326 rLOSLIC : OR THE RIGHT USE OF REASON. sent with it, as when a man or a horse is deaf, or blind, or dead, or if a physician or a divine be unlearned, these are called privations; so the sinfulness of any human action is said to be a privation ; for sin is that want of conformity to the law of God, Which ought to be found in every action of man. Note, There are some writers who make all sort of relative modes or relations, as well as all external denominations, to be mere creatures of the mind, and entia rationis, and 'then they rank them also under the general head of not beings; but it is my opinion, that whatsoever may be determined concerning mere mental relations and external denominations, which seem to have something less of entity or being in them, yet there are many real relations, which ought not to be reduced to so low a class, such are the situation of bodies, their mutual distances, their particular proportions and measures, the notions of fatherhood, brotherhood, sonship, &c. all which are relative ideas. The very essence of virtue or holiness consists in the conformity of our actions to the rule of right reason, or the law of God : the nature and essence of sincerity is the conformity of our words and actions to our thoughts, all which are but mere relations; and I think, we must not reduce such positive beings as piety, and virtue, and truth, to the rank of non- entities, which have nothing real in them, though sin (or rather the sinfulness of an action) may be properly called a not - being, for it is a want of piety and virtue. This is the most usual, and perhaps the just- est way of representing these matters. -...... CHAP, ITI. Of the several Sorts of Perceptions or Ideas, IDEAS may be divided with regard to their original, their nature, their objects, and their qualities. SECT. I. Of sensible, spiritual, and abstracted Ideas, There has been a great controversy about the origin of ideas, namely, whether any of our ideas are innate or no, that is, born with us, and naturally belonging to our minds. Mr. Locke utterly denies it; others as positively affirm it. Now, though this controversy may be compromised, by allowing that there is a sense, wherein our first ideas of some things may be said to be innate, as I have shewn in some remarks on Mr. Locke's Essay; (which have lain long by me) yet it does not belong to this place and business to have that point debated at large, nor will it hinder our pursuit of the present work to pass it over in silence. There is sufficient ground to say, that all our ideas, with regard to their original, may be divided into three sorts, namely, sensible, spiritual, and abstracted ideas,
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