A Treatise of Human Nature

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BOOK I PART IV


agant scepticism concerning them. If colours,
sounds, tastes, and smells be merely percep-
tions, nothing we can conceive is possest of a
real, continued, and independent existence; not
even motion, extension and solidity, which are
the primary qualities chiefly insisted on.


To begin with the examination of motion; it
is evident this is a quality altogether inconceiv-
able alone, and without a reference to some
other object. The idea of motion necessarily
supposes that of a body moving. Now what
is our idea of the moving body, without which
motion is incomprehensible? It must resolve
itself into the idea of extension or of solid-
ity; and consequently the reality of motion de-
pends upon that of these other qualities.


This opinion, which is universally acknowl-
edged concerning motion, I have proved to be

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