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"Again, when he uses the metaphor of white paper, &c. he marks very clearly, by the terms (as we [end page 68] say that it is not strict philosophical language, but designed as an elucidation of the subject, addressed through the medium of the senses, to the conceptions of the world in general."

— Thomas, Daniel (b. 1748)

Author

Thomas, Daniel (b. 1748)

Work Title

An answer, on their own principles to direct and consequential atheists

Place of Publication

London

Publisher

Printed for J. Ridgway

Date

1791

Metaphor

"Again, when he uses the metaphor of white paper, &c. he marks very clearly, by the terms (as we [end page 68] say that it is not strict philosophical language, but designed as an elucidation of the subject, addressed through the medium of the senses, to the conceptions of the world in general."

Metaphor in Context

Let us then suppose the mind to be (as we say) white paper, void of all character; without any ideas; how comes it to be furnished with them?--Now mark how fairly Dr. Beattie has quoted this passage. Locke does not say, previous to education, the soul is like white paper. For, as education does not take place till the work of self-instruction is nearly finished, and the mind is not only well stored with ideas, but has also learned many of the words by which we express them, this would be to make him assert, that before persons began to instruct children, they did not distinguish between pleasure and pain, light and darkness, sweet and bitters; but that their ideas of these things were derived from our instruction. Again, when he uses the metaphor of white paper, &c. he marks very clearly, by the terms (as we [end page 68] say that it is not strict philosophical language, but designed as an elucidation of the subject, addressed through the medium of the senses, to the conceptions of the world in general. Dr. Beattie asserts that it is the most unlucky allusion; I maintain it to be the most happy that could have been selected for expressing a pure capacity of receiving ideas. The admired simile of the ancients, wax, quidquid cerá imitaberis udá, would not express it with half the propriety: for it has naturally a yellow colour; white paper has none; the former retains any impression merely until some other is given to it; the latter preserves the first with the most obstinate perseverance. He says that the soul is not extended; but in all his works Mr. Locke does not give the most remote hint that it is; nay, had he asserted any such thing, he must have contradicted himself, since he offers arguments in favour both of the immateriality and materiality of the soul; the former of which seems to preponderate with him, and of course consistency must prevent him from ascribing to it any property of mat- [end page 69] ter. This quality of extension Dr. Beattie has inferred from the metaphor of white paper, by a most unpardonable perversion of language, concluding that whatever was compared to any thing in one respect, must bear and exact resemblance to it in every other also; but this is doubly absurd in a man who is not a poet, and deeply versed in scripture: for surely Homer compares one of his heroes to an ass cudgelled out of a field by a parcel of boys; when the Indian asserts himself to be a turkey perched on a tree watching the steps of the hunter; or when Solomon, under the figure of two young rose, depicts the resilient breast of his mistress; the intention was to mark inflexibility, apprehension, and elasticity: not to degrade men, endued with reason and speech, to the level of beasts, devoid of each. This imperfect conception of the metaphor introduced by Locke, betrays his Commentator into a variety of most palpable blunders. The soul, says he, is not of a white colour: but can he presume to insinuate that Locke would ascribe any colour [end page 70] to the soul, when he seems inclined to deem it immaterial? But had he metaphorically attributed whiteness to it, it would be more allowable than any other metaphor, since the term expresses not any of the primary or positive colours, but merely an effect produced by the reflection and refraction of them all, and of course might be most aptly used by an immaterialists, to designate the energy of the mind by which it derives, from the source of sensation, certain notions, which it new modifies, in such a manner that they scarcely bear any resemblance to the primary sensations. [...]
(pp. 68-71)