Page:An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding - Hume (1748).djvu/35

 ing that Word in a Sense somewhat different from the usual. By the Term, Impressions, then, we mean all our more lively Perceptions, when we hear, or see, or feel, or love, or hate, or desire, or will. And Impressions are contradistinguish'd from Ideas, which are the less lively Perceptions we are conscious of, when we reflect on any of these Sensations or Movements above mention'd.

, at first View, may seem more unbounded than the Thought of Man, which not only escapes all human Power and Authority, but is not even restrain'd within the Limits of Nature and Reality. To form Monsters, and join incongruous Shapes and Appearances costs it no more Trouble than to conceive the most natural and familiar Objects. And while the Body is confin'd to one Planet, along which it creeps with Pain and Difficulty; the Thought can in an Instant transport us into the most distant Regions of the Universe; or even beyond the Universe, into the unbounded Chaos, where Nature is suppos'd to lie in total Confusion. What never was seen, nor heard of may yet be conceiv'd; nor is any thing beyond the Power of Thought, except what implies an absolute Contradiction.

tho' Thought seems to possess this unbounded Liberty, we shall find, upon a nearer Examination, that it is really confin'd within very narrow Limits,