ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS

ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS,is where two or more Ideas, constantly and immediately follow or succeed one another in the Mind, so that one shall almost infallibly produce the other; whether there be any natural Relation between them, or not. See IDEA. Where there is a real Affinity or Connection in Ideas, it is the excellency of the Mind, to be able to collect, compare, and range them in Order, in its Enquiries: But where there is none, nor any Cause to be assigned for their accompanying each other, but what is owing to mere Accident or Habit; this unnatural Association becomes a great Imperfection, and is generally speaking, a main Cause of Error, or wrong Deductions in reasoning. See ERROR, etc.



Thus the Idea of Goblins and Sprites, has really no more Affinity with Darkness than with Light, and yet let a foolish Maid inculcate these often on the Mind of a Child, and raise them there together, 'tis possible he shall never be able to separate them again so long as he lives, but Darkness shall ever bring with it those frightful Ideas—Let Custom, from the very Childhood, have joined the Idea of Figure and Shape to the Idea of God, and what Absurdities will that Mind be liable to, about the Deity?Such wrong Combinations of Ideas, Mr. Locke shows, are a great Cause of the irreconcilable Opposition between the different Sects of Philosophy and Religion: For we can’t imagine, that all who hold Tenets different from, and sometimes contradictory to one another, should wilfully and knowingly impose upon themselves, and refuse Truth offered by plain Reason: But some loose and independent Ideas are by Education, Custom, and the constant Din of their Party, so coupled in their Minds, that they always appear there together: These they can no more separate in their Thoughts, than if they were but one Idea, and they operate as if they were so. This gives Sense to Jargon, Demonstration to Absurdities, Consistency to Nonsense, and is the Foundation of the greatest, and almost of all the Errors in the World.

ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS