Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 1 - Institutes of Metaphysic (1875 ed.).djvu/433

PROPOSITION I.

WHAT IGNORANCE IS.

Ignorance is an intellectual defect, imperfection, privation, or shortcoming.

DEMONSTRATION.

The deprivation of anything whose possession is consistent with the nature of the Being which wants it, is a defect. But ignorance is a deprivation of something which is consistent with the nature of intelligence: it is a deprivation of knowledge. Therefore ignorance is an intellectual defect, imperfection, privation, or shortcoming.

OBSERVATIONS AND EXPLANATIONS.

Why this proposition is introduced.1. The demonstration, and even the enunciation, of so obvious a truism may appear superfluous. It is introduced, however, in order that the doctrine of ignorance may be cleared from the very beginning,