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See also:COLLIER, See also:ARTHUR (1680-1732) , See also:English philosopher, was See also:born at the rectory of See also:Steeple Langford, See also:Wiltshire; on the 12th of See also:October 1680. He entered at See also:Pembroke See also:College, See also:- OXFORD
- OXFORD, EARLS OF
- OXFORD, EDWARD DE VERE, 17TH EARL
- OXFORD, JOHN DE VERE, 13TH EARL OF (1443-1513)
- OXFORD, PROVISIONS OF
- OXFORD, ROBERT DE VERE, 9TH EARL OF (1362-1392)
- OXFORD, ROBERT HARLEY, 1ST
Oxford, in See also:July 1697, but in October 1698 he and his See also:brother See also:- WILLIAM
- WILLIAM (1143-1214)
- WILLIAM (1227-1256)
- WILLIAM (1J33-1584)
- WILLIAM (A.S. Wilhelm, O. Norse Vilhidlmr; O. H. Ger. Willahelm, Willahalm, M. H. Ger. Willehelm, Willehalm, Mod.Ger. Wilhelm; Du. Willem; O. Fr. Villalme, Mod. Fr. Guillaume; from " will," Goth. vilja, and " helm," Goth. hilms, Old Norse hidlmr, meaning
- WILLIAM (c. 1130-C. 1190)
- WILLIAM, 13TH
William became members of Balliol. His See also:father having died in 1697, it was arranged that the See also:family living of Langford Magna should be given to Arthur as soon as he was old enough. He was presented to the See also:benefice in 1704, and held it till his See also:death. His sermons show no traces of his bold theological speculations, and he seems to have been faithful in the See also:discharge of his See also:duty. He was often in pecuniary difficulties, from which at last he was obliged to See also:free himself by selling the reversion of Langford rectory to Corpus Christi College, Oxford. His philosophical opinions See also:grew out of a diligent study of See also:Descartes and See also:Malebranche. See also:John See also:Norris of Bemerton also strongly influenced him by his See also:Essay on the Ideal See also:World (1701-1704). It is remarkable that Collier makes no reference to See also:Locke, and shows no sign of having any knowledge of his See also:works. As See also:early as 1703 he seems to have become convinced of the non-existence of an See also:external world. In 1712 he wrote two essays, which are still in See also:manuscript, one on substance and See also:accident, and the other called Clavis Philosophica. His See also:chief See also:work appeared in 1713, under the See also:title Clavis Universalis, or a New Inquiry after Truth, being a Demonstration of the Non-Existence or Impossibility of an External World (printed privately, See also:Edinburgh, 1836, and reprinted in Metaphysical Tracts, 1837, edited by Sam. See also:Parr). It was favourably mentioned by See also:Reid, See also:- STEWART, ALEXANDER TURNEY (1803-1876)
- STEWART, BALFOUR (1828-1887)
- STEWART, CHARLES (1778–1869)
- STEWART, DUGALD (1753-1828)
- STEWART, J
- STEWART, JOHN (1749—1822)
- STEWART, JULIUS L
- STEWART, SIR DONALD MARTIN (1824–19o0)
- STEWART, SIR HERBERT (1843—1885)
- STEWART, SIR WILLIAM (c. 1540—c. 1605)
- STEWART, STUART
- STEWART, WILLIAM (c. 1480-c. 1550)
Stewart and others, was frequently referred to by the Leibnitzians, and was translated into See also:German by von Eschenbach in 1756. See also:Berkeley's Principles of Knowledge and Theory of See also:Vision preceded it by three and four years respectively, but there is no See also:evidence that they were known to Collier before the publication of his See also:book.
His views are grounded on two presuppositions:—first, the utter aversion of See also:common sense to any theory of representative See also:perception; second, the See also:opinion which Collier held in common with Berkeley, and See also:Hume afterwards, that the difference between See also:imagination and sense perception is only one of degree. The former is the basis of the negative See also:part of his See also:argument; the latter supplies him with all the See also:positive See also:account he has to give, and that is meagre enough. The Clavis consists of two parts. After explaining that he will use the See also:term " external world " in the sense of See also:absolute, self-existent, See also:independent natter, he attempts in the first part to prove that thevisible world is not,external, by showing—first, that the seeming externality of a visible See also:object is no See also:- PROOF (in M. Eng. preove, proeve, preve, &°c., from O. Fr . prueve, proeve, &c., mod. preuve, Late. Lat. proba, probate, to prove, to test the goodness of anything, probus, good)
proof of real externality, and second, that a visible object, as such, is not external. The See also:image of a centaur seems as much external to the mind as any object of sense; and since the difference between imagination and perception is only one of degree, See also:God could so See also:act upon the mind of a See also:person imagining a centaur, that he would perceive it as vividly as any • object can be seen. Similar illustrations are used to prove the second proposition, that a visible object, as such, is not external. The first part ends with a reply to objections based on the universal consent of men, on the assurance given by See also:touch of the extra existence of the visible world, and on the truth and goodness of God (Descartes), which would be impugned if our senses deceived us. Collier argues naively that if universal consent means the consent of those who have considered the subject, it may be claimed for his view. He thinks with Berkeley that See also:objects of sight are quite distinct from those of touch, and that the one therefore cannot give any assurance of the other; and he asks the Cartesians to consider how far God's truth and goodness are called in question by their denial of the externality of the secondary qualities. The second part of the book is taken up with.a number of metaphysical arguments to prove the impossibility of an external world. The See also:pivot of this part is the logical principle of See also:contradiction. From the See also:hypothesis of an external world a See also:series of contradictions are deduced, such as that the world is both finite and See also:infinite, is movable and immovable, &c.; and finally, See also:Aristotle and various other philosophers are quoted, to show that the external See also:matter they dealt with, as See also:mere potentiality, is just nothing at all. Among other uses and consequences of his See also:treatise, Collier thinks it furnishes an easy refutation of the Romish See also:doctrine of See also:transubstantiation. If there is no external world, the distinction between substance and accidents vanishes, and these become the See also:sole essence of material objects, so that there is no See also:room for any See also:change whilst they remain as before. See also:Sir William See also:- HAMILTON
- HAMILTON (GRAND or ASHUANIPI)
- HAMILTON, ALEXANDER (1757-1804)
- HAMILTON, ANTHONY, or ANTOINE (1646-1720)
- HAMILTON, ELIZABETH (1758–1816)
- HAMILTON, EMMA, LADY (c. 1765-1815)
- HAMILTON, JAMES (1769-1831)
- HAMILTON, JAMES HAMILTON, 1ST DUKE OF (1606-1649)
- HAMILTON, JOHN (c. 1511–1571)
- HAMILTON, MARQUESSES AND DUKES OF
- HAMILTON, PATRICK (1504-1528)
- HAMILTON, ROBERT (1743-1829)
- HAMILTON, SIR WILLIAM
- HAMILTON, SIR WILLIAM (1730-1803)
- HAMILTON, SIR WILLIAM ROWAN (1805-1865)
- HAMILTON, THOMAS (1789-1842)
- HAMILTON, WILLIAM (1704-1754)
- HAMILTON, WILLIAM GERARD (1729-1796)
Hamilton thinks that the logically necessary advance from the old theory of representative perception to See also:idealism was stayed by anxiety to See also:save this See also:miracle of the See also:- CHURCH
- CHURCH (according to most authorities derived from the Gr. Kvpcaxov [&wµa], " the Lord's [house]," and common to many Teutonic, Slavonic and other languages under various forms—Scottish kirk, Ger. Kirche, Swed. kirka, Dan. kirke, Russ. tserkov, Buig. cerk
- CHURCH, FREDERICK EDWIN (1826-1900)
- CHURCH, GEORGE EARL (1835–1910)
- CHURCH, RICHARD WILLIAM (1815–189o)
- CHURCH, SIR RICHARD (1784–1873)
church; and he gives Collier See also:credit for being the first to make the See also:discovery.
His Clavis Universalis is interesting on account of the resemblance between its views and those of Berkeley. Both were moved by their dissatisfaction with the theory of representative perception. Both have the feeling that it is inconsistent with the common sense of mankind, which will insist that the very object perceived is the sole reality. They equally affirm that the so-called representative image is the sole reality, and discard as unthinkable the unperceiving material cause of the philosophers. Of objects of sense, they say, their esse is percipi. But Collier never got beyond a bald assertion of the fact, while Berkeley addressed himself to an explanation of it. The thought of a distinction between See also:direct and indirect perception never dawned upon Collier. To the question how all matter exists in dependence on percipient mind his only reply is, " Just how my reader pleases, provided it be somehow." As cause of our sensations and ground of our belief in externality, he substituted for an unintelligible material substance an equally unintelligible operation of divine See also:power. His book exhibits no traces of a scientific development. The most that can be said about him is that he was an intelligent student of Descartes and Malebranche, and had the ability to apply the results of his See also:reading to the facts of his experience. In See also:philosophy he is a curiosity, and nothing more. His biographer attributes the See also:comparative failure of the Clavis to its inferiority in point of See also:style, but the crudeness of his thought had quite as much to do with his failure to gain a See also:hearing. Hamilton (Discussions, p. 197) allows greater sagacity to Collier than to Berkeley, on the ground that he did not vainly See also:attempt to enlist men's natural belief against the hypothetical See also:realism of the philosophers. But Collier did so as far as his See also:light enabled him. He appealed to the popular conviction that the proper object of sense is the sole reality, although he despaired of getting men to give up their belief in its externality, and asserted that nothing but See also:prejudice prevented them from doing so; and there is little doubt that, if it had ever occurred to him, as it did to Berkeley, to explain the See also:genesis of the notion of externality, he would have been more hopeful of commending his theory to the popular mind.
In See also:theology Collier was an adherent of the High Church party, though his views were by no means orthodox. In the Jacobite Mist's See also:Journal he attacked See also:Bishop See also:Hoadly's See also:defence of sincere errors. His views on the problems of Arianism, and his attempt to reconcile it with orthodox theology, are contained in A Specimen of True Philosophy (1730, reprinted in Metaphysical Tracts, 1837) and Logology, or a Treatise on the See also:Logos in Seven Sermons on John i. I, 2, 3, j4 (1732, analysed in Metaph. Tracts). These may be compared with Berkeley's Siris.
See Robt. See also:Benson, See also:Memoirs of the See also:Life and Writings of Arthur Collier (1837); Tennemann, See also:History of Philosophy; Hamilton, Discussions; A. C. See also:Fraser, edition of Berkeley's Works; G. See also:Lyon, " See also:tin Idealiste anglais au XVIII. siecle," in Rev. philos. (1880), x. 375.
End of Article: COLLIER, ARTHUR (1680-1732)
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