 To answer these questions we must first uncover an important distinction that Malebranche draws between ideas on the one hand and sensations on the other. As we have already discovered, ideas are in God and are cosubstantial with his substance. Sensations of colors, sounds, odors, heat, pleasure, etc., on the other hand, are modifications of finite minds. Another important difference is that ideas are intrinsically representational, whereas sensations are not. The idea of a pyramid, for example, represents an actual pyramid in the sense that it resembles it, but the sensation of pain that one experience’s when, say, accidentally lacerating one’s arm, in no way resembles the wounded tissue. Ideas and sensations, then, are very different kinds of entity, but Malebranche maintains that sense perception combines elements of each.