External objects are seen, and felt, and become present to the mind; that is, they acquire such a relation to a connected heap of perceptions, as to influence them very considerably in augmenting their number by present reflections and passions, and in storing the memory with ideas.

The same continued and uninterrupted Being may, therefore, be sometimes present to the mind, and sometimes absent from it, without any real or essential change in the Being itself.

An interrupted appearance to the senses implies not necessarily an interruption in the existence.

The supposition of the continued existence of sensible objects or perceptions involves no contradiction.

We may easily indulge our inclination to that supposition.