 | Chapter III
Other considerations concerning Innate Principles, both Speculative and
Practical An essay concerning human understanding |  |
16. Idea of God not innate although wise men of all nations come to have it.
If it be said, that wise men of all nations came to have true conceptions of the unity and infinity of the Deity, I grant it. But then this,
First, excludes universality of consent in anything but the name; for those wise men being very few, perhaps one of a thousand, this universality is very narrow.
Secondly, it seems to me plainly to prove, that the truest and best notions men have of God were not imprinted, but acquired by thought and meditation, and a right use of their faculties: since the wise and considerate men of the world, by a right and careful employment of their thoughts and reason, attained true notions in this as well as other things; whilst the lazy and inconsiderate part of men, making far the greater number, took up their notions by chance, from common tradition and vulgar conceptions, without much beating their heads about them. And if it be a reason to think the notion of God innate, because all wise men had it, virtue too must be thought innate; for that also wise men have always had.
| Chapter III
Other considerations concerning Innate Principles, both Speculative and
Practical An essay concerning human understanding | |