that represents the thing. Sometimes it appears to give a true account
of it; sometimes it seems to give a garbled account; sometimes it is a
false representative throughout--there is no reality behind it. It is,
then, the _idea_ that is immediately known, and not the _thing_; the
thing is merely _inferred_ to exist.

I do not mean to say that the plain man is conscious of drawing this
conclusion. I only maintain that it seems a natural conclusion to draw
from the facts which he recognizes, and that sometimes he seems to draw
the conclusion half-consciously.

On the other hand, we must all admit that when the plain man is not
thinking about the distinction between ideas and things, but is looking
at some material object before him, is touching it with his fingers and
turning it about to get a good look at it, it never occurs to him that
he is not directly conscious of the thing itself.

He seems to himself to perceive the thing immediately; to perceive it
_as_ it is and _where_ it is; to perceive it as a really extended
thing, out there in space before his body. He does not think of
himself as occupied with mere images, representations of the object.
He may be willing to admit that his mind is in his head, but he cannot
think that what he sees is in his head. Is not the object _there_?
does he not _see_ and _feel_ it? Why doubt such evidence as this? He
who tells him that the external world does not exist seems to be
denying what is immediately given in his experience.

The man who looks at things in this way assumes, of course, that the
external object is known directly, and is not a something merely
inferred to exist from the presence of a representative image. May one