In looking at any object, as at St. James’s Palace, for example, it is taken for granted that the impression I have of it is a perfectly distinct, precise, and definite idea, in which abstraction or generalisation has no concern. Now it appears to me an easy matter to shew that this sensible image of a particular building is itself but a vague and confused notion, not one precise, individual impression, or any number of impressions, distinctly perceived. For I would demand of any one who thinks his senses furnish him with these infallible and perfect images of things, free from all contradiction and perplexity, what is the amount of the knowledge which he has of the object before him? For instance, is the knowledge which he has that St. James’s Palace is larger than the houses which are near it, owing to his perceiving, with a glance of the eye, all the bricks of which the front is composed, or can he not tell that it contains a number of windows of different sizes, without distinctly counting them? Let us even suppose that he has this exact knowledge, yet this will not be enough unless he has also a distinct perception of the number and size of the panes of glass in each window, and of every mark, stain, or dent in each brick, otherwise, his idea of each of these particulars will still be general, and his most substantial knowledge built on shadows, that is, composed of a number of parts, of the parts of which he has no knowledge. In the same manner that I form an idea of St. James’s Palace, I can form an idea of Pall-Mall, of the adjoining streets, of Westminster, and London, of Paris, of France, and England, and of the different cities and kingdoms of the world. At least, I do not see the point of separation in this progressive scale of our ideas. May I not be able, in looking out of my window, to distinguish, first, a certain object in the distance, then that it is a man, then that it is a person whom I know, and all this before I can distinguish his particular features; and after I can distinguish those features, what do I know or see of them, except their general form, expression, and effect? Little or nothing. Let any one, who is not an artist, or let any one who is, attempt to give an outline from memory of the features of his most intimate friend, and he will feel the truth of this remark. Yet though he does not know the exact turn of any one feature, he will instantly, and without fail, recognise the person the moment he meets him in the street, and that often, merely from catching a glimpse of some part of his dress, or from peculiarity of motion, though he may be quite at a loss to define in what this peculiarity consists, or to account for its impression on him. We may be said to have a particular knowledge of things, in proportion to the number of parts which we distinguish in them. But the real ultimate foundation of all our knowledge is and must be general, that is, made up