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An essay concerning human understanding

  
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[title page]
  
To The Right Honourable Lord Thomas,
  
Epistle to the Reader

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Introduction An Essay Concerning Human Understanding
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Book I Neither Principles Nor Ideas Are Innate
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Book II Of Ideas
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Book III Of Words
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Book IV Of Knowledge and Probability
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Chapter I Of Knowledge in General
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Chapter II Of the Degrees of our Knowledge
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Chapter III Of the Extent of Human Knowledge
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Chapter IV Of the Reality of Knowledge
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Chapter V Of Truth in General
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Chapter VI Of Universal Propositions: their Truth and Certainty
  
1. Treating of words necessary to knowledge.
  
2. General truths hardly to be understood, but in verbal propositions.
  
3. Certainty twofold--of truth and of knowledge.
  
4. No proposition can be certainly known to be true, where the real essence of each species mentioned is not known.
  
5. This more particularly concerns substances.
  
6. The truth of few universal propositions concerning substances is to be known.
  
7. Because necessary co-existence of simple ideas in substances can in few cases be known.
  
8. Instance in gold.
  
9. No discoverable necessary connexion between nominal essence of gold and other simple ideas.
  
10. As far as any such co-existence can be known, so far universal propositions may be certain. But this will go but a little way.
  
11. The qualities which make our complex ideas of substances depend mostly on external, remote, and unperceived causes.
  
12. Our nominal essences of substances furnish few universal propositions about them that are certain.
  
13. Judgment of probability concerning substances may reach further: but that is not knowledge.
  
14. What is requisite for our knowledge of substances.
  
15. Whilst our complex ideas of substances contain not ideas of their real constitutions, we can make but few general certain propositions concerning them.
  
16. Wherein lies the general certainty of propositions.
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Chapter VII Of Maxims
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Chapter VIII Of Trifling Propositions
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Chapter IX Of our Threefold Knowledge of Existence
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Chapter X Of our Knowledge of the Existence of a God
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Chapter XI Of our Knowledge of the Existence of Other Things
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Chapter XII Of the Improvement of our Knowledge
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Chapter XIII Some Further Considerations Concerning our Knowledge
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Chapter XIV Of Judgment
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Chapter XV Of Probability
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Chapter XVI Of the Degrees of Assent
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Chapter XVII Of Reason
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Chapter XVIII Of Faith and Reason, and their Distinct Provinces
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Chapter XIX Of Enthusiasm
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Chapter XX Of Wrong Assent, or Error
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Chapter XXI Of the Division of the Sciences

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3. Names of simple ideas and modes signify always both real and nominal essences.

Secondly, The names of simple ideas and modes signify always the real as well as nominal essence of their species. But the names of natural substances signify rarely, if ever, anything but barely the nominal essences of those species; as we shall show in the chapter that treats of the names of substances in particular.

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