To Be Is To Be Perceived

This Perceiving, Active Being Is What I Call Mind, Spirit, Soul, Or Myself. By Which Words I Do Not Denote Any One Of My Ideas, But A Thing Entirely Distinct From Them, Wherein They Exist, Or, Which Is The Same Thing, Whereby They Are Perceived; For The Existence Of An Idea Consists In Being Perceived.

Upon The Whole, I Am Inclined To Think That The Far Greater Part, If Not All, Of Those Difficulties Which Have Hitherto Amused Philosophers, And Blocked Up The Way To Knowledge, Are Entirely Owing To Our Selves. That We Have First Raised A Dust, And Then Complain, We Cannot See.

To Me It Seems That Liberty And Virtue Were Made For Each Other. If Any Man Wish To Enslave His Country, Nothing Is A Fitter Preparative Than Vice; And Nothing Leads To Vice So Surely As Irreligion.

That The Discovery Of This Great Truth, Which Lies So Near And Obvious To The Mind, Should Be Attained To By The Reason Of So Veryfew, Is A Sad Instance Of The Stupidity And Inattention Of Men, Who, Though They Are Surrounded With Such Clear Manifestations Of The Deity, Are Yet So Little Affected By Them, That They Seem As It Were Blinded With Excess Of Light.

Where The People Are Well Educated, The Art Of Piloting A State Is Best Learned From The Writings Of Plato.