'_Phil._ As I am no sceptic with regard to the nature of things, so neither am I as to their existence. That a thing should be really perceived by my senses, and at the same time not really exist is to me a plain contradiction; since I cannot prescind or abstract even in thought, the existence of a sensible thing from its being perceived. Wood, stones, fire, water, flesh, iron, and the like things, which I name and discourse of, are things that I know. And I should not have known them but that I perceived them by my senses; and things perceived by the senses are immediately perceived; and things immediately perceived are ideas; and ideas cannot exist without the mind; their existence therefore consists in being perceived; when therefore they are actually perceived there can be no doubt of their existence.... I might as well doubt of my own being, as of the being of those things I actually see and feel. '_Hyl._ Not so fast, _Philonous_; you say you cannot conceive how sensible things should exist without the mind. Do you not? '_Phil._ I do. '_Hyl._ Supposing you were annihilated, cannot you conceive it possible that things perceivable by sense may still exist? '_Phil._ I can; but then it must be in another mind. When I deny sensible things an existence out of the mind, I do not mean my mind in particular, but all minds. Now, it is plain they have an existence exterior to my mind; since I find them by experience to be independent of it. There is therefore some other mind wherein they exist, during the intervals between the times of my perceiving them; as likewise they did before my birth, and would do after my supposed annihilation. And as the same is true with regard to all other finite created spirits, it necessarily follows there is an _omnipresent, eternal Mind_, which knows and comprehends all things, and exhibits them to our view in such a manner, and according to such rules, as He Himself hath ordained, and are by us termed the _Laws of Nature_.' 'Truth is the cry of all,' says Berkeley in the final paragraph of _Siris_, 'but the game of a few. Certainly, where it is the chief passion, it doth not give way to vulgar cares and views, nor is it contented with a little ardour, active perhaps to pursue, but not so fit to weigh and revise. He that would make a real progress in knowledge, must dedicate his age as well as youth, the latter growth as well as firstfruits at the altar of truth.' Elsewhere in this famous treatise he writes: