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| Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger Portrait of a man in classical dress possibly Philip Herbert, 4th Earl of Pembroke ca. 1610 oil on panel Tate Britain |
"Perception, as it is the first faculty of the Mind exercised about our Ideas, so it is the first and simplest Idea we have from Reflection, and is by some called Thinking in general. Though Thinking, in the propriety of the English Tongue, signifies that sort of operation of the Mind about its Ideas wherein the Mind is active, where it with some degree of voluntary attention considers any thing. For in bare naked Perception, the Mind is, for the most part, only passive, and what it perceives it cannot avoid perceiving."
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| Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger Portrait of Mary Rogers, Lady Harington 1592 oil on panel Tate Britain |
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| Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger Portrait of Captain Thomas Lee in Irish dress 1594 oil on canvas Tate Britain |
"Since the Mind, in all its Thoughts and Reasonings, hath no other immediate Object but its own Ideas, which it alone does or can contemplate, it is evident that our Knowledge is only conversant about them. Knowledge then seems to me to be nothing but the perception of the connexion and agreement, or disagreement and repugnancy of any of our Ideas. In this alone it consists. Where this Perception is, there is Knowledge, and where it is not, there, though we may fancy, guess, or believe, yet we always come short of Knowledge. For when we know that White is not Black, what do we else but perceive that these two Ideas do not agree?"
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| Robert Peake the Elder Portrait of a woman possibly Frances Cotton, Lady Montagu ca. 1616 oil on canvas Yale Center for British Art |
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| Hans Holbein Portrait of Charles de Solier, Sieur de Morette 1534-35 oil on panel Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden |
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| Lavinia Fontana Portrait of a lady with a dog before 1614 oil on panel Auckland Art Gallery, New Zealand |
"From all which it is evident, that the extent of our Knowledge comes not only short of the reality of Things, but even of the extent of our own Ideas. Though our Knowledge be limited to our Ideas, and cannot exceed them either in extent or perfection, and though these be very narrow bounds in respect of the extent of All-Being, and far short of what we may justly imagine to be in some even created understandings not tied down to the dull and narrow ways of Perception, such as our Senses, yet it would be well with us if our Knowledge were but as large as our Ideas, and there were not many Doubts and Enquiries concerning the Ideas we have, whereof we are not, nor I believe ever shall be in this World, resolved."
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| Paolo Veronese Portrait of a lady as St Agnes 1580s oil on canvas Museum of Fine Arts, Houston |
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| Paolo Veronese Portrait of a gentleman 1560 oil on canvas Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest |
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| Simon-Pietersz Verelst Portrait of Mary of Modena 1680 oil on canvas Yale Center for British Art |
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| Anthony van Dyck Portrait of Charles I ca. 1632 oil on canvas Dulwich Picture Gallery, London |
"Our Knowledge being so narrow, as I have shew'd, it will, perhaps, give us some Light into the present State of our minds if we look a little into the dark side, and take a view of our Ignorance, which being infinitely larger than our Knowledge, may serve much to the quieting of Disputes and Improvement of useful Knowledge, if discovering how far we have clear and distinct Ideas, we confine our Thoughts within the Contemplation of those Things that are with the reach of our Understandings, and launch not out into that Abyss of Darkness (where we have not Eyes to see, nor Faculties to perceive any thing) out of a Presumption that nothing is beyond our Comprehension. But to be satisfied of the Folly of such a Conceit, we need not go far. He that knows any thing, knows this in the first place, that he need not seek long for Instances of his Ignorance. The meanest and most obvious Things that come in our way have dark sides that the quickest Sight cannot penetrate into. The clearest and most enlarged Understandings of thinking Men find themselves puzzled and at a loss in every Particle of Matter."
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| Peter Lely Portrait of Diana Kirke, later Countess of Oxford ca. 1665 oil on canvas Yale Center for British Art |
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| attributed to Joseph Parrocel Madame La Comtesse de Saint-Géran on horseback ca. 1675-83 oil on canvas Skokloster Castle, Sweden |
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| Giovanni Battista Moroni Portrait of a lady ca. 1556-60 oil on canvas National Gallery, London |
"I doubt not but my Reader, by this time, may be apt to think that I have been all this while only building a Castle in the Air, and be ready to say to me, To what purpose all this stir? Knowledge, you say, is only the perception of the agreement or disagreement of our own Ideas, but who knows what those ideas may be? Is there any thing so extravagant as the Imaginations of Men's Brains? Where is the Head that has no Chimeras in it? Or if there be a sober and a wise Man, what difference will there be by your Rules between his Knowledge and that of the most extravagant Fancy in the World? They both have their Ideas and perceive their agreement or disagreement with one another. If there be any difference between them, the advantage will be on the warm-headed Man's side, as having the more Ideas and the more lively. And so, by your Rules, he will be the more knowing. If it be true that all Knowledge lies only in the perception of the agreement or disagreement of our own Ideas, the Visions of an Enthusiast and the Reasonings of a sober Man will be equally certain. 'Tis no matter how Things are, so a Man observe but the agreement of his own Imaginations and talk conformably, it is all Truth, all Certainty. Such Castles in the Air will be as strong Holds of Truth as the Demonstrations of Euclid. That an Harpy is not a Centaur is by this way as certain knowledge and as much a Truth as that a Square is not a Circle."
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| Giovanni Battista Moroni Portrait of a knight with jousting helmet ca. 1554-58 oil on canvas National Gallery, London |
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| Giovanni Battista Moroni Portrait of a gentleman with helmet on column-shaft before 1578 oil on canvas National Gallery, London |
– quoted passages are by John Locke from An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689)