It looks, at first, as though Berkeley himself would say that the things I saw are identical with my sensations of sight: in the third passage quoted above he says, "the things I perceive are my own ideas ... the things, I say, immediately perceived are ideas or sensations, call them which you will." Let us, therefore, see the consequences of adhering strictly to this interpretation of the ambiguous phrase. It will follow in the first place that, unless I can see with my eyes shut, the things I see are not permanent, but do cease to exist when I close my eyes. Next, my sensations cannot exist in somebody else's mind--the fact that you can see the object when your eyes are open does not enable me to see it with my eyes closed. On the other hand, of course, it does not follow that because my eyes are closed nobody else can see anything--only, this does not make my sensations permanent, or prove that they can exist in someone else's mind. In fine, if "the things I saw" are the sensations of sight that I had, then Berkeley's argument from the permanent existence of "things" to their existence in a permanent mind breaks down doubly; for, first, my sensations plainly are not permanent; and, second, my sensations cannot exist in another mind, permanent or otherwise. At this point it is necessary to note that "existence" has been used in this connection in a double sense: actual existence has been distinguished from potential. It is on this distinction that Mill bases his definition of matter as "the permanent possibility of sensation"; but the distinction is derived from Berkeley, who has, as usual, given the most lucid explanation. In his _MS. Common Place Book_ (quoted in Fraser, i. 325, n. 9), Berkeley says, "Bodies, taken for powers, do exist when not perceived; but this existence is not actual. When I say a _power_ exists, no more is meant than that _if_, in the light, I open my eyes, and look that way, I shall see the body." Thus far Mill will go with Berkeley; and thus far both are open to the reproach of not giving a plain answer to a plain question. The plain question of common sense to the Idealist is: Do things exist when unperceived? Does the furniture of my room exist when nobody is in the room to perceive it? To which the Idealist replies that if I go into the room I shall see the furniture--which is perfectly true, but is no answer to the question. There is, indeed, no particular reason why Mill should not plainly answer "No," if it were not for fear of giving a shock to the man of common sense who cannot readily comprehend how it is that the coal in his grate has come to be consumed if the process of combustion has been suspended in his absence. But with Berkeley the case is different: for him the permanence of things and the common-sense belief in that permanence have a value as furnishing an additional argument in favour of a Supreme Mind. But he too evades rather than meets the plain