Quotes from De Motu — George Berkeley
1685–1753 Ireland
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5 quotes
Abstract terms (however useful they may be in argument) should be discarded in meditation, and the mind should be fixed on the particular and the concrete, that is, on the things themselves.
De Motu (1721)
For no one's authority ought to rank so high as to set a value on his words and terms even though nothing clear and determinate lies behind them.
De Motu (1721)
In the pursuit of truth we must beware of being misled by terms which we do not rightly understand. That is the chief point. Almost all philosophers utter the caution; few observe it.
De Motu (1721)
Solicitation and effort or conation belong properly to animate beings alone. When they are attributed to other things, they must be taken in a metaphorical sense; but a philosopher should abstain from metaphor.
De Motu (1721)
Moreover, force, gravity, and words of that kind, are often, and not unwisely, used in the concrete; in such a way that they know the movement of the body, the difficulty of resistance, etc. But when they are used by philosophers to signify certain natures, precise and abstract from all these, which are neither subject to the senses, nor can be understood by any power of the mind, nor can they be shaped by the imagination, they in turn give rise to errors and confusion.
De Motu (1721)