I think on it the less can I comprehend it: in short I find that I know
nothing of it.

PHIL. It seems then you have no idea at all, neither relative nor
positive, of Matter; you know neither what it is in itself, nor what
relation it bears to accidents?

HYL. I acknowledge it.

PHIL. And yet you asserted that you could not conceive how qualities or
accidents should really exist, without conceiving at the same time a
material support of them?

HYL. I did.

PHIL. That is to say, when you conceive the real existence of
qualities, you do withal conceive Something which you cannot conceive?

HYL. It was wrong, I own. But still I fear there is some fallacy or
other. Pray what think you of this? It is just come into my head that the
ground of all our mistake lies in your treating of each quality by
itself. Now, I grant that each quality cannot singly subsist without the
mind. Colour cannot without extension, neither can figure without some
other sensible quality. But, as the several qualities united or blended
together form entire sensible things, nothing hinders why such things may
not be supposed to exist without the mind.

PHIL. Either, Hylas, you are jesting, or have a very bad memory. Though
indeed we went through all the qualities by name one after another, yet
my arguments or rather your concessions, nowhere tended to prove that the