Fortuitous Poem by Jorge Luis Borges

Berkeley affirmed the continuous existence of objects,
Insomuch when no individual perceives them, God does.

Hume, with greater logic, denied this existence.

Berkeley affirmed personal identity, “for I myself am not my ideas,
But somewhat else, a thinking, acting principle that perceives.”

Hume, the skeptic, refuted this belief, and made each man “a bundle or collection
Of different perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity.”

Both men affirmed the existence of time:

For Berkeley it is “the succession of ideas in my mind,
Flowing uniformly and participated in by all beings.”

For Hume, it is “a succession of indivisible moments.”


(From A New Refutation of Time)