideas themselves are not, there can be no Knowledge, no Assent, no Mental or Verbal Propositions about them.
§ 2. If we will attentively consider newborn Children, we shall have little Reason, to think, that they bring many Ideas into the World with them. For, bating, perhaps, some faint Ideas, of Hunger, and Thirst, and Warmth, and some Pains, which they may have felt in the Womb, there is not the least appearance of any setled Ideas at all in them; especially of Ideas, answering the Terms, which make up those universal Propositions, that are esteemed innate Principles. One may perceive how, by degrees, afterwards, Ideas come into their Minds; and that they get no more, nor no other, than what Experience, and the Observation of things, that come in their way, furnish them with; which might be enough to satisfy us, that they are not Original Characters, stamped on the Mind.
§ 3. It is impossible for the same thing to be, and not to be, is certainly (if there be any such) an innate Principle. But can any one think, or will any one say, that Impossibility and Identity, are two innate Ideas? Are they such as all Mankind have, and [72]bring into the World with them? And are they those, that are the first in Children, and antecedent to all acquired ones? If they are innate, they must needs be so. Hath a child an Idea of Impossibility and Identity, before it has of White or Black; Sweet or Bitter? And is it from the Knowledge of this