Phil.  How then came you to say, you conceived a house or tree existing independent and out of all minds whatsoever?

HYL.  That was I own an oversight; but stay, let me consider what led me into it.—­It is a pleasant mistake enough.  As I was thinking of a tree in a solitary place, where no one was present to see it, methought that was to conceive a tree as existing unperceived or unthought of; not considering that I myself conceived it all the while.  But now I plainly see that all I can do is to frame ideas in my own mind.  I may indeed conceive in my own thoughts the idea of a tree, or a house, or a mountain, but that is all.  And this is far from proving that I can conceive them existing out of the minds of all spirits.

Phil.  You acknowledge then that you cannot possibly conceive how any one corporeal sensible thing should exist otherwise than in the mind?

HYL.  I do.

Phil.  And yet you will earnestly contend for the truth of that which you cannot so much as conceive?

HYL.  I profess I know not what to think; but still there are some scruples remain with me.  Is it not certain I see things at a distance?  Do we not perceive the stars and moon, for example, to be a great way off?  Is not this, I say, manifest to the senses?

Phil.  Do you not in a dream too perceive those or the like objects?

HYL.  I do.

Phil.  And have they not then the same appearance of being distant?

HYL.  They have.

Phil.  But you do not thence conclude the apparitions in a dream to be without the mind?

HYL.  By no means.

Phil.  You ought not therefore to conclude that sensible objects are without the mind, from their appearance, or manner wherein they are perceived.

HYL.  I acknowledge it.  But doth not my sense deceive me in those cases?

Phil.  By no means.  The idea or thing which you immediately perceive, neither sense nor reason informs you that it actually exists without the mind.  By sense you only know that you are affected with such certain sensations of light and colours, &c.  And these you will not say are without the mind.

HYL.  True:  but, beside all that, do you not think the sight suggests something of outness or distance?

Phil.  Upon approaching a distant object, do the visible size and figure change perpetually, or do they appear the same at all distances?

HYL.  They are in a continual change.

Phil.  Sight therefore doth not suggest, or any way inform you, that the visible object you immediately perceive exists at a distance, or will be perceived when you advance farther onward; there being a continued series of visible objects succeeding each other during the whole time of your approach.