An Essay Concerning Human Understanding Book II


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John Locke wrote four essays on human (or humane) understanding. Here are a few quotes from the book:

"I see no reason to believe, that the soul thinks before the senses have furnished it with ideas to think on. The dreams of sleeping men are, as I take it, all made up of the waking man's ideas, though for the most part oddly put together. Can the soul think, and not the man, or a man think, and not be conscious of it? Suppose the soul of Castor separated, during his sleep, from his body, to think apart. Let us suppose too, that it chooses for its scene of thinking the body of another man, v. g. Pollux, who is sleeping without a soul. Nobody can imagine that his soul can think, or move a body at Oxford, whilst he is at London. The question is, whether if the same substance which thinks, be changed, it can be the same person; or, remaining the same, it can be different persons? Whiteness and coldness are no more in snow than pain is."

John Locke wrote four essays on human (or humane) understanding. The first and second have been recorded into LibriVox. This recording is a repetition of the second of Locke's Essays. All of his essays were, and are, very influential. Edward Stillingfleet 1635-1699 (Bishop of Worcester) wrote a Critique of Locke’s ideas and many letters to him. Locke’s Essays inspired Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716) to write his New Essays Concerning Human Understanding and Victor Cousin analyzed all four books in his 1834 Elements of Psychology. - Summary by Craig Campbell (14 hr 39 min)

Chapters

Chapter 1 Of Ideas in general, and their Original 40:00 Read by Pamela Nagami
Chapters 2-7 Of Simple Ideas, Of Ideas of one Sense, Of Solidity, Of Simple Ide… 32:58 Read by franklinvios
Chapter 8 Some farther Considerations concerning our Simple Ideas 27:16 Read by Brian C. Rideout
Chapter 9 Of Perception 15:33 Read by garybclayton
Chapter 10 Of Retention 14:32 Read by garybclayton
Chapter 11 Of Discerning, and other Operations of the Mind 18:11 Read by garybclayton
Chapter 12 Of Complex Ideas 8:39 Read by garybclayton
Chapter 13 Of Simple Modes, and first of the Simple Modes of Space 34:05 Read by Patrick Munoz
Chapter 14 Of Duration, and its simple Modes 35:50 Read by Patrick Munoz
Chapter 15 Of Duration and Expansion, considered together 32:54 Read by enz2103
Chapter16 Of Number 11:22 Read by Joseph
Chapter 17 Of Infinity 44:25 Read by Craig Campbell
Chapters 18-19 Of Other Simple Modes, Of the Modes of Thinking 13:38 Read by Larry Wilson
Chapter 20 Of Modes of Pleasure and Pain 13:10 Read by Craig Campbell
Chapter 21 Of Power Part 1 28:21 Read by ChadH94
Chapter 21 Of Power Part 2 46:07 Read by ChadH94
Chapter 21 Of Power Part 3 45:50 Read by ChadH94
Chapter 21 Of Power Part 4 32:03 Read by ChadH94
Chapter 22-Of Mixed Modes 18:58 Read by franklinvios
Chapter 23 Of our complex Ideas of Substances Part 1 27:05 Read by realisticspeakers
Chapter 23 Of our complex Ideas of Substances Part 2 41:34 Read by realisticspeakers
Chapters 24-26 Of Collective Ideas of Substances, Of Relation, Of Cause and Ef… 33:37 Read by enz2103
Chapter 27 Of Identity and Diversity Part 1 33:09 Read by garybclayton
Chapter 27 Of Identity and Diversity Part 2 19:02 Read by garybclayton
Chapter 27 Footnote: Locke discusses the Bishop of Worchester Part 1 42:32 Read by garybclayton
Chapter 27 Footnote: Locke discusses the Bishop of Worchester Part 2 32:30 Read by garybclayton
Chapter 28 Of Moral Relations 30:07 Read by Kathleen Nelson
Chapter 29 Of Clear and Obscure, Distinct and Confused Ideas 24:01 Read by Leon
Chapter 30 Of Real and Fantastical Ideas 9:55 Read by Mayah
Chapter 31 Of adequate and inadequate Ideas 24:33 Read by Ryan Bassette
Chapter 32 Of True and False Ideas 26:24 Read by Ryan Bassette
Chapter 33 Of the Association of Ideas 21:15 Read by ChadH94