George Berkeley

Philosophy Irish 1685 – 1753 93 quotes

An empiricist who famously argued for subjective idealism, stating 'Esse est percipi' ('To be is to be perceived').

Quotes by George Berkeley

The true object of sense is the immediate object of perception.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The ideas of sense are stronger, livelier, and more distinct than those of the imagination.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

Whatever we perceive is an idea, and ideas can only exist in a mind.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The mind is a thinking, active principle.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The existence of God is so far from being an inference, that it is a direct perception.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

We are not to think that the ideas of sense are useless, because they are not the originals of things, but only the copies.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The great use of the senses is to inform us of the existence of other minds.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The only things whose existence I deny are those things which philosophers call material substances.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The world is a machine, but it is a machine of God's making.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The proper object of sense is the immediate object of perception.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

All our ideas are either ideas of sense or ideas of imagination.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The existence of a sensible object consists in its being perceived.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The only things that exist are minds and their ideas.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The world is a collection of ideas, and these ideas are produced by God.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

The true end of philosophy is to discover the nature of things, and to apply that knowledge to the improvement of human life.

Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous 1713

He who says there is no God, says that there is no cause of the existence of the world.

Alciphron, or the Minute Philosopher 1732

The greatest part of mankind are more governed by custom than by reason.

Alciphron, or the Minute Philosopher 1732

It is not for us to prescribe to God how he shall govern the world.

Alciphron, or the Minute Philosopher 1732

Esse est percipi.

A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge 1710

All the choir of heaven and furniture of the earth, in a word all those bodies which compose the mighty frame of the world, have not any subsistence without a mind.

A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge 1710