cures all the
concerns of life, and distinguishes that which is real from the
IRREGULAR VISIONS of the fancy.

HYL. I agree to all you have now said, and must own that nothing can
incline me to embrace your opinion more than the advantages I see it is
attended with. I am by nature lazy; and this would be a mighty abridgment
in knowledge. What doubts, what hypotheses, what labyrinths of amusement,
what fields of disputation, what an ocean of false learning, may be
avoided by that single notion of IMMATERIALISM!

PHIL. After all, is there anything farther remaining to be done? You
may remember you promised to embrace that opinion which upon examination
should appear most agreeable to Common Sense and remote from Scepticism.
This, by your own confession, is that which denies Matter, or the
ABSOLUTE existence of corporeal things. Nor is this all; the same
notion has been proved several ways, viewed in different lights, pursued
in its consequences, and all objections against it cleared. Can there be
a greater evidence of its truth? or is it possible it should have all the
marks of a true opinion and yet be false?

HYL. I own myself entirely satisfied for the present in all respects.
But, what security can I have that I shall still continue the same full
assent to your opinion, and that no unthought-of objection or difficulty
will occur hereafter?

PHIL. Pray, Hylas, do you in other cases, when a point is once
evidently proved, withhold your consent on account of objections or
difficulties it may be liable to? Are the difficulties that attend the
doctrine of incommensurable quantities, of the angle of contact, of the
asymptotes to curves, or the like, sufficient to make you hold out
against mathematical demonstration? Or will you disbelieve the Providence
of God, because there may be some particular things which you know not
how to reconcile with it? If there are difficulties ATTENDING
IMMATERIALISM, there are at the same time direct and evident proofs of
it. But for the existence of Matter there is not one proof, and far more
numerous and insurmountable objections lie against it. But where are
those mighty difficulties you insist on? Alas! you know not where or what
they are; something which may possibly occur hereafter. If this be a
sufficient pretence for withholding your full assent, you should never
yield it to any proposition, how free soever from exceptions, how clearly
and solidly soever demonstrated.

HYL.