n by
venomous spiders, or that they should seldom feel pain, or have
other personal peculiarities similar to those spoken of above.
It is necessary therefore to suspend the judgment on account of
the differences in men.

THE THIRD TROPE.

While, however, the Dogmatics are conceited enough to think 90
that they should be preferred to other men in the judgement of
things, we know that their claim is absurd, for they themselves
form a part of the disagreement; and if they give themselves
preference in this way in the judgment of phenomena, they beg
the question before they begin the judgment, as they trust the
judgment to themselves. Nevertheless, in order that we should 91
reach the result of the suspension of judgment by limiting
the argument to one man, one who for example they deem to be
wise, let us take up the third Trope. This is the one that is
based upon differences in perception. That the perceptions 92
differ from each other is evident. For example, paintings seem
to have hollows and prominences to the sense of sight, but not
to the sense of touch, and honey to the tongue of some people
appears pleasant, but unpleasant to the eyes; therefore it is
impossible to say whether it is really pleasant or unpleasant.
In regard to myrrh it is the same, for it delights the sense of
smell, but disgusts the sense of taste. Also in regard to 93
euphorbium, since it is harmful to the eyes and harmless to
all the rest of the body, we are not able to say whether it is
really harmless to bodies or not, as far as its own nature is
concerned. Rain-water, too, is useful to the eyes, but it makes
the trachea and the lungs rough, just as oil does, although it
soothes the skin; and the sea-torpedo placed on the extremities
makes them numb, but is harmless when placed on the rest of the
body. Wherefore we cannot say what each of these things is by
nature. It is possible only to say how it appears each time. We 94
could cite more examples than these, but in order not to
spend too long in laying out the plan of this book we shall
simply say the following: Each of the phenomena perceived by us
seems to present itself in many forms, as the apple, smooth,
fragrant, sweet, yellow. Now it is not known whether it has in
reality only those qualities which appear to us, or if it has
only one quality, but appears different on account of the
different constitution of the sense organs, or if it has more