[19] Those who say that ‟the Sceptics abolish appearances,” or phenomena, seem to me to be unacquainted with the statements of our School. For, as we said above, we do not overthrow the affective sense- impressions ¹ which induce our assent involuntarily; and these impressions are ‟the appearances.” And when we question whether the underlying object is such as it appears, we grant the fact that it appears, and our doubt does not concern the appearance itself but the account given of that appearance,—and that is a different thing from questioning the appearance itself.

[20] For example, honey ² appears to us to be sweet (and this we grant, for we perceive sweetness through the senses), but whether it is also sweet in its essence is for us a matter of doubt, since this is not an appearance but a judgement regarding the appearance, And even if we do actually argue against the appearances, we do not propound such arguments with the intention of abolishing appearances, but by way of pointing out the rashness of the Dogmatists; for if reason is such a trickster as to all but snatch away the appearances from under our very eyes, surely we should view it with suspicion in the case of things non-evident so as not to display rashness by following it. ³