CHAPTER I

LOCKE'S THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE

1. In order to understand Locke's moral and political philosophy, it is quite necessary to keep in mind his general epistemological views. His conclusions in ethics were naturally determined to a large extent by his method of procedure, which in turn was influenced very considerably by his theory of knowledge. There can be traced in all his allusions to, and discussions of, moral and political problems the effects of the epistemological principles set forth in the Essay, with the same inadequacies, the same shifting of ground, and the same limitations of a rationalistic position.

Locke's disciples and critics during the last two centuries have expounded his epistemological position in a variety of quite different ways. Some of them have made him a sensationalist, and others have regarded him as an intellectualist. It is surprising that a consideration of the same Essay should lead to such diverse interpretations. Yet the Essay was, as Locke himself states, "written by incoherent parcels,” 1 and its full thesis is not clearly presented. Though called an Essay concerning Human Understanding the first two books deal principally with ideas, the third book with words, and the fourth book with knowledge and probability-while the human understanding itself receives only incidental treatment. This apparent neglect of that faculty of the mind for which the whole treatise is named is doubtless due to the fact that Locke realized that he shared the general view of his contemporaries as to the importance of the understanding, and wished to stress what he deemed his unique contribution, namely, his theory of ideas. Had he lived in a different age, when the prevailing philosophic attitude was not so rationalistic, he might have given a better balanced account of "the original, certainty, and extent of human knowledge." Yet in spite of the almost exclusive emphasis upon ideas

1 Essay, Epistle 4.

2 Idem, Introduction 2.

3 That Locke was quite aware of his slighting of the faculty of understanding in the Essay is evident from a later comment he made on this point. Stillingfleet had been misled by the lack of proportion in Locke's treatment of the matter in the Essay. So in his second letter to Stillingfleet Locke wrote: "Because treating in it [i.e., in the Essay] of the understanding, which is nothing but the faculty of thinking, I could not well treat of that faculty of the mind, which consists in thinking, without considering the immediate objects of the mind in thinking, which I call ideas: and therefore in treating of the understanding, I guess it will not be thought strange that the greatest part of my book has been taken up in considering what these objects of the mind, in thinking, are; whence they come; what use the mind makes of them, in its several ways of thinking; and what are the outward marks whereby it signifies them to others, or records them for its own use." Works, Vol. IV, p. 134. Yet unfortunately

and the corresponding slighting of the understanding, there are frequent passages, both in the Essay and in his controversial writings, which should prevent a sensationalistic interpretation of his system of thought.

According to Locke, knowledge comes about only when the understanding or reason observes the agreement or disagreement of our ideas. In spite of ambiguities and consequent confusions which arise later in his epistemological theories, he always consistently held to this central point, that there are two distinct steps necessary to obtain knowledge—the possession of ideas and the grasp by the reason of the relations between those ideas. There is "nothing truer than that it is not the idea which makes us certain without reason, or without the understanding: but it is as true, that it is not reason, it is not the understanding, that makes us certain without ideas." 4 On the one hand, ideas, singly or in any combination, are not the completed product we call knowledge; and their relationships do not constitute knowledge until the reason observes these relationships. On the other hand, reason cannot evolve knowledge from its own activity-indeed it can not even be active without ideas as a material with which, and with which alone, it is able to work. Hence, both the possession of ideas and observation thereof by reason are essential to knowledge; and each of these two elements must in turn be briefly examined.

2. In presenting his theory of ideas Locke first raised the problem of the source or channel through which ideas can be obtained. In order to ascertain the bounds of knowledge, it is first of all necessary to "inquire into the original of those ideas, notions, or whatever else you please to call them, which a man observes and is conscious to himself he has in his mind." 5 It is rather striking that Locke sought to determine the genesis of ideas before he discussed their nature, that he endeavored to tell how we get them before he defined what they are. Much of the ambiguity which occurs in his use of the term idea later in the Essay is due to his failure to settle at the outset exactly what the subject matter is with which he is dealing. But Locke's problem was set him by what he considered the inadequacies of Descartes. Unwilling to accept the intrinsic clearness of ideas as the test of their validity, he had at once to find a suitable test in the consideration of their origin. So he plunged into this problem of genesis at the outset of the Essay, and never returned to a discussion of the nature of ideas. His critics must follow his procedure, and waive for a time the question of what is meant by ideas, in order to discover how, according to Locke, they arise.

what Locke supposed would not be thought strange has led most of his critics astray, both in his own day and ever since.

•Works, Vol. IV, p. 59.

'Essay, Introduction 3.

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6

The first book of the Essay tells us how ideas do not arise; and the second book tells how they do. According to the argument of the first book, ideas are not innate-i.e., they are neither present as conscious content at birth, nor are they implicitly present so as to be revealed by future mental development. The proofs for this position are that there are no universally accepted ideas or principles, speculative or practical; that the persons whose minds are least affected by experience are also least likely to be aware of the alleged innate truths; 7 that the alleged innate truths are not the beginning, but the goal of the mental life, and are reached, not by unfolding from within, but by reflection on the material which comes to the mind from without; 9 that widespread acceptance of certain standards is due to social tradition, education, and the force of habit; etc.10 All of this discussion seems almost futile today. But Locke regarded it as necessary, in order to sweep aside various prejudices which might otherwise make men unfavorably inclined to an exposition of his positive doctrine. All sorts of dogmatism in Locke's day, theological and political, was, as has been shown, seeking sanction in God-given truths implanted in the human mind at birth. Hence if ever an empirical position was to gain a hearing, the theory of innate ideas had to be adequately refuted. The positive statement of Locke's theory of the genesis of ideas comes in the second book. The mind is at first like a "white paper, void of all characters, without any ideas;" 11 and all the endless variety of ideas with which it comes to be furnished are derived from experience. Experience has two aspects, or is of two varieties; it includes the observation both of "external sensible objects" (i.e., sensation) and of "the internal operations of our minds perceived and reflected on by ourselves" (i.e., reflection). "These two are the fountains of knowledge, whence all the ideas we have, or can naturally have, do spring.” These initial ideas derived from experience are "simple ideas” 13 and constitute the indispensable basis of knowledge. Yet knowledge is not, for that reason, limited to the realm of the simple ideas. Simple ideas are not, in their simplicity, the only valid ideas, nor the sole material of knowledge. They are worked over, by the mental faculties of composition, of abstraction, and of comparison, into what are called "complex ideas." 14 These complex ideas are not, to be sure, immediately given in sense experience; but they are constructed out of the • Idem, I, 2, 10.11.

7 Idem, I, 1, 5.

8 Idem, I, I, 19, 25.26.

• Idem, I, 3, 23.24.

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simple data of experience. "The understanding or reason makes or forms, out of the simple ones that come in by sensation and reflection, all the other ideas, whether general, relative, or complex, by abstracting, comparing, and compounding its positive simple ideas." 15 Hence, though "our knowledge is all founded on simple ideas," it is "not always about simple ideas." "We may know the truth of propositions which include complex ideas." 16 And the qualities of these complex ideas are often entirely different from the qualities of the simple ideas from which they are derived. But whether the mind deals with simple or complex ideas, Locke has now a genetic test for their validity which he opposes to such a test as that of the intrinsic clearness theory of Descartes. Though the mind constructs complex ideas, all the constituent parts of which they are composed are the simple ideas of experience, and elements from no other source are introduced into their structure.17 Moreover, the mind cannot possibly frame any simple ideas for itself.18 Hence experience is the sole basis for all the manifold ideas which the mind uses in reaching knowledge.

3. Locke divided complex ideas into three classes-substances, relations, and modes,19 each of which calls for special comment. (a) Substances "are such combinations of simple ideas as are taken to represent distinct particular things subsisting by themselves." 20 These are the ideas which were to cause Locke most difficulty in the fourth book of the Essay. They precipitate at once the problem of an extra-ideational reality, to which ideas must conform. Thus they seem to assume the possibility of a knowledge which goes beyond ideas and deals directly with that extra-ideational reality. A full discussion of Locke's treatment of this problem will be given in the next section of this chapter which deals with the nature of ideas. (b) Relation is that sort of complex idea "which consists in the consideration and comparing one idea with another." 21 These ideas of relation are very closely akin to the observation by the understanding of the agreement and disagreement of ideas. Hence the discussion of relations, though brought up by Locke in connection with ideas, may well be treated of in a later section of this chapter on the faculty of understanding. (c) The complex ideas called modes are quite different from the other two kinds. And as they are particularly important in Locke's discussion of morality, they must be more fully explained. They are those ideas "which, however compounded, contain not in them the supposition of subsisting by themselves, but are considered as dependences on, or affections

15 Works, Vol. IV, p. 71.

16 Idem, Vol. IV, p. 47.

17 Essay, II, 22, 9.

18 Works, Vol. IV, p. 71.

19 Essay, II, 12, 3.

20 Idem, II, 12, 6.

21 Idem, II, 12, 7. Cf. also II, 25, 5,