Common SENSE is a term that has been variously used both by ancient and by modern writers. With some it has been synonymous with public sense; with others it has denoted prudence; in certain instances it has been confounded with some of the powers of taste; and, accordingly, those who commit egregious blunders with regard to decorum, saying and doing what is offensive to their company, and inconsistent with their own character, have been charged with a defect in common sense. Some men are distinguished by an uncommon acuteness in discovering the characters of others; and this talent has been sometimes called common sense, similar to which is that use of the term which makes it to signify that experience and knowledge of life which is acquired by living in society. To this meaning Quintilian refers, when speaking of the advantages of a public education. "Sensum ipsum qui communis dicitur, ubi discet, cum se a congressu, qui non hominibus solum, sed mutis quoque animalibus naturalis est, segregarit?" (Lib. i. cap. 2.)
But the term common sense has in modern times been employed to signify that power of the mind which perceives truth, or commands belief, not by progressive argumentation, but by an instantaneous, instinctive, and irresistible impulse, derived neither from education nor from habit, but from nature, acting independently of our will, whenever its object is presented according to an established law, and therefore called sense; and acting in a similar manner upon all, or at least upon a great majority of mankind, and therefore called common sense. See METAPHYSICS.