An Inquiry into the Human Mind

The philosopher Thomas Reid (1710 – 1796), the founder of the Scottish School of Common Sense and, was with his contemporary David Hume, played an integral role in the Scottish Enlightenment. 


Reid's classic treatise on phenomenology includes the following chapters: 


Chapter I. Introduction 

I. The importance of the subject, and the means of prosecuting it 

II. The impediments to our knowledge of the mind 

III. The present state of this part of philosophy—of Des Cartes, Nalebranche, and Locke 

IV. Apology for those philosophers 

V. Of Bishop Berkeley—the “Treatise of Human Nature”—and of scepticism 

VII. The system of all these authors is the same and leads to scepticism 

VIII. We ought not to despair of a better 


Chapter II. Of Smelling 

I. The order of proceeding. 

II. The sensation considered abstractly 

III. Sensation and its remembrance natural principles of belief 

IV. Judgment and belief in some cases precede simple apprehension 

V. Two theories of the nature of belief refuted. Conclusions from what hath been said 

VI. Apology for metaphysical absurdities. Sensation without a sentient, a consequence of the theory of ideas. Consequences of this strange opinion 

VII. The conception and belief of a sentient being or mind, is suggested by our constitution. The notion of relations not always got by comparing the related ideas 

VIII. There is a quality or virtue in bodies, which we call their smell. How this is connected in the imagination with the sensation 

IX. That there is a principle in human nature, from which the notion of this, as well as all other natural virtues or causes, is derived 

X. Whether in sensations the mind is active or passive 


Chapter III. Of Tasting 


Chapter IV. Of Hearing 

I. Variety of sounds. Their place and distance learned by custom, without reasoning 

II. Of natural language 


Chapter V. Of Touch 

I. Of heat and cold 

II. Of hardness and softness 

III. Of natural signs 

IV. Of hardness, and other primary qualities 

VI. Of extension 

VII. Of extension 

VIII. Of the existence of a material world 

IX. Of the systems of philosophers concerning the senses 


Chapter VI. Of Seeing 

I. The excellence and dignity of this faculty 

II. Sight discovers almost nothing which the blind may not comprehend. The reason of this 

III. Of the visible appearances of objects 

IV. That colour is a quality of bodies, not a sensation of the mind 

V. First inference from the preceding 

VI. Second. That none of our sensations are resemblances of any of the qualities of bodies 

VII. Of visible figure and extension 

VIII. Some queries concerning visible figure answered 

IX. Of the geometry of visibles 

X. Of the parallel motion of the eyes 

XI. Of our seeing objects erect by inverted images 

XII. The same subject continued 

XIII. Of seeing objects single with two eyes 

XIV. Of the laws of vision in brute animals 

XV. The phenomena of squinting considered hypothetically 

XVI. Facts relating to squinting 

XVII. Of the effect of custom in seeing objects single 

XVIII. Of Dr. Porterfield’s account of single and double vision 

XIX. Of Dr. Briggs's theory, and Sir Isaac Newton's conjecture on this subject 

XX. Of perception in general 

XXI. Of the process of nature in perception 

XXII. Of the signs by which we learn to perceive distance from, the eye 

XXIII. Of the signs used in these acquired perceptions 


Chapter VII. Conclusion