An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume 1: MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books 1 and 2Locke, John
Philosophy
An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume 1: MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books 1 and 2
Locke, John
Knowledge, Theory of -- Early works to 1800
11. It is not always conscious of it.
I grant that the soul, in a waking man, is never without thought,
because it is the condition of being awake. But whether sleeping
without dreaming be not an affection of the whole man, mind as well as
body, may be worth a waking man’s consideration; it being hard to
conceive that anything should think and not be conscious of it. If the
soul doth think in a sleeping man without being conscious of it, I ask
whether, during such thinking, it has any pleasure or pain, or be
capable of happiness or misery? I am sure the man is not; no more than
the bed or earth he lies on. For to be happy or miserable without being
conscious of it, seems to me utterly inconsistent and impossible. Or if
it be possible that the SOUL can, whilst the body is sleeping, have its
thinking, enjoyments, and concerns, its pleasures or pain, apart, which
the MAN is not conscious of nor partakes in,—it is certain that
Socrates asleep and Socrates awake is not the same person; but his soul
when he sleeps, and Socrates the man, consisting of body and soul, when
he is waking, are two persons: since waking Socrates has no knowledge
of, or concernment for that happiness or misery of his soul, which it
enjoys alone by itself whilst he sleeps, without perceiving anything of
it; no more than he has for the happiness or misery of a man in the
Indies, whom he knows not. For, if we take wholly away all
consciousness of our actions and sensations, especially of pleasure and
pain, and the concernment that accompanies it, it will be hard to know
wherein to place personal identity.
12. If a sleeping Man thinks without knowing it, the sleeping and
waking Man are two Persons.
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