The imagination that is raised in man, or any other creature indued with the faculty of imagining, by words, or other voluntary signs, is that we generally call “understanding”; and is common to man and beast. For a dog by custom will understand the call, or the rating of his master; and so will many other beasts. That understanding which is peculiar to man, is the understanding not only his will, but his conceptions and thoughts, by the sequel and contexture of the names of things into affirmations, negations, and other forms of speech; and of this kind of understanding I shall speak hereafter.
Of the Consequence or Train of Imaginations
By “consequence,” or “train” of thoughts, I understand that succession of one thought to another, which is called, to distinguish it from discourse in words, “mental discourse.”