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Academy Resources Glossary of Philosophical Terms Timeline of Philosophy A Timeline of American Philosophy Diagram: Development of Philosophic Thought Diagram: Divisions of Philosophy The Philosophy Resource Center The Religion Resource Center Books about Philosophy in The Radical Academy Bookstore Books about Religion in The Radical Academy Bookstore Click Here for New & Used College Textbooks at Discount Prices Click Here for College Education Information & Study Resources Shop Amazon Stores in the Radical Academy Bookstore Magazine Outlet Music Store Classical Music Store Video Store DVD Store Computer Store Camera & Photo Store Computer/Video Games Software Store Musical Instruments Outlet Store Cellular Phones Toys & Games Tools & Hardware Automotive Store Outdoor Living Consumer Electronics Home & Garden Kitchen & Housewares Baby Superstore Apparel & Accessories Gourmet Food Grocery Store Sporting Goods Jewelry & Watches Health & Personal Care Beauty Store		Sensation Cannot Rise to Knowledge by Ralph Cudworth   For, first, Sense only Suffering and receiving from without, and having no Active Principle of its own, to take Acquaintance with what it receives, it must needs be a Stranger to that which is altogether adventitious to it, and therefore cannot know or understand it. For to Know or Understand a thing, is nothing else but by some Inward Anticipation of the Mind, that is Native and Domestic, and so familiar to it, to take Acquaintance with it; of which I shall speak more afterward. Sense is but the Offering or Presenting of some Object to the Mind, to give it an Occasion to exercise its own Inward Activity upon. Which two things being many times nearly conjoined together in Time, though they be very different in Nature from one another, yet they are vulgarly mistaken for one and the same thing, as if it were all nothing but mere Sensation or Passion from the Body. Whereas Sense itself is but the Passive Perception of some Individual Material Forms, but to Know or Understand, is Activity to Comprehend a thing by some Abstract, Free and Universal Reasonings, from whence the Mind as it were looking down (as Boetius expresseth it) upon the individuals below it, views and understands them. But Sense which lies Flat and Grovelling in the Individuals, and is stupidly fixed in the Material Form, is not able to rise up or ascend to an Abstract Universal Notion; For which Cause it never Affirms or Denies any thing of its Object, because (as Aristotle observes) in all Affirmation, and Negation at least, the Predicate is always Universal. The Eye which is placed in a Level with the sea, and touches the Surface of it, cannot take any large Prospect upon the Sea, much less see the whole Amplitude of it. But an Eye Elevated to a higher Station, and from thence looking down, may comprehensively view the whole Sea at once, or at least so much of it as is within our Horizon. The Abstract Universal Reasons are that higher Station of the Mind, from whence looking down upon Individual things, it hath a Commanding view of them, and as it were a priori comprehends or Knows them. But Sense, which either lies in the same Level with that Particular Material Object which it perceives, or rather under it and beneath it, cannot emerge to any Knowledge or Truth concerning it.   Excerpted from A Treatise Concerning Eternal and Immutable Morality, by Ralph Cudworth (1731) Enrich Your Life With a Philosophy Book... Enrich Your Life With a Philosophy Magazine... Academy Showcase Specials     Introduction & Directory
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