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John Locke: An Essay
Concerning Human Understanding: Book 3: Chapter 3
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Book III - Chapter III
Of General Terms
1. The greatest part of words are general terms. All things that
exist being particulars, it may perhaps be thought reasonable that
words, which ought to be conformed to things, should be so too,- I
mean in their signification: but yet we find quite the contrary. The
far greatest part of words that make all languages are general
terms: which has not been the effect of neglect or chance, but of
reason and necessity.
2. That every particular thing should have a name for itself is
impossible. First, It is impossible that every particular thing
should have a distinct peculiar name. For, the signification and use
of words depending on that connexion which the mind makes between
its ideas and the sounds it uses as signs of them, it is necessary,
in the application of names to things, that the mind should have
distinct ideas of the things, and retain also the particular name
that belongs to every one, with its peculiar appropriation to that
idea. But it is beyond the power of human capacity to frame and
retain distinct ideas of all the particular things we meet with:
every bird and beast men saw; every tree and plant that affected the
senses, could not find a place in the most capacious understanding.
If it be looked on as an instance of a prodigious memory, that some
generals have been able to call every soldier in their army by his
proper name, we may easily find a reason why men have never
attempted to give names to each sheep in their flock, or crow that
flies over their heads; much less to call every leaf of plants, or
grain of sand that came in their way, by a peculiar name.
3. And would be useless, if it were possible. Secondly, If it
were possible, it would yet be useless; because it would not serve
to the chief end of language. Men would in vain heap up names of
particular things, that would not serve them to communicate their
thoughts. Men learn names, and use them in talk with others, only
that they may be understood: which is then only done when, by use or
consent, the sound I make by the organs of speech, excites in
another man's mind who hears it, the idea I apply it to in mine,
when I speak it. This cannot be done by names applied to particular
things; whereof I alone having the ideas in my mind, the names of
them could not be significant or intelligible to another, who was
not acquainted with all those very particular things which had
fallen under my notice.
4. A distinct name for every particular thing, not fitted for
enlargement of knowledge. Thirdly, But yet, granting this also
feasible, (which I think is not), yet a distinct name for every
particular thing would not be of any great use for the improvement
of knowledge: which, though founded in particular things, enlarges
itself by general views; to which things reduced into sorts, under
general names, are properly subservient. These, with the names
belonging to them, come within some compass, and do not multiply
every moment, beyond what either the mind can contain, or use
requires. And therefore, in these, men have for the most part
stopped: but yet not so as to hinder themselves from distinguishing
particular things by appropriated names, where convenience demands
it. And therefore in their own species, which they have most to do
with, and wherein they have often occasion to mention particular
persons, they make use of proper names; and there distinct
individuals have distinct denominations.
5. What things have proper names, and why. Besides persons,
countries also, cities, rivers, mountains, and other the like
distinctions of place have usually found peculiar names, and that
for the same reason; they being such as men have often an occasion
to mark particularly, and, as it were, set before others in their
discourses with them. And I doubt not but, if we had reason to
mention particular horses as often as we have to mention particular
men, we should have proper names for the one, as familiar as for the
other, and Bucephalus would be a word as much in use as Alexander.
And therefore we see that, amongst jockeys, horses have their proper
names to be known and distinguished by, as commonly as their
servants: because, amongst them, there is often occasion to mention
this or that particular horse when he is out of sight.
6. How general words are made. The next thing to be considered
is,- How general words come to be made. For, since all things that
exist are only particulars, how come we by general terms; or where
find we those general natures they are supposed to stand for? Words
become general by being made the signs of general ideas: and ideas
become general, by separating from them the circumstances of time
and place, and any other ideas that may determine them to this or
that particular existence. By this way of abstraction they are made
capable of representing more individuals than one; each of which
having in it a conformity to that abstract idea, is (as we call it)
of that sort.
7. Shown by the way we enlarge our complex ideas from infancy.
But, to deduce this a little more distinctly, it will not perhaps be
amiss to trace our notions and names from their beginning, and
observe by what degrees we proceed, and by what steps we enlarge our
ideas from our first infancy. There is nothing more evident, than
that the ideas of the persons children converse with (to instance in
them alone) are, like the persons themselves, only particular. The
ideas of the nurse and the mother are well framed in their minds;
and, like pictures of them there, represent only those individuals.
The names they first gave to them are confined to these individuals;
and the names of nurse and mamma, the child uses, determine
themselves to those persons. Afterwards, when time and a larger
acquaintance have made them observe that there are a great many
other things in the world, that in some common agreements of shape,
and several other qualities, resemble their father and mother, and
those persons they have been used to, they frame an idea, which they
find those many particulars do partake in; and to that they give,
with others, the name man, for example. And thus they come to have a
general name, and a general idea. Wherein they make nothing new; but
only leave out of the complex idea they had of Peter and James, Mary
and Jane, that which is peculiar to each, and retain only what is
common to them all.
8. And further enlarge our complex ideas, by still leaving out
properties contained in them. By the same way that they come by the
general name and idea of man, they easily advance to more general
names and notions. For, observing that several things that differ
from their idea of man, and cannot therefore be comprehended under
that name, have yet certain qualities wherein they agree with man,
by retaining only those qualities, and uniting them into one idea,
they have again another and more general idea; to which having given
a name they make a term of a more comprehensive extension: which new
idea is made, not by any new addition, but only as before, by
leaving out the shape, and some other properties signified by the
name man, and retaining only a body, with life, sense, and
spontaneous motion, comprehended under the name animal.
9. General natures are nothing but abstract and partial ideas of
more complex ones. That this is the way whereby men first formed
general ideas, and general names to them, I think is so evident,
that there needs no other proof of it but the considering of a man's
self, or others, and the ordinary proceedings of their minds in
knowledge. And he that thinks general natures or notions are
anything else but such abstract and partial ideas of more complex
ones, taken at first from particular existences, will, I fear, be at
a loss where to find them. For let any one effect, and then tell me,
wherein does his idea of man differ from that of Peter and Paul, or
his idea of horse from that of Bucephalus, but in the leaving out
something that is peculiar to each individual, and retaining so much
of those particular complex ideas of several particular existences
as they are found to agree in? Of the complex ideas signified by the
names man and horse, leaving out but those particulars wherein they
differ, and retaining only those wherein they agree, and of those
making a new distinct complex idea, and giving the name animal to
it, one has a more general term, that comprehends with man several
other creatures. Leave out of the idea of animal, sense and
spontaneous motion, and the remaining complex idea, made up of the
remaining simple ones of body, life, and nourishment, becomes a more
general one, under the more comprehensive term, vivens. And, not to
dwell longer upon this particular, so evident in itself; by the same
way the mind proceeds to body, substance, and at last to being,
thing, and such universal terms, which stand for any of our ideas
whatsoever. To conclude: this whole mystery of genera and species,
which make such a noise in the schools, and are with justice so
little regarded out of them, is nothing else but abstract ideas,
more or less comprehensive, with names annexed to them. In all which
this is constant and unvariable, That every more general term stands
for such an idea, and is but a part of any of those contained under
it.
10. Why the genus is ordinarily made use of in definitions. This
may show us the reason why, in the defining of words, which is
nothing but declaring their signification, we make use of the genus,
or next general word that comprehends it. Which is not out of
necessity, but only to save the labour of enumerating the several
simple ideas which the next general word or genus stands for; or,
perhaps, sometimes the shame of not being able to do it. But though
defining by genus and differentia (I crave leave to use these terms
of art, though originally Latin, since they most properly suit those
notions they are applied to), I say, though defining by the genus be
the shortest way, yet I think it may be doubted whether it be the
best. This I am sure, it is not the only, and so not absolutely
necessary. For, definition being nothing but making another
understand by words what idea the term defined stands for, a
definition is best made by enumerating those simple ideas that are
combined in the signification of the term defined: and if, instead
of such an enumeration, men have accustomed themselves to use the
next general term, it has not been out of necessity, or for greater
clearness, but for quickness and dispatch sake. For I think that, to
one who desired to know what idea the word man stood for; if it
should be said, that man was a solid extended substance, having
life, sense, spontaneous motion, and the faculty of reasoning, I
doubt not but the meaning of the term man would be as well
understood, and the idea it stands for be at least as clearly made
known, as when it is defined to be a rational animal: which, by the
several definitions of animal, vivens, and corpus, resolves itself
into those enumerated ideas. I have, in explaining the term man,
followed here the ordinary definition of the schools; which, though
perhaps not the most exact, yet serves well enough to my present
purpose. And one may, in this instance, see what gave occasion to
the rule, that a definition must consist of genus and differentia;
and it suffices to show us the little necessity there is of such a
rule, or advantage in the strict observing of it. For, definitions,
as has been said, being only the explaining of one word by several
others, so that the meaning or idea it stands for may be certainly
known; languages are not always so made according to the rules of
logic, that every term can have its signification exactly and
clearly expressed by two others. Experience sufficiently satisfies
us to the contrary; or else those who have made this rule have done
ill, that they have given us so few definitions conformable to it.
But of definitions more in the next chapter.
11. General and universal are creatures of the understanding, and
belong not to the real existence of things. To return to general
words: it is plain, by what has been said, that general and
universal belong not to the real existence of things; but are the
inventions and creatures of the understanding, made by it for its
own use, and concern only signs, whether words or ideas. Words are
general, as has been said, when used for signs of general ideas, and
so are applicable indifferently to many particular things; and ideas
are general when they are set up as the representatives of many
particular things: but universality belongs not to things
themselves, which are all of them particular in their existence,
even those words and ideas which in their signification are general.
When therefore we quit particulars, the generals that rest are only
creatures of our own making; their general nature being nothing but
the capacity they are put into, by the understanding, of signifying
or representing many particulars. For the signification they have is
nothing but a relation that, by the mind of man, is added to them.
12. Abstract ideas are the essences of genera and species. The
next thing therefore to be considered is, What kind of signification
it is that general words have. For, as it is evident that they do
not signify barely one particular thing; for then they would not be
general terms, but proper names, so, on the other side, it is as
evident they do not signify a plurality; for man and men would then
signify the same; and the distinction of numbers (as the grammarians
call them) would be superfluous and useless. That then which general
words signify is a sort of things; and each of them does that, by
being a sign of an abstract idea in the mind; to which idea, as
things existing are found to agree, so they come to be ranked under
that name, or, which is all one, be of that sort. Whereby it is
evident that the essences of the sorts, or, if the Latin word
pleases better, species of things, are nothing else but these
abstract ideas. For the having the essence of any species, being
that which makes anything to be of that species; and the conformity
to the idea to which the name is annexed being that which gives a
right to that name; the having the essence, and the having that
conformity, must needs be the same thing: since to be of any
species, and to have a right to the name of that species, is all
one. As, for example, to be a man, or of the species man, and to
have right to the name man, is the same thing. Again, to be a man,
or of the species man, and have the essence of a man, is the same
thing. Now, since nothing can be a man, or have a right to the name
man, but what has a conformity to the abstract idea the name man
stands for, nor anything be a man, or have a right to the species
man, but what has the essence of that species; it follows, that the
abstract idea for which the name stands, and the essence of the
species, is one and the same. From whence it is easy to observe,
that the essences of the sorts of things, and, consequently, the
sorting of things, is the workmanship of the understanding that
abstracts and makes those general ideas.
13. They are the workmanship of the understanding, but have their
foundation in the similitude of things. I would not here be thought
to forget, much less to deny, that Nature, in the production of
things, makes several of them alike: there is nothing more obvious,
especially in the race of animals, and all things propagated by
seed. But yet I think we may say, the sorting of them under names is
the workmanship of the understanding, taking occasion, from the
similitude it observes amongst them, to make abstract general ideas,
and set them up in the mind, with names annexed to them, as patterns
or forms, (for, in that sense, the word form has a very proper
signification,) to which as particular things existing are found to
agree, so they come to be of that species, have that denomination,
or are put into that classis. For when we say this is a man, that a
horse; this justice, that cruelty; this a watch, that a jack; what
do we else but rank things under different specific names, as
agreeing to those abstract ideas, of which we have made those names
the signs? And what are the essences of those species set out and
marked by names, but those abstract ideas in the mind; which are, as
it were, the bonds between particular things that exist, and the
names they are to be ranked under? And when general names have any
connexion with particular beings, these abstract ideas are the
medium that unites them: so that the essences of species, as
distinguished and denominated by us, neither are nor can be anything
but those precise abstract ideas we have in our minds. And therefore
the supposed real essences of substances, if different from our
abstract ideas, cannot be the essences of the species we rank things
into. For two species may be one, as rationally as two different
essences be the essence of one species: and I demand what are the
alterations [which] may, or may not be made in a horse or lead,
without making either of them to be of another species? In
determining the species of things by our abstract ideas, this is
easy to resolve: but if any one will regulate himself herein by
supposed real essences, he will, I suppose, be at a loss: and he
will never be able to know when anything precisely ceases to be of
the species of a horse or lead.
14. Each distinct abstract idea is a distinct essence. Nor will
any one wonder that I say these essences, or abstract ideas (which
are the measures of name, and the boundaries of species) are the
workmanship of the understanding, who considers that at least the
complex ones are often, in several men, different collections of
simple ideas; and therefore that is covetousness to one man, which
is not so to another. Nay, even in substances, where their abstract
ideas seem to be taken from the things themselves, they are not
constantly the same; no, not in that species which is most familiar
to us, and with which we have the most intimate acquaintance: it
having been more than once doubted, whether the foetus born of a
woman were a man, even so far as that it hath been debated, whether
it were or were not to be nourished and baptized: which could not
be, if the abstract idea or essence to which the name man belonged
were of nature's making; and were not the uncertain and various
collection of simple ideas, which the understanding put together,
and then, abstracting it, affixed a name to it. So that, in truth,
every distinct abstract idea is a distinct essence; and the names
that stand for such distinct ideas are the names of things
essentially different. Thus a circle is as essentially different
from an oval as a sheep from a goat; and rain is as essentially
different from snow as water from earth: that abstract idea which is
the essence of one being impossible to be communicated to the other.
And thus any two abstract ideas, that in any part vary one from
another, with two distinct names annexed to them, constitute two
distinct sorts, or, if you please, species, as essentially different
as any two of the most remote or opposite in the world.
15. Several significations of the word "essence." But since the
essences of things are thought by some (and not without reason) to
be wholly unknown, it may not be amiss to consider the several
significations of the word essence.
Real essences. First, Essence may be taken for the very being of
anything, whereby it is what it is. And thus the real internal, but
generally (in substances) unknown constitution of things, whereon
their discoverable qualities depend, may be called their essence.
This is the proper original signification of the word, as is evident
from the formation of it; essentia, in its primary notation,
signifying properly, being. And in this sense it is still used, when
we speak of the essence of particular things, without giving them
any name.
Nominal essences. Secondly, The learning and disputes of the
schools having been much busied about genus and species, the word
essence has almost lost its primary signification: and, instead of
the real constitution of things, has been almost wholly applied to
the artificial constitution of genus and species. It is true, there
is ordinarily supposed a real constitution of the sorts of things;
and it is past doubt there must be some real constitution, on which
any collection of simple ideas co-existing must depend. But, it
being evident that things are ranked under names into sorts or
species, only as they agree to certain abstract ideas, to which we
have annexed those names, the essence of each genus, or sort, comes
to be nothing but that abstract idea which the general, or sortal
(if I may have leave so to call it from sort, as I do general from
genus), name stands for. And this we shall find to be that which the
word essence imports in its most familiar use.
These two sorts of essences, I suppose, may not unfitly be
termed, the one the real, the other nominal essence.
16. Constant connexion between the name and nominal essence.
Between the nominal essence and the name there is so near a
connexion, that the name of any sort of things cannot be attributed
to any particular being but what has this essence, whereby it
answers that abstract idea whereof that name is the sign.
17. Supposition, that species are distinguished by their real
essences, useless. Concerning the real essences of corporeal
substances (to mention these only) there are, if I mistake not, two
opinions. The one is of those who, using the word essence for they
know not what, suppose a certain number of those essences, according
to which all natural things are made, and wherein they do exactly
every one of them partake, and so become of this or that species.
The other and more rational opinion is of those who look on all
natural things to have a real, but unknown, constitution of their
insensible parts; from which flow those sensible qualities which
serve us to distinguish them one from another, according as we have
occasion to rank them into sorts, under common denominations. The
former of these opinions, which supposes these essences as a certain
number of forms or moulds, wherein all natural things that exist are
cast, and do equally partake, has, I imagine, very much perplexed
the knowledge of natural things. The frequent productions of
monsters, in all the species of animals, and of changelings, and
other strange issues of human birth, carry with them difficulties,
not possible to consist with this hypothesis; since it is as
impossible that two things partaking exactly of the same real
essence should have different properties, as that two figures
partaking of the same real essence of a circle should have different
properties. But were there no other reason against it, yet the
supposition of essences that cannot be known; and the making of
them, nevertheless, to be that which distinguishes the species of
things, is so wholly useless and unserviceable to any part of our
knowledge, that that alone were sufficient to make us lay it by, and
content ourselves with such essences of the sorts or species of
things as come within the reach of our knowledge: which, when
seriously considered, will be found, as I have said, to be nothing
else but, those abstract complex ideas to which we have annexed
distinct general names.
18. Real and nominal essence the same in simple ideas and modes,
different in substances. Essences being thus distinguished into
nominal and real, we may further observe, that, in the species of
simple ideas and modes, they are always the same; but in substances
always quite different. Thus, a figure including a space between
three lines, is the real as well as nominal essence of a triangle;
it being not only the abstract idea to which the general name is
annexed, but the very essentia or being of the thing itself; that
foundation from which all its properties flow, and to which they are
all inseparably annexed. But it is far otherwise concerning that
parcel of matter which makes the ring on my finger; wherein these
two essences are apparently different. For, it is the real
constitution of its insensible parts, on which depend all those
properties of colour, weight, fusibility, fixedness, &c., which
are to be found in it; which constitution we know not, and so,
having no particular idea of, having no name that is the sign of it.
But yet it is its colour, weight, fusibility, fixedness, &c.,
which makes it to be gold, or gives it a right to that name, which
is therefore its nominal essence. Since nothing can be called gold
but what has a conformity of qualities to that abstract complex idea
to which that name is annexed. But this distinction of essences,
belonging particularly to substances, we shall, when we come to
consider their names, have an occasion to treat of more fully.
19. Essences ingenerable and incorruptible. That such abstract
ideas, with names to them, as we have been speaking of are essences,
may further appear by what we are told concerning essences, viz.
that they are all ingenerable and incorruptible. Which cannot be
true of the real constitutions of things, which begin and perish
with them. All things that exist, besides their Author, are all
liable to change; especially those things we are acquainted with,
and have ranked into bands under distinct names or ensigns. Thus,
that which was grass to-day is to-morrow the flesh of a sheep; and,
within a few days after, becomes part of a man: in all which and the
like changes, it is evident their real essence- i.e. that
constitution whereon the properties of these several things
depended- is destroyed, and perishes with them. But essences being
taken for ideas established in the mind, with names annexed to them,
they are supposed to remain steadily the same, whatever mutations
the particular substances are liable to. For, whatever becomes of
Alexander and Bucephalus, the ideas to which man and horse are
annexed, are supposed nevertheless to remain the same; and so the
essences of those species are preserved whole and undestroyed,
whatever changes happen to any or all of the individuals of those
species. By this means the essence of a species rests safe and
entire, without the existence of so much as one individual of that
kind. For, were there now no circle existing anywhere in the world,
(as perhaps that figure exists not anywhere exactly marked out), yet
the idea annexed to that name would not cease to be what it is; nor
cease to be as a pattern to determine which of the particular
figures we meet with have or have not a right to the name circle,
and so to show which of them, by having that essence, was of that
species. And though there neither were nor had been in nature such a
beast as an unicorn, or such a fish as a mermaid; yet, supposing
those names to stand for complex abstract ideas that contained no
inconsistency in them, the essence of a mermaid is as intelligible
as that of a man; and the idea of an unicorn as certain, steady, and
permanent as that of a horse. From what has been said, it is
evident, that the doctrine of the immutability of essences proves
them to be only abstract ideas; and is founded on the relation
established between them and certain sounds as signs of them; and
will always be true, as long as the same name can have the same
signification.
20. Recapitulation. To conclude. This is that which in short I
would say, viz. that all the great business of genera and species,
and their essences, amounts to no more but this:- That men making
abstract ideas, and settling them in their minds with names annexed
to them, do thereby enable themselves to consider things, and
discourse of them, as it were in bundles, for the easier and readier
improvement and communication of their knowledge, which would
advance but slowly were their words and thoughts confined only to
particulars.
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