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Reproduced by DUOPAGE process 
 in the United States of America 
 
 MICRO PHOTO INC. 
 
 Cleveland 12, Ohio 
 
THE CONDUCT 
 
 OP 
 
 THE UNDERSTANDING 
 
 BT 
 
 JOHN LOCKE 
 
 WITH INTRODUCTION AND N0T18 
 
 BT 
 
 J. A. ST. JOHN 
 
 NEW YORK : 
 
 JOHN B. ALDEN, PUBLISHEa 
 
•3|N,UU:. 
 

 NOTE BY THE EDITOR. 
 
 [Locke has seldom obtained the credit due to him for 
 the following brief treatise. It may in fact be said to 
 be comparatively little known ; for though sometimes 
 printed separately, and at other times added almost bv 
 way of Appendix to the Essay on the Human Under- 
 standing, the opinion of the earliest editor of his works 
 that it is little more than a series of ** sudden views, in- 
 tended to be afterwards revised and further looked into," 
 appears to have been pretty generally adopted Never- 
 theless the work is in every respect deserving of very 
 high praise. The author when he wrote it had com- 
 pleted his meditations on all the important topics therein 
 glanced at. He had learned, by the reception his own 
 philosophy had met with, how hard it is to give cur- 
 rency to new truths, which are commonly suspected for 
 counterfeits, until long use and familiarity have recon- 
 ciled mankind to their .-ippearance. Controversialists 
 had assaulted him ; his doctrines had been misunder- 
 stood, his motives misinterpreted ; his indignation 
 against ignorance and error, against prejudice and 
 calumny, against the obstinacy which is blind to the 
 beauties of truth, and the timidity, which though per- 
 ceiving refuses to acknowledge them, was therefore 
 wound up to a high pitch, and brought some relief for 
 his mind in exposing the contemptible weakness and the 
 perverse selfishness by which philosophy like religion is 
 thwarted in its benevolent endeavors to enlighten and 
 fortify the human mind. This is the object of the Con- 
 duct of the Understanding. It is an apology for phil- 
 osophy, full of the highest wisdom, the most exquisite 
 good sense, and is rendered doubly piquant by a tone of 
 resentment, mingled with and modifying his character- 
 istic yearning to be of service to his fellow-creatures. 
 Though written later in the order of time, it should now 
 be regarded as an introduction to the greater essay, 
 being written in a style more sprightly, popular, and 
 easy, abounding with figures and brilliant sallies of the 
 
 y^ 820 
 
6 NOTE BY THE EDITOR. 
 
 fancy, and therefore calculated to operate as a recom- 
 raendation to the more formidable speculations that sue- 
 ceed it. How it is likely to be estimated or received by 
 readers of the present day it is difficult to foresee. I 
 never remember to have met with the slightest notice of 
 it by any of my contemporaries. The work is evidently 
 little read, but no one who is at the trouble to become 
 acquainted with its merits will acknowledge that it de- 
 serves to be neglected. Some few repetitions there are, 
 together with certain roughnesses, and slight inaccuracies 
 .of style, which may perhaps be owing to its posthumous 
 publication. Perhaps, however, the author, had he 
 lived, would not have been very solicitous to remove 
 these trifling blemishes, since he indulged in the affecta- 
 tion, scarcely pardonable in one so great and wise, of 
 looking with indifference on the niceties of language 
 and composition. But if there be found here and there 
 some few small imperfections, they are scarcely visible 
 amid the crowd of beauties which press upon the sight. 
 From first to last the chain of reasoning proceeds in one 
 almost unbroken flow. It more resembles an oration in 
 its ornaments and magnificence than a philosophical 
 treatise. The language is quick, full, vehement. Argu- 
 ment does not here disdain the alliance of wit, or irony, 
 or satire. Every weapon wh?ljh can pierce ignorance, or 
 beat down the defences of fraud, is seized on and wielded 
 with surprising vigor and adroitness. The reader, ex- 
 pecting mere instruction, is surprised at finding the 
 most animate entertainment, so that T much doubt 
 whether any one who can relish speculation at all, or 
 experience an interest in anything but fiction, ever com- 
 menced the Conduct of the Understanding for the first 
 time without pressing forward to its conclusion with un- 
 satisfied appetite and unabated delight. To sum up its 
 merits we may briefly say, that it is not unworthy to 
 usher the mind into the great and magnificent building 
 of which it may be regarded as the vestibule. ] 
 
OP THE 
 
 CONDUCT OF THE UNDERSTANDING. 
 
 "Quid tarn tcmprarium tamauo iLdlgnum sapientis gravitate atque 
 oonstiintifl, <^iiain aut fttlHiira sentlro. atit quod non satis oxploratd 
 perceptuni sit. et cogQituin, sine ulla duhftatione defendere?" 
 
 Ciu. de Xatu7-a Veonivi, lib. !• 
 
 1. Introduction. — The l;ist resort jv man lias recourse 
 to, ill tlie conduct of himself, is liia understanding; for 
 thoiigli we distinguish the faculties of the mind, and 
 give the supreme command to tlie will, as to an agent, 
 ^vet the truth is, the man, who is the agent, determines 
 himself to this or that voluntary action, upon some 
 precedent knowledge, or appearance of knowledge, in 
 the understanding.* No man ever sets himself about 
 anything but upon some view or otlier, which serves him 
 for a reason for what he does : and whatsoever faculties 
 he employs, the utiderstanding, with such light as it 
 has, well or ill informed, constantly le.ads ; and by that 
 light, true or false, all his operative powers are directed. 
 The will itself, how absolute and uncontrollable soever 
 it may be tliought, never fails in its obedience to the 
 dictates of the understanding. Temples have their 
 sacred images, and we see what influence they have 
 always had over a great part of mankind. But in truth 
 the ideas and images in men's minds are the invisible 
 powers that constaritly govern them, and to these they 
 all universally pay a ready submission. It is therefore 
 of the highest concernment that great care should be 
 taken of the understanding, to conduct it right in the 
 search of knowledge, and in the judgments it makes. 
 
 The logic now in use has so long possessed the chair 
 RB the only art taught in the iichools, for the direction 
 of the mind in the study of the arts and sciences, that 
 it would perhaps be thought an affectation of novelty to 
 Kuspect that rules that have served the learned world 
 
 • The question barely glanced at In this place Is fully discussed 
 In the Essay on the Human Understanding. Book IL ch. ii> 1 3>. 
 
8 TnS UNDER8TAND1N0. 
 
 t})e8e two or three thousand yeara, and wltich, without 
 any cotuplaiat of defects, the learned have rested in, are 
 not sufficient to guide t)ie understanding.* And I 
 should not doubt but tbis attempt would be censured as 
 vanity or presuinptiou, did not tlje great Lord Verulam's 
 authority justify it; who, not servilely tbinking learn* 
 ing could not be advanced beyond what it was, because 
 for many ages it bad not been, did not rest in the lazy 
 approbation and appliiusu of what was, because it was, 
 but^ enlarged his mind to what it might be. In his pref- 
 ace to his Novum Orgunum, concerning logic, he pro- 
 nounces thus : "Qui suuimas diulecticaj partes tribuer- 
 uiit, atquo inde iidissinia scientiis prtusidia comparari 
 putilrunt verissimc ct optimu vidcrunt intellectum 
 nuntanum, sibi perniissum, merito suspectuin esse de'* 
 bei-c. Veruin intirniior omnind est malo medicina; neo 
 ipsa mail expers. Siquidem dialectica, quaj receptaest, 
 licet :id civilia et artes, quic in sermone et opinione 
 pusita) sunt, rectissime adhibeatur ; naturae tamen sub- 
 tilitatem longo intervallo non attiiigit, et prensandoquod 
 non capit, ad errores potius stabiliendos et quasi figen- 
 do3, quam ad viain veritati aperieiulam valuit." 
 
 "They,'' says he, " who attributed so mueh to logic, per- 
 ceived very well and truly that it was not safe to trust 
 the understanding to itself 'Without the guard of any 
 rules. But the remedy reached not the evil, but became 
 a part of it, for the logic which took place, though it 
 might do well enough in civil affairs and the arts, 
 which consisted" in talk and opinion, yet comes very 
 far short of subtlety in the real performances of 
 nature; and, catching at what it cannot reach, has 
 served to confirm and establish errors rather than to 
 open a way to trii*:h." And therefore a little after he 
 says, "That it is absolutely necessary that a better and 
 perfecter use and employment of the mind and under- 
 standing should be introduced." " Necessari6 requiritur 
 ut melior et perfectior mentis et intellectus humani usus 
 et adoperatio introducatur." 
 
 • Though It had grown fashlonablo In Locke's age to attack the 
 aucieut Hystoms of IdkIc, it will not, I imtitfiue, bo BUpposed that 
 tbo pbilosopbor biuiHolf iutendod to undorvulue tbo scionce, though 
 he points out the injporfections and abuHes of it. However, no 
 uppours in some ca.soa to have confounded the clear, systematio 
 reasonings of the ancients with the subtleties prevalent among the 
 schoolmen, and to have valued uvuu the latter at much lesu thaa 
 they were worth. 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 9 
 
 2. Parts. — There is, it is visible, great variety in 
 mer.'s understandings, and their natural constitutions 
 put 80 wide a difference between some men in this re- 
 spect, that art and industry would never bo able to 
 master, and their very natures seem to want a founda- 
 tioti to raise on it that which other men easily attain 
 unto.* Amongst men of equal education there is great 
 inequality of parts. And the woods of America, as well 
 as the schools of Athens, produce men of several abilities 
 in the same kind. Though this be so, yet I imagine 
 most men come very short of what they might attain 
 unto, in their several degrees, by a neglect of their 
 understandings.f A few rules of logic are thought 
 sufficient in this case for those who pretend to the 
 highest improvement, whereas I think there are a great 
 many natural defects in the understanding capable of 
 amendment, which are overlooked and wholly neglected. 
 And it is easy to perceive that men are guilty of a great 
 many faults in the exercise and improvement of this 
 faculty of the mind, which hinder them in their prog- 
 ress, and keep them in ignorance and error all theit 
 lives. Some of them I shall take notice of, and en« 
 deavor to point out proper remedies for, in the following 
 discourse. 
 
 3, Reasoning — Besides the want of determined ideas, 
 and of sagacity and exercise in finding out and laying 
 in order intermediate ideas, there are three miscarriages 
 that men are guilty of, in reference to their reason, where- 
 by this faculty is hindered in them from that service ifc 
 might do and was designed for. And he that refiects 
 upon the actions and discourses of mankind will find their 
 
 • This view of human nature being that which common flense 
 and Gxporience sutfgosta, has been that of most philosophers from 
 the (lays of Horaor until now. But Holvetius, who dosirod rather 
 to advance a now and startling theory than Xc ostaldish truth, con- 
 tends for the absolute equality of natural powers amoiiK men, and 
 derives all the dllTorencoa observable in them from the aoeldonta o( 
 their education. In support of this hypothesis ho exhibits much 
 Ingenuity, and brinsrs forward many valuable aud little-known 
 faeta, servlnK at least to show that discipline and instruction, 
 thoueh Incanablo of impartinK int<>llect. create, nevertheless, most 
 of those distinctions existiuK among mankind. So far, however, he 
 harl, as the reader will perceive, been anticipated by Locke, and 
 Indeed long before him, by Quinctllian. 
 
 t A French writer has put this thouKht In a more eplsrammatlo 
 form : " II n'y a personne pout 6tro qui a fait tout ce nu'll nouvalt" 
 Yet Tonneraann observes that "Boerates formed tne deslcra of 
 carrylDR human natnre In wisdom and vlrtne as far as it could go, 
 and be carried It" But it this was bo la 009 oasei the experiment 
 bas seldom boea repeated* 
 
10 TBE UNVJSRSTANDJNO. 
 
 defects in this kiud very frequent and very observable. 
 
 1. The first is of those who seldom reason at all, but 
 do and think according to the example of others, whether 
 parents, neighbors, ministers, or who else they are 
 pleased to make choice of to have an implicit faith in, for 
 the saving of themselves the pains and trouble of think- 
 ing and examining for themselves.* 
 
 2. The second is uf those who put passion in the place 
 of reason, and being resolved that shall govern their 
 actions and arguments, neither UKe their own, nor barken 
 to other people's reason, any further than it suits their 
 humOr, interest or party ; and these one may observe com- 
 monly content themselves with words which have no dis- 
 tinct ideas to them, though in other matters, that they 
 com'o with an unbiassed indifferency to, they want not 
 abilities to talk and hear reason, where they have no 
 secret inclination that hinders them from being tractable 
 to it. 
 
 3. The third sort is of those who readily and sincerely 
 follow reason, but for want of having that whicli one may 
 call large, sound, roundabout sense, have not a full view 
 of all that relates to the question, and may be of moment 
 to decide it. We are all shortsighted, and very often see 
 but one side of a matter; our views are not extended to 
 all that has a connection wilUit.t From this defect I 
 think no man is free. We see but in part, and we l:now 
 but in part, and therefore it is no wonder we conclude 
 not right from our partial views. This might instruct 
 the proudest esteemer of his own parts, how useful it is 
 to talk and consult with others, even such as come short 
 of him in capacity, quickness, and penetration ; for since 
 no one sees all, and we generally have different pros- 
 pects of the same thing aeconling to our different, as I 
 may say, positions to it, it is not incongruous to think, 
 
 * Tho [Hjot Ilosiml huH soiuowheio ilivldtMl luon into tbroo olassos. 
 distinpuished from ouch other by tho qualitios of tho undorHtand- 
 lug: the llrst ho .says ('((UMiMts uf thoso who are uhh) to tllscover 
 truth for thoirisolvos; tho Hccidid, of Huch as though thoy t-unnot 
 niiiko tho discovory by tholrown stron^th, are yot willliiu to roirolvo 
 tho truth disolosod to thoiu hy othors; hut tho third cliiss, whoouu 
 noitluM- disi'ovor it thoiasolvcH nor will roooivo it whou dist'ov- 
 eiod by otlu^'s, ho ovorwiii^liiis with scorn as ttio droya of tho 
 Hpocios. Pliiti) lil{owls(t, in his roptiliiif, nialtos a similar divisloa 
 of mankind, Imt with aviowto pulitics, c juforriuK on tho (Irsttho 
 riyht to rulo, on the socond tho itrivilone of boarlnjj arms, while to 
 tho third ho only yrants tho liard lot of tolling for tim former two. 
 Kimilar notionH, moro literally iutorjirotod, lod lu India to the eys- 
 tom of castos- 
 
 t " For now wo Hoo tUrou(;h a Klass darkly, but tuou face to face." 
 
or rnt! conduct or \\ 
 
 iior boiicalli any man to try, whether another may not 
 liave notions of tilings which have escapeil him, and 
 winch liis reason would maUo use of if they came into 
 Ilia mind. The faculty of reasoning seldom or never 
 deceives those who trust to it; its consequences, from 
 what it bnilds on, .ire evident and certain; but that 
 which it oftenest, if not only, misleads us in is, that the 
 principles from which we conclude the grounds upon 
 which we bottom our reasoning, are but apart; some- 
 Uiing is left out, which should go into the reckoning, 
 to make it just and exact. Here we may imagine a 
 vast and almost infinite advantage that angels and 
 separate spirits may have over us, who in their several 
 degrees of elevation above us may be endowed with 
 more comprehensive faculties; and some of them per- 
 haps, having perfect and exact views of all tinite beings 
 that come under their consideration, can, as it were in 
 the twinkling of an eye, collect together all their scat- 
 tered and almost boundless relations. A mind so fur- 
 nished, wliat reason has it to acquiesce in the certainty 
 of its conclusions ! ♦ 
 
 • The KTms of this opinion, which is purely Platonic, may be found 
 dovelopcd to R certain point in several parts of the Paradise- Lost. 
 Philosophical In the strictest sonse of the word It unquestionably 
 is. fortnouRh incapable of proof.lt fliiws almost necessarily from 
 the noblest theory of the universe, and view of the works of God. 
 The readers of Milton, who reflect on what they read, cannot but 
 bo filled with wonder at his conception of those superior inteili- 
 
 f;ence8which, eucirclinK the throne of the Divinity, are more deeply 
 mpresmated by his rower, more brilliantly illuminated by the 
 briKhtness of his wisdom. Raphael, discoursiuK with Adam, lifts 
 up for a moment R part of the curtain which conceals from nsthe 
 Rntrelic nature, and at the same time teaches that the principle of 
 life and the power of intellect develop themselves more and more 
 In nn Rscondlnc scale, from the huml)lest orcanized sentient belnif 
 to the hiRhest spiritual order of creation. Though there is here no 
 space to accumulate all the passages in which allusions to this 
 hypothesis are found, wo cannot refuse ourselves the pleasure o! 
 Introducing the following most magniflcent fragment of pbiloso- 
 phjr:- 
 
 One Almighty is, from whom 
 
 All things pro<'eod, and up to him return. 
 
 If not depraved from good, created all 
 
 Bnch to perfection, one llrst matter all. 
 
 Indued with various forms, various degrees 
 
 Of substance, and in things that live, of life : 
 
 But more refined, more spirituous, and pure. 
 
 As nearer to him placed or nearer tending 
 
 Each in their several active spheres assigned, 
 
 Till bo<ly up to spirit work, in l)ound8 
 
 Proportioned to each kind. 80 from the root 
 
 Hnrtnga lighter the green stnlk, from thence the leaves 
 
 More airy, lost the bright consummate flower 
 
 Spirits odorous breathes; flowers and their fruit 
 
 Man's nourishment, by graduated scale sablimed 
 
 To vltAl spirits aspire, to animal, 
 
12 THE UNDEBSTANMlfO, 
 
 In this we may see the reason why some men of study 
 and thought, that reason riglit and are lovers of truth, 
 do make no great advances in their discoveries of it. 
 Error and truth are uncertainly blended in their minds ; 
 their decisions are lame and defective, and they are very 
 often mistaken in their judgments : the reason whereof 
 is, they converse witli but one sort of men, they read but 
 one sort of books, tliey will not come in the hearing but 
 of one sort of notions ; the truth is, they canton out to 
 themselves a little Goshen in the intellectual world 
 wh^re light shines, and as they conclude, day blesses 
 them ; but the rest of that vast expansum they give up 
 to night and darkness, and so avoid coming near it. 
 They have a pretty traffic with known correspondents, in 
 some little creek ; within that they confine themselves, 
 and are dexterous managers enough of the wares and 
 products of that corner with which they content them- 
 selves, but will not venture out into the great ocean of 
 knowledge, to survey the riches that nature hath stored 
 other parts with, no less genuine, no less solid, no less 
 useful than what has fallen to their lot, in the admired 
 plenty and sufficiency uf their own little spot, which to 
 them contains whatsoever is good in the universe.* 
 Those who thus live mewed up within their own con- 
 tracted territories, and will not look abroad beyond the 
 boundaries that chance, conceit, or laziness has set to 
 their inquiries, but live separate from the notions, dis- 
 courses, and attainments of the rest of mankind, may 
 not amiss be represented by the inhabitants of the 
 Marian islands, who, being separated by a large tract of 
 sea from all communion with the habitable parts of the 
 
 To intellectHal. jdvo both life and sonse. 
 Fancy and undorfitanding, whence the soul 
 ll<'iim)n rccoivcts. and reason in her beina, 
 Discursive, or Intuitive; discourKe 
 Is oftest yours, the latter most is ours, 
 DifTcrinij l)ut in ile>;ree, of kinil the same." 
 The use which r( me made of this notion Is well known, and It 
 will therefore be bumcient to allude to it. 
 
 * In the above remarks is contained the whole philosophy of 
 sectarianism, whether In reiijjion or the higher parts of learning. 
 Coidd men divest themselves of the narrowness of mind here de- 
 scriljcd, a more liberal and generous spirit of nhllosophizing might 
 be introduced, capahle of overcoming not only the prejudices of sect, 
 but also till isf of nation and race, more dilufult still topxtlrnate. 
 By these latter chiefly, the progress of I.ocke's philosophy has been 
 olistructcd on tlu< continent, if not within the limits of onr own 
 Island; for perliaps we may without injustice suspect certain 
 Bfotch metaphysicians of being actuated by somesuca /eolinKS In 
 their treatment of his system. 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 13 
 
 earth, thought themselves the oi\ly people of the world.* 
 And though the straitness of the conveniences of life 
 amongst thorn hud never readied so far as to the use of 
 fire, till the Spaniards, not many years since, in their 
 voyages from Acapulco to Manilla, brought it amongst 
 them ; yet, in the want and ignorance of almost all 
 things, they looked upon themselves, even after that the 
 Spaniards had brought amongst them the notice of 
 variety of nations, abounding in sciences, arts, and con- 
 veniences of life, of which they knew nothing ; they 
 looked upon themselves, I say, as the happiest and 
 wisest people of the universe, liut for .all that, no- 
 body, I think, will imagine them deep naturalists or 
 solid metaphysicians ; nobody will deem the quickest- 
 sighted amongst them to have very enlarged views 
 in ethics or politics; nor can anyone allow the most 
 capable amongst them to be advanced so far in his 
 understanding as to have any other knowledge but of 
 the few little things of his and the neighboring islands 
 within his commerce; but far enough from that compre- 
 hensive enlargement of mind which adorns a soul de- 
 voted to truth, assisted with letters, and a free genera- 
 tion of the several views and sentiments of thinking 
 men of all sides. Let not men, therefore, that would 
 have a sight of what every one pretends to be desirous 
 to have a sight of, truth in its full extent, narrow and 
 
 • Wo have hero ono example, and many others will hereafter 
 occur, of tho adv.-intaco wliirh the pliilosnphor derived from his 
 familiarity with books of voynpes and travels. He rend with 
 method, but ponflned his rendinc to no particular department of 
 literature: thouRh amonc his favorite works were tno«e which 
 
 fiaint the manners of nations savaKO or but slichtly civilized. By 
 hese means he had penetrated into the causes whi<'h impel man 
 from ono state of society into another; I mean the proximate 
 causes, for the remote original cause lies as far beyond the ranfire 
 of human contemplation, as that which impels tho individual from 
 Infancy to boyhood, from youth to ape. In tho above passnKO 
 L/ocko alludes to an anocdoto often repeated, viz., that the natives 
 of the Marian Islands when first they saw lire, supposed it to 
 bo some new kind of animal, and approached to stroke it with 
 their band.s. When the flames burnt their flncers they started 
 back. »i.nd exclaimed that the creature had bitten them. Tho 
 uat'ves of the Amlaman Islamls, almost within sicht of our Indian 
 possessions In the Bay of BouRab were until very lately iRiiorant 
 of tho use of fire. See a very curious account of them In the Asiatlo 
 Researches, vol. Iv. n. 4ni et seq. The natives of Norway, though 
 from time Immemorial familiar with the uso of fire. In one Instance 
 vfe are told Imagined that it jnvw on trees. "Tho poor Nor- 
 woflrian." says Bishop Patrick, ' whom stories tell of, was afraid to 
 totich roses when he first saw them, for fear they should burn bin 
 flnirers. He much wontlerod to see that trees (as ho thouarhtl 
 Bhoald put forth flames and blosMoms of fire : l)efore which he held 
 up his hand to warm himself, not dariOR to approach any nearer." 
 (Advice to a Friend, p. ss. i 
 
14 THE UNDEHSTANDINO. 
 
 blind their own proBpect. Let not men think there is 
 no truth but in the sciences that they study, or books 
 that they read. To prejudge other men's notions, be- 
 fore we have looked into them, is not to show their dark- 
 ness, but to put out our own eyes. " Try all things, 
 hold fast that which is good," is a divine rule, coming 
 from the Father of light and truth, and it is hard to 
 know what other way men can come at truth, to lay 
 hold of it, if they do not dig and search for it as for gold 
 and hid treasure ; but he that does so must have much 
 earth and rubbish before he gets the pure metal ; sand 
 and pebbles and dross usually lie blended with it, but 
 the gold is nevertheless gold, and will enrich the man 
 that employs his pains to seek and separate it. Neither 
 is there any danger he should be deceived by the mix- 
 ture. Every man carries about him a touchstone, 
 if he will make use of it, to distinguish substantial gold 
 from superficial glitterings, truth from appearances. 
 And, indeed, the use and benefit of this touchstone, 
 which is natural reason, is spoiled and lost only by 
 assuming prejudices, overweening presumption, and 
 narrowing our minds. The want of exercising it in 
 the full extent of things intelligible, is that which 
 weakens and extinguishes this noble faculty in us. 
 Trace it and see whether it btf not so. The day-laborer 
 in a country villago has commonly but a small pittance 
 of knowledge, because his ideas and notions have been 
 confined to the narrow bounds of a poor conversation 
 and employment; the low mechanic of a country town 
 does somewliat outdo him ; porters and cobblers of great 
 cities surpass them. A country gentleman who, leaving 
 Latin and learning in the university, reuioves thence to 
 his mansionhouse, and associates with neighbors of the 
 same t^train, who relish nothing but hunting aiid a 
 bottle ; with those alone he spends his time, with those 
 alone he converses, and can away with no company 
 whose discourse goes beyond what claret and dissolute- 
 ness inspire.* Such a patriot, formed in this happy 
 way of improvement, cannot fail, as we see, to give 
 
 *OwiuK partly perhaps to the offoct of Locke's owu works, thl« 
 repulsive picture f)f country Keutltniieu is nolonKcrcniioit. at loast 
 to the same oxtout as formerly. Education is uow lludiiiy its way 
 amonsr all classes of the community. hi«h and low; though the arts 
 and selencofi most popularly Mtudiod are not precisely thobe which 
 a philosopher would apprc>ve. 
 
THE CONDUCT OF 15 
 
 notable decisions upon the bencli at quarter-sessions, 
 and eminent proofs of his skill in politics, when the 
 strength of his purse and party have advanced him to a 
 more conspicuous station. To such a one, truly, an 
 ordinary coffee-house gleaner of the city is an arrant 
 statesman, and as much superior to as a man conversant 
 about Whitehall and the court is to an ordinary shop- 
 keeper. To carry this a little further: here is one 
 muffled up in the zeal and infallibility of his own sect, 
 and will not touch a book or enter into debate with a 
 person that will question any of those thitigs which to 
 him are sacred. Another surveys our differences in 
 religion with an equitable and fair indifference, and so 
 finds, probably, that none of them are in everything un- 
 exceptionable. These divisions and systems were made 
 by men, and carry the mark of fallible on them ; and in 
 those whom he differs from, and till he opened his eyes 
 had a general prejudice against, he meets with more to 
 be said for a great many things than before he was aware 
 of, or could have imagined. Which of these two now is 
 most likely to judge right in our religious controversies 
 and to be most stored with truth, the mark all pretend 
 to aim at ? All these men that I have instanced in, 
 thus unequally furnished with truth and advanced in 
 knowledge, I suppose, of equal natural parts; all the 
 odds between them lias been the different scope that has 
 been given to their understandings to range in, for the 
 gathering up of information and furnishing their heads 
 with ideas and notions and observations, whereon to em- 
 ploy their mind at)d form their understandings.* 
 
 It will possibly be objected, " who is suflficient for all 
 this ? " I answer, more than can be imagined. Every 
 one knows what his proper business is, and what, accord- 
 ing to the character he makes of himself, the world may 
 justly expect of him ; and to answer that, he will find 
 lie will have time and opportunity enough to furnish 
 liimself, if he will not deprive himself by a narrowness 
 of spirit of those helps that are at hand. I do not say 
 to be a good geographer, that a man should visit every 
 mountain, river, promontory, and creek upon the face of 
 
 •It should here be observed thftt Ijocke's conception of ©dncatlon 
 differed verv materially from that which flreuemlly prevails. Ho 
 understood by It rather the training and diwlpllnlne of the mind 
 intoffood hnbltM than the mei-e ttudltlou of knowledge; on which 
 point be offreed enUrelv with the ancients. 
 
16 THE UNDERSTANDING. 
 
 the earth, view the buildings and survey the land eTery^ 
 where, as if he were going to make a purchase; but yet 
 every one must allow that he shall know a country 
 better that makes often sallies into it and traverses up 
 and down, than he that like a milMiorse goes still round 
 in the same track, or keeps within the narrow bounds of 
 a tield or two that delight him. He that will inauire 
 out of the best books in every science, and inform him- 
 self of the most material authors of the several sects of 
 philosophy and religion, will not find it an infinite work 
 to acquaint himself with the sentiments of mankind con> 
 cerning the most weighty and comprehensive subjects.* 
 Let him exercise the freedom of his reason and under- 
 standing in such a latitude as this, and his mind will be 
 strengthened, his capacity enlarged, his faculties im- 
 proved; and the light which the remote and scattered 
 parts of truth will give to one another will so assist his 
 judgment, that he will seldom be widely out, or miss 
 giving proof of a clear head and a comprehensive kjiowl- 
 edge, Atleast, this is the only way I know to give 
 the understanding its due improvement to the full ex- 
 tent of its capacity, and to distinguish the two most 
 different things I know in the world, a logical chicaner 
 from a man of reason. Only, he that would thus give 
 the mind its flight, and send alaroad his inquiries into 
 all parts after truth, must be sure to settle in his head 
 determined ideas of all that he employs his thoughts 
 about, and never fail to judge himself, and judge un- 
 biassedly, of all that he receives from others, either in 
 
 •To aid the reader in the aceomplishnieutofwhut he here rocom- 
 mouds, Loo lie has himsolt drawu u|t a list of the works a Koutlemau 
 shuuld study, which though inipt'ifcrt evcii with rofoieiicH to his 
 owa times, aud uow o( uecessity imich iimio .so, may still bo con- 
 sulted with advantaRO. Luid Bat;oa has likewiso coude.s^'ouded to 
 direct the stui'.ents of philosophy aud politics iu their readiuc. and 
 euumeratos many " Helps to the lutel'ectual Powers." The works 
 he recounneuds are not now likely to he road, for which reason I do 
 not uaaio them ; but his description of the man who profits most by 
 s.uily, I shall introduce- "Certain it is, whether it be bt>lieved or 
 not, that as the most excellent of metals, gold, is of all others the 
 most pliant and most ondurint; tr> Im wrou^lit, so of all livine and 
 breathing substances, the perfectest man is the most suscentiblo of 
 help, improvement, impression, and alteration: and uoi only in his 
 body, but iu his mind aud spirit: aud there again, not only in his 
 appetite aud afToction, but in his wit and reason." 1 Works, vol. v. p. 
 329. et so(i.) But on the subjuct of this section, Mili'-^u's " Tiactato 
 on Eilucation " may be regarded as the best guide to which we could 
 refer, the noblest grounds of lit*.wary taste aud knowledge being 
 there pointed out, and enlarged ui>on in a manner nowhere olse 
 emialled. Another work worthy of praise is the AbbtS Floury's 
 "Cboix des Etudes," which Oibbou had the euudor to commend, 
 aud the wisidooi to study. 
 
TUE CONDUCT OF 17 
 
 their writings or discourses. Reverence or prejudice 
 must not be suffered to give beauty or deformity to any 
 of their opinions. 
 
 4. 0/ Practice and Habits, — We are born with 
 faculties and powers capable almost of anything, such at 
 least as would carry us further tlian can easily be 
 imagined; but it is only the exercise of those powers 
 which give us ability and skill in anything, that leads 
 us towards perfection. 
 
 A middle-aged ploughman will scarce ever bo brought 
 to the carriage and language of a gentleman, though his 
 body be as well-proportioned, and his joints as supple, 
 and his natural parts not any way inferior. The legs of 
 a dancing-master and the fingers of a musician fall as it 
 were naturally, without thought or pains, into regular 
 and admirable motions. Bid them change their parts, 
 and they will in vain endeavor to produce like motions 
 in the members not used to them, and it will require 
 length of time and long practice to attain but some de- 
 grees of a like ability. What incredible and astonishing 
 actions do we fin(^ rope-dancers and tumblers bring their 
 bodies to I Not but that sundry in almost all manual 
 arts are as wonderful ; but I name those which the world 
 takes notice of for such, because on that very account 
 they give money to see them. All these admired motions 
 beyond the reach and almost conception of unpracticed 
 spectators, are nothing but the mere effects of use and 
 industry in men whose bodies have nothiiig peculiar iu 
 them from those of the amazed lookers-on.* 
 
 • And yet thoy who witness tho rprformancea of the Indian jng- 
 plors, orbolievo what others relate of thoin, will scarcely s'.ippose 
 their dexterity to he tho result of mere exercise. For Ibn Batnta 
 saw at Delhi one of this fraternity bundle his body up into the form 
 of aeiibe.and ascend like a dark vapor into the air: a feat not likely 
 to arise out of simple practice. AkaId, honest Tavernior ha^ n 
 story, which he relates with the utmost nrtirp/e, calculated to convey 
 B lofty idea of the natural philosophy of juRRlers. "Thoy took n 
 sipall piece of wood, and havine planted It in tho earth, demanded 
 of one of the bystanders what fruit they should cause it to produce. 
 The company replied that they wished to see mangos. One of the 
 iucTKlers then wrapped himself la a sheet, and crouched down to 
 the earth, several times In succession. Tavornier, whom all thie 
 diablerie delifrhtod exceedlnjjly, ascended to the window of an upper 
 chamber for the purpose or bcboldine more distinctly the wuole 
 proceedings of tho maKlelan, and through a rent In the sheet saw 
 him cut himself under the arms with a razor, and rub the piece of 
 wood with his blood. Every time he rose from his crouchinR pos- 
 ture the bit of wood grew visibly, and at the third time branches 
 and buds snranR out The tree, which had now attained the height 
 of five or six foot, was next covered with leaves and then with flow- 
 ers At this instant an Enclish clergyman arrived, the |>orf6rmance 
 taking place at the bouse of one of our countrymen, and perceiviiMK 
 
18 TH^ UNDIERaTANDINO. 
 
 As it is in the body, so it is iu the mind ; practice 
 makes it what it is; and most even of those excellencies 
 which are looked on as natural endowments, will be 
 found, when examined into more narrowly, to be the 
 product of exercise, and to be raised to that pitch only 
 by repeated actions.^ Some men are remarked for 
 pleasantness in raillery ; others for apologues and apposite 
 diverting stories. This is apt to be taken fur the 
 effect of pure nature, and that the rather because it 
 is not got by -rules, and those who excel in either of 
 them never purposely set themselves to the study of it 
 as an art to be learnt.f But yet it is true, that at first 
 some lucky hit, which took with somebody and gained 
 him commendation, encouraged him to try again, in- 
 clined his thoughts and endeavors that way, till at last 
 he insensibly got a facility in it, without perceiving how ; 
 and that is attributed whuliy to nature which was much 
 more the effect of use and practice. 1 do not deny that 
 natural disposition may often give the first rise to it, 
 but that never carries a man far without use and exer- 
 cise, and it is practice alone that brings the powers of 
 the mind, as well as those of the body, to their pcrfec- 
 tion.t Many a good poetic vein is buried under a trade 
 
 and never produces anything for want of improvement.! 
 
 ft 
 In what practices the jngj?ler.s wore onKOCod. commanded them in- 
 stantly to desist, tLriiilouiug the whole of the Euiopoaus present 
 with exclusion from the holy comnumion if they persisted lu 
 encourauing the dialjoiical arts of Borcerers, and magicians " Our 
 ti aveller \va.s thus i)reveated from beholding the crowning miraclo. 
 (Lives of Celebrated Travellers, vol. 1. p. 183, et seij.) 
 
 •An iilustraliou of this point, as far as the boily is concerned, 
 occurs in the story of Bnharam Gour, in the Tales of the Rauiadhai:, 
 where Hhireen, commeuclag with carrying a calf up the steps of a 
 tower, ends by being able to carry up a cow- 
 
 t Lawyers are usually good racmtlmrK, (I must borrow this word 
 because our language has no eciuivulent.) the art of dressing up 
 trilling narratives in an amusing way forming part of their legal 
 etudies. To this Lord Hacon alludes when he meiitious " the exer- 
 cise of lawyers in memory, narratives," etc. His Lordship is well 
 known to have made for his own use a collection of <hoice anecdotes 
 and witty sayings, which have since been published) and are in 
 Uiauy cu.ses well worthy of notice. (Holm's edition, p. 164.) 
 
 * The greatest ambition of a wit is to pass for ai\ improvisatore; 
 but Kwift, lying in bed till noon to invent sprightly sallies for the 
 remuiudor of the day, was a type of the whole painstaking race of 
 jokers, who fatigue their own intellects to make other jieople merry, 
 and uro generally observed to bt^ themselves thoughtful, if not sad, 
 except at the moment when they are jittering their jests. 
 
 K Tnis reflection has crept into (Jrey's Elegy, and Is therefore 
 familiar to mo.st readers:— 
 
 " Perhaps iu this neglected spot is laid 
 Some ueait once pregnant with celestial Are; 
 Hands that the rod of empire might have swayed, 
 Or waked to ecstasy the Itvlug lyre. 
 
rut: CONDUCT or w 
 
 We see the ways of diacourde and rc.i8ouiiig are very 
 different, even concorniiig the same matter, at court 
 and in the university. And he that will go but from 
 Westminster-hall to the Exchange will find a different 
 genius and turn in their ways of talking; and yet one 
 cannot think that all whose lot fell in the city were 
 born with different parts from those who were bred at 
 the university or inns of court. 
 
 To what purpose all this but to show that the differ- 
 ence 80 observable in men's understandings and parts 
 does not arise so much from the natural faculties aa 
 acquired liabits. He would be laughed at that should 
 go about to make a fine dancer out of a country hedger 
 at past fifty. And he will not have much better success 
 who shall endeavor at that age to make a man reason 
 well, or speak handsomely, who has never been used to 
 it, though you should lay before him a collection of all 
 the best precepts of logic or oratory. Nobody is made 
 anything by hearing of rules or laying them up in his 
 memory; practice must settle the habit of doing with- 
 out reflecting on the rule ; and you may as well hope to 
 make a good painter or musician extempore, by a lecture 
 and instruction in the arts of music and painting, as a 
 coherent thinker or a strict reasoner by a set of rules 
 showing him wherein right reasoning consists. 
 
 This being so that defects and weakness in men's 
 understanding, as well ns other faculties, come from 
 want of a right use of their own minds, I am apt to think 
 the fault is generally mislaid upon nature, and there is 
 often a complaint of want of parts when the fault lies in 
 want of a due improvement of them. We see men fre- 
 quently dexterous and sharp enough in making a bar- 
 gain who, if you reason with them about matters of 
 religion, appear perfectly stupid. 
 
 5. Ideas. — I will not here, in what related to the 
 right conduct and improvement of the understanding, 
 repeat again the getting clear .ind determined ideas, and 
 the employing our thoughts rather about them than 
 about sounds put for them, nor of settling the significa- 
 tion of words which we use with ourselves in the search 
 of truth, or with others in discoursing about it. Those 
 
 Bojne Tlllntre Hamnflon, that with dauntloss breast. 
 The little tyrant of hh flolils withstood ; 
 Borne mute. Inglorious Milton hore may rest, 
 Borne OromwolU sulltlos<< of his country's blood." 
 
20 i'aX UN2)ER8T4KDIN0. 
 
 hindrancea of our understandings in the pursuit of knowl« 
 edge I have sufiQcieutly enlarged upon in another place, 
 80 that nothing more needs here to be said of those 
 matters. 
 
 G. Principles. — There is another fault that stops or 
 misleads men in their knowledge which I have also 
 spoken something of, but yet is necessary to mention 
 here again, that we may examine it to the bottom and 
 see the root it springs frum, and that is, a custom of 
 taking up with principles that are not self-evident, and 
 very often not so much as true. It is not unusual to 
 see men rest their opinions upon foundations that have 
 no more certainty and solidity than the propositions built 
 on them and embraced for their sake. Such foundations 
 are these and the like, viz., the founders or leaders of 
 my party are good men, and therefore their tenets are 
 true ; it is the opinici of a sect that is erroneous, there- 
 fore it is false ; it hatl. been long received in the world, 
 therefore it is true ; or, it is new, and therefore false. 
 
 These, and many the Hke, which are by no means che 
 measures of truth and falsehood, the generality of men 
 make the standards by which they accustom their under- 
 standing to judge. And thus, they falling into a habit 
 of determining of truth and falsehood by such wrong 
 measures, it is no wonder tlfey should embrace error for 
 certainty, and be very positive in things they have no 
 ground for. 
 
 There is not any who pretends to the least reason, but 
 when any of these his false maxims are brought to the 
 test, must acknowledge them to be fallible, and such as 
 he will not allow in those that differ from him; and 
 yet after he is convinced of this you shall see him go on 
 in the use of them, and the very next occasion that offers 
 argue again upon the same grounds.* Would one not 
 be ready to think that men are willing to impose upon 
 themselves, and mislead their own understandings, who 
 conduct them by such wrong measures, even after they 
 see they cannot be relied on ? But yet they will not 
 appear so blanmble as may be thought at first sight; for 
 
 ♦ Every person must have observed In arerumont that there are 
 peonle who, though repeatedly refuted, yet return again and again 
 to the charge with the nelf-same weapons, verif yiuK the philosophi- 
 cal remark of Butler, that 
 
 " The man convinced against his will 
 is of the same opinion still." 
 
THK CONDUCT OF 21 
 
 I think there are a greivt many that argue thus in 
 eanieBt, and do it not to impose on themselves orothers. 
 They are persuufied of what they say, and think there 
 is weight in it, though in alike case they have been con- 
 vinced there is none; but men would be intolerable to 
 themselves and contemptible to others if they should 
 embrace opinions without any ground, and hold what 
 they could give no manner of reason for. True or false, 
 solid or sandy, the mind must have some foundation to 
 rost itself upon, and, as I have remarked in another 
 place, it no sooner entertains any proposition but it 
 presently hastens to some hypothesis to bottom it on ; 
 till then it is unquiet and unsettled. So much do our 
 own very tempers dispose us to a right use of our under- 
 standings if we would follow, as we should, the inclina- 
 tions of our nature. 
 
 In some matters of concernment, especially those of 
 religion, men arc not permitted to be always wavering 
 and uncertain, they must embrace and profess some 
 tenets or other ; and it would be a shame, nay u contra- 
 diction too heavy for any one's mind to lie constantly 
 under, for him to pretend seriously to be persuaded of 
 the truth of any religion, and yet not to be able to give 
 any reason of his belief, or to say anything for his pref- 
 erence of this to any other opinion; and therefore they 
 must make use of some principles or other, and those 
 can be no other than such as they have and can manage, 
 and to say they are not in earnest persuaded by them, 
 and do not rest upon those they make use of, is contrary 
 to experience, and to allege that they are not misled, 
 when we complain thej' are. 
 
 If this be 80, it will be urged, why then do they not 
 make use of sure and unquestionable principles, rather 
 than rest on such grounds as may deceive them, and 
 will, as is visible, serve to support error as well as 
 truth ? 
 
 To this I answer, the reason why they do not mnke 
 use of better and surer principles is because they cannot : 
 but this inability proceeds not from want of natural 
 parts (for those few whose cf-se that is are to be excused) 
 but for want of use and exercise.* Few men are from 
 
 'See a cnrious dlsouBslon on the possibility of sincerity in error. 
 In Arthur Colller'fl letter to Mr. Mist, reprinted In Benson's Life of 
 Onllier, p. log. et 8ef|. He relates a conversAtlon he had formerly 
 bad with Bishop Hoadly, who maintained the possibility of men 
 
23 THE UNVKliHTAMJlNG, 
 
 their youth accustomed to strict reasoniug, and to trace 
 the dependence of any truth, in a long train of conse- 
 quences, to its remote principles, and to observe itacon- 
 nectiou ; and he that by frequent practice has not been 
 used to this employment of his understanding, it is no 
 more wonder that he should not, when he is grown into 
 years, be able to bring his mind to it, than that he 
 should not be on a sudden able to grave or design, 
 dance on the ropes, or write a good hand, who has never 
 practiced either of them. 
 
 I Nay, the most of men are so wholly strangers to this 
 that they do not so much as perceive their want of it : 
 they despatch the ordinary business of their callings by 
 rote, as we say, as they have learnt it, and if at any 
 time they miss success they impute it to anything 
 rather than want of thought or skill, that they conclude 
 (because they know no better) they have in perfection : 
 or if there be any subject that interest or fancy has rec- 
 ommended to their thoughts, their reasoning about it 
 is still after their own fashion ; be it better or worse, it 
 serves their turns, and is the best they are acquainted 
 with, and therefore, when they are led by it into mis- 
 takes and their business succeeds accordingly, they im- 
 pute it to any cross accident or default of others, rather 
 than to their own want of Riulerstanding; that is what 
 nobody discovers or complains of in' himself. * "Whatso- 
 ever made his business to miscarry, it was not want t.'f 
 right thought and judgment in himself; he sees no such 
 defect in himself, but is satisfied that he carries on his 
 designs well enough by his own reasoning, or at least 
 should liave done, had it not been for unlucky traverses 
 not in his power. Thus, being content with this short 
 and very iinperfe(;t use of his understanding, he never 
 troubles himself to seek out methods of ini{)roving his 
 mind, and lives all his life without any notion of close 
 reasoning in a continued connection of a long train of 
 consequences from sure foundations, such as is requisite 
 for the making out and clearing most of the speculative 
 truths most men own to believe and are most concerned 
 
 being sincere In error, while ho him.solf adopted the opposite opin- 
 ion. Lot'ko talios part with Hoadly, imt armies that truth lies 
 within our reach, if we will from the boKluninK properly use our 
 faculties in the search after it. 
 
 * " Tout le monde se plaint do sa m^moiro. et personne ne se plaint 
 do son iuKemeBt-"—JiochefuucauU, lief. 113. 
 
THE CONDUCT OF 23 
 
 in. Not to mention here what I shall have occasion to 
 insist on by and by more fully, viz., that in many cases 
 it is not one sories of consequences will serve the tui-n, 
 but many different and opposite deductions must be 
 examined and laid together before a man can come to 
 make a right judgment of the point in question. What 
 then can be expected from men that neither see the want 
 of. any such kind of reasoning as this; nor, if they do, 
 know how to set about it, or could perform it ? You 
 may as well set a countryman, who scarce knows the 
 iigurc'3 and never cast up a sum of three particulars, to 
 state a merchant's lung account, and find the true bal- 
 ance of it. 
 
 What then should be done in the case? I answer, 
 we should always remember what I said above, that the 
 faculties of our souls are improved and'^made useful to 
 us just after the same manner as our bodies are. W'ould 
 you have a man write or paint, dance or fence well, or 
 perform any other manual operation dexterously and 
 with ease ; let him have over so much vigor and activity, 
 suppleness and address naturjilly, yet nobody expects 
 this from him unless he has been used to it, and Invs em- 
 ployed time aiid pains in fashioning and forming his 
 hand or outward parts to these motions. Just so it is 
 in the mind; would you have a man reason well, you 
 must use him to it betimes, exercise his mind in observ- 
 ing the connection of ideas and following thtm in train. 
 Nothing does this better than mathematics, which there- 
 fore I think should be taught all those who have the 
 time and opportunity, not so much to make them mathe- 
 maticians as to make them reasonable creatures ; for 
 though we all call oux'selves so because we are born to it 
 if we please, yet we may truly say, nature gives us but 
 the seeds of it ; we are born to be, if we please, rational 
 creatures, but it is use and exercise only that makes us 
 so, and we are indeed so no further than industry and 
 application has carried us.* And therefore, in ways of 
 
 •The nhllosophor In this pjissaco bopitib to attributo too mnch to 
 nso una oxorcise, though iipnn tho whole ho Rcknowlodces with 
 Qnlnotlllan, that a man rloflpjent by naturo In IntcUootnal powors 
 will in vain hopo tr> mipply th« rirflHonry by lat>or. " Ilhid tflmoa 
 In primia tcstAiulum est," says the Roman rnptoilolan, " nihil nrro- 
 oeptA Rtcjno artoH valere. nisi adjuvanto natnra. Qnapropter el cut 
 deerit ineoninm, non rooels hive soripta snnt, qtinm de aerorum 
 cultq sterilibufl torria. Sunt ot alia InRonitA finindam adjumenta, 
 vox. latns paticns laborls, valotudo, ronstanfla, decor: nua> hi 
 modlca obllgerunt, possunt, ratlone ampliari: sed Donnunquam Ita 
 
34 THE UNDERaTANDINO. 
 
 reasoning which men have not been used to, he that 
 will observe the conclusions they take up must be satis* 
 fied thev are not all rational. 
 
 This has been the less taken notice of because every 
 one in his private affairs uses some sort of reasoning or 
 other enough to denominate him reasonable. But the 
 mistake is, that he that is found reasonable in one thing is 
 concluded to be so in all, and to think or to say other- 
 wise is thought so unjust an affront and so senseless a 
 censure that nobody ventures to do it. It looks like the 
 degradation of a man below the dignity of his nature. It is 
 true, that he that reasons well in any one thing, has a mind 
 naturally capable of reasoning well in others, and to the 
 same degree of strength and clearness, and possibly 
 much greater, bad his understanding been so employed. 
 But it is aa true^ that he who can reason well to^ay 
 about one sort of matters, cannot at all reason to-day 
 about others, though perhaps a year hence he may. But 
 wherever a man's rational faculty fails him, and will not 
 serve him to reason, there we cannot say he is rational 
 how capable soever he may be by time and exercise to 
 become so. 
 
 Try in men of low and mean education who have 
 never elevated their thoughts above the spade and the 
 plough, nor looked beyond tlie ordinary drudgery of a 
 day-laborer. Take the thoughts of such an one used for 
 many years to one track, out of that narrow compass he 
 has been all his life confined to, you will find him no 
 more capable of reasoning than almost a perfect natural. 
 Some one or two rules on which their conclusions 
 imujediately depend, you will find in most men have 
 governed all their thoughts : these, true or false, have 
 been the maxims they have been guided by : take these 
 from them and they are perfectly at a loss, their compass 
 and pule-star then are gone, and their understanding is 
 perfectly at a nonplus ; and therefore they either im- 
 mediately return to their old maxims again, as the 
 foundations to all truth to them, notwithstanding all that 
 can be said to show their weakness, or if they give them 
 up to their reasons, they with them give up all truth and 
 further inquiry, and think there is no such thing as 
 
 dAsunt, ut bona etiam Inctenii studiique corrumnant: slcutet hseo 
 ipsa sine dootore peiito, ntudlo pertinacii scribondi, loeeDdl, dlcendl 
 miiUa et contlnua exercltattone. per se Qlbll prosunt. (Inst, Orat 
 I- ?i.) 
 
TltK coy DUCT OP 26 
 
 certainty.* For if you would enlarge their thoughts 
 and settle them upon more remote and surer principles, 
 they either cannot easily apprehend them, or, if they 
 can, know not what use to make of them, for long de- 
 ductions from remote principles are whf.t they have not 
 been used to and cannot manage. 
 
 What, then, can grown men never be improved or 
 enlarged in their understandings ? I say not so, but . 
 this I think I may say, that it will not be done without 
 industry and application, which will require more time 
 and pains than grown men, settled in their course of life 
 will allow to it, and therefore very seldom is done.f 
 And this very capacity of attaining it by use and exer- 
 cise only, brings us back to that which I laid down be- 
 fore, that it is only practice that improves our minds as 
 well as bodies, and we must expect nothing from our 
 understandings any further than they are perfected by 
 habits. 
 
 The Americans are not all born with worse under- 
 standings than the Europeans, though we see none of 
 them have such reaches in the arts and sciences. And 
 among the children of a poor countryman, the lucky 
 
 • The CAnso is here oxplained, "why In times abounding with scio- 
 lists, whon a small Hharo of knowledge Is noesossed by many, and 
 f»rofound philosophy by (ew, rash and shallow sceptics spring up 
 n great numbers. 
 
 " Hero scanty draughts Intoxicate the brain. 
 But drinking largely sobers us again." 
 
 Bo Lord Bacon, In his Essay on Atheism: "A little philosophy In- 
 cllnolh man's mlpd to Atheism: but depth In philosophy hrinpeth 
 men'H minds about to religion; for while the mind of man lookcth 
 upon second causes scattered, It may sometimes rest In them and 
 go no further; but when It beholdeth the chain of them confederate 
 and linked together, It must needs fly to Providence and Deity." 
 (Bohn's edition, p. 46.) 
 
 t Never, according to Bishop Butler. " The beginning of our 
 days is adapted to be, and is, a state of education in the theory and 
 
 riractice of mature life. We are much assisted In it by example, 
 nstruction, and the care of others; but a groat deal Is loft to our- 
 selves to do. And of this, OS part is done easily and of TOursp, so 
 part rofjulres diligence and care, the voluntary foregoing many 
 things which we desire, and setting ourselves todowuattse have 
 no inclination to, but for the necessity or expedience of it For, 
 that labor and industry which the station of so many absolutely 
 requires, they would bo greatly unqualifled for, in maturity, as 
 those In other stations would be for any other works of application. 
 If both were not accustomed to them in their youth. And accord- 
 ing as persons behave themselves, In the general education which 
 all go through, and in the particular ones adapted to particular 
 employments, their character Is formed and made appear; they 
 recommend themselves more or less ; and are capable of and placed 
 In difTerent stations in the society of mankind. The former part of 
 Ufe then Is to be considered a.s an Important opportunity, which 
 iiatnre pats into oar hands, and which whea lost Is not to be recov 
 9ni."--AntUogy oflieligion, part I- chap. v. (Doha's ediUoo, p. 147.) 
 
26 THE UNDERSTAlftolffa. 
 
 chance of education, and getting into the world, gives 
 one infinitely the superiority in parts over the rest, who 
 continuing at home had continued also just of the saue 
 size with his brethren. 
 
 He that has to do with young scholars, especially in 
 mathematics, may perceive how their minds open by de- 
 grees, and how it is exercise alone that opens them. 
 Sometimes they will stick a long time at a part of a de- 
 monstration, not for want of will and application, but 
 really for want of perceiving the connection of two idfaa 
 ' tliat, to one whose understanding is more exercised, is 
 as visible as anything can be. Tije same would be with 
 a grown man beginning to study mathematics, the 
 understanding for want of use often sticks in every plain 
 way, and he himself that is so puzzled, when he comes 
 to see the connection wonders what it was he stuck at in 
 a case &o plain. 
 
 7. Mathematics. — I have mentioned mathematics as 
 a way to settle in the mind a habit of reasoning closely 
 and in train; not that I tiiink it necessary that all men 
 should be deep mathematicians, but that, having got the 
 way of reasoning, which that study necessarily brings 
 the mind to, they might be able to transfer it to otlur 
 parts of knowledge as they shall have occasion. For in 
 all sorts of reasoning every*single argument should bo 
 managed as a mathematical demonstration ; the con- 
 nection and dependence of ideas should bo followed, till 
 the mind is brought to the source on which it bottoms, 
 and observes the coherence all along, though in jtroofs 
 of probability one such train is not enough to settle the 
 judgment, as in demonstrative kno\vlcdg«». 
 
 Where a truth is made out by one demonstration, 
 there needs no further inquiry ; but in probabilities, 
 where there wants demonstration to establish the trutli 
 beyond doubt, there it is not enough to trace one argu- 
 ujent to its source, and observe its strength and weak- 
 ness, but all the arguments, after having been so 
 examined on both sides, must be laid in balance one 
 against another, and upon the whole the understanding 
 determine its assent. 
 
 This is a way of reasoning the understanding should 
 be accustomed to, which is so different from what the 
 .illiterate are used to tliat even learned men sometimes 
 seem to have very little or no notion of it. Nor is it to 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 27 
 
 bo wondered, since tlio way of disputing in tlie schools 
 lends them quite way from it, by insisting on one topical 
 iirgument, by the success of which the truth or false- 
 hood of the question is to be determined, and victory 
 adjudged to the opj)oncnt or defendant, which is all ono 
 as if one should balance an account by one sum, charged 
 and discharged, when there are a hundred others to be 
 taken into consideration. 
 
 This, therefore, it would be well if men's minds were 
 accustomed to, and that early, that they might not 
 erect their opinions upon ono single view when so many 
 others are requisite to make up the account, and must 
 come into the reckoning before a man can form a right 
 judgtnent. This would enlarge their minds and give a 
 due freedom to their understandings, that they might 
 not bo led into error by presumption, laziness, or pre- 
 cipitancy, for I think nobod}' can approve such a con- 
 duct of the understanding as should mislead it from 
 truth, though it bo ever so much in fashion to make use 
 of it. 
 
 To this perhaps it will be objected, that to manage 
 the understanding as I propose would require every 
 man to be a scholar, and to be furnished with all the 
 materials of knowledge and exercised in all the ways o£ 
 reasoning. To which I answer, that it is a shame for 
 those that have time and the means to attain knowledge 
 to want any helps or assistance for the improvement of 
 their understandings that are to be got, and to such I 
 would be 'hought here chiefly to speak. Those me- 
 thinks, who, by the industry and parts of their ances- 
 tors, have been set free from a constant drudgery to their 
 backs and their bellies, should bestow some of their 
 spare time on their heads, and open their minds by some 
 trials and essays, in all the sorts and matters of reason- 
 ing.* I have before mentioned mathematics, wherein 
 algebra gives new helps and views to the understanding. 
 If I propose these, it is not, as I said, to make every man 
 a thorough mathematician or a deep algebraist : but yet I 
 think the study of them is of infinite use, even to grown 
 
 • Most men will admit the truth of the doctrine hero maintAlnod 
 by Locke. The difflcnlty Is not to prove that men otiRht to be well 
 educated, but to discover In what jrood education consists. Milton's 
 llttlo tructato, which I am never weary of refcriInK to, and Locke's 
 own lareer treatise, contain, taken both toRethor, the best theory 
 o( dlacipllDe and (nstructloa with which I am acc^ualntedU ' 
 
28 THJS UNDKRSTANDiya. 
 
 men ; first, by experimeutally convincing them that to 
 make any one reason well it is not enough to have parts 
 wherewith he is satisfied and that serve him well 
 enough in his ordinary course. A man in those studies 
 will see, that however good he may think his under- 
 standing, yet in many things, and those very visible, it 
 may fail him. This would take o£E that presumption 
 that most men have of themselves in this part, and they 
 would not be so apt to think their minds wanted no helps 
 to enlarge them, that there could be nothing added to 
 the acuteness and penetration of their understandings. 
 
 Secondly, the study of mathematics would show them 
 the necessity there is iu reasoning, to separate all the 
 distinct ideas, and see the habitudes that all those con- 
 cerned in the present inquiry have to one another, and to 
 lay by those which relate not to the proposition in hand, 
 and wholly to leave them out of the reckoning. This is 
 that which in other subjects besides quantity, is what is 
 absolutely requisite to just reasoning, though iu them it 
 is not so easily observed nor so carefully practised. In 
 those parts of knowledge where it is thought demonstra- 
 tion has nothing to do, men reason as it were in the 
 lump ; and if, upon a summary and confused view, or 
 upon a partial consideration, they can raise the appear- 
 ance of a probability, they usually rest content, espe- 
 cially if it be in a dispute where every little straw is laid 
 hold on, and everything that can but be drawn in any way 
 to give color to the argument is advanced with ostenta- 
 tion.* But that mind is not in a posture to find the 
 truth that does not distinctly take all the parts asunder, 
 and omitting what is not at all to the point, draw a 
 conclusion from the result of all the particulars which 
 any way influence it. There is another no less useful 
 habit to be got by an application to mathematical de- 
 monstrations, and that is, of using the mind to a long 
 train of consequences : but having mentioned that 
 already, I shall not again here repeat it. 
 
 As to men whose fortunes and time are narrower, 
 what may suflBce them is not of that vast extent as may 
 be imagined, and so comes not within the objection. 
 
 Nobody is under an obligation to know everything. 
 Knowledge and science in general is the business only 
 
 • This character most exactly suit* ordinary political reasonioK In 
 all countries, wherein wen Invariably soek not truth but victory. 
 
OF THE COKDVCT OF 20 
 
 o( lKo«e who are at ease and leisure. Those who have 
 partiqular callings ought to understand them, and it is 
 no unreasonable proposal, nor impossible to be com- 
 passed, that they should think and reason right about 
 what is their daily employment. This one cannot think 
 thenj incapable of without levelling them with the 
 brutes, and charging them with a stupidity below the 
 rank of rational creatures.* 
 
 8. lieligioh. — Besides his particular calling for tke 
 support of this life, every one has a concern in a future 
 life, which he is bound to look after. This engages his 
 thoughts in religion, and here it mightily lies upon him 
 to understand and reason right. Men, therefore, cannot 
 be excused from understanding the words and framing 
 the general notions relating to religion right. The one 
 day of seven, besides other days of rest, allows in the 
 Christian world time enough for this, (had they had no 
 other idle hours,) if they would but make use of these 
 vacancies from their daily labor, and apply themselves 
 to an improvement of knowledge with as much diligence 
 as they often do to a great many other things that are 
 useless, and had but those that would enter them, ac- 
 cording to their several capacities, in a right way to this 
 knowledge. The original make of their minds is like 
 that of other men, and they would be found not to want 
 understanding fit to receive the knowledge of religion 
 if they were a little encouraged and helped in it as they 
 should be.f For there are instances of very mean 
 
 • These were the views which the Greeks took of study and re- 
 search ; and as amoDK them men commonly applied thoraselvos to 
 their own particular branches of loarnintr with srreat earnestness 
 and enthusiasm, It was not at all unusuftl to find much eloquence 
 and ability ovon amouR cooks and artiRans. Indeed the humbler 
 classes of socloty in Greece were so jrroedy of knowledge, and so 
 ostentatious of what thoy possessed, that one constant source of 
 ridicule among the comic poets was the pretensions of such persons 
 to erudition : though this of course forms no argument against the 
 education of the people. 
 
 t There may perhaps be little necessity of citing examples In 
 proof of this: yet I will not let slip tho opportunity of mentioning 
 the name of Bunyan, a tinker, but deeply versed In the Scriptures, 
 and In faith and practice as genuine a Christian as any since the 
 apostolic ago. Chubb, the tallow-chandler of Salisbury, though not 
 remarkable for his orthodoxy, yet attained a considerable knowl- 
 edge of theology, and has left behind him tracts of no small ability. 
 Benson. Indeedi In his life of Arthur Collier, notices a susnicloa 
 entertained at the time, that " The Supremacy of the Father 
 aMserted," was corrected by Dr. Hoody» afterwards primate of Ire- 
 land, and relates that Collier took the pains to make r large collec- 
 tion otOhubb'B letters* written on business, and these, full of errors, 
 he often exhibited to. the carious, (p. e2.et8ea.) But this, after 
 •U. wotild our prove that Chubb'i ityie and srammur needed ■ome 
 
30 THE UNDEHSTANDING. 
 
 people who have raised their minds to a great sense and 
 understanding of religion : and though these have not 
 been so frequent as could be wished, yet they are enough 
 to clear that condition of life from a necessity of gross 
 ignorance, and to show that more might be brought to 
 be rational creatures and Christians, (for they can 
 hardly be thought really to be so who, wearing the 
 name, know not so much as the very principles of that 
 religion,) if due care were taken of them. For, if I mis- 
 take not, the peasantry lately in France (a rank of peo- 
 ple under a much heavier pressure of want and poverty 
 than the day-laborers in England) of the reformed re- 
 ligion understood it much better and could say more for 
 it than those of a higher condition among us.* 
 
 But if it shall be concluded that the meaner sort of 
 people must give themselves up to brutish stupidity in 
 the things of their nearer concernment, which I see no 
 reason for, this excuses not those of a freer fortune and 
 education, if they neglect their understandings, and 
 take no care to employ them as they ought and set them 
 right in the knowledge of those things for which princi- 
 pally they were given tliem. At least those whose 
 plentiful fortunes allow them the opportunities and helps 
 of improvement arc not so few out that it might bo 
 hoped great advancements might be made in knowledge 
 of all kinds, especially in that of the greatest concern 
 and largest views, if men would make a right use of 
 their faculties and study their own understandings. 
 
 9. Ideas. — Outward corporeal objects that constantly 
 importune our senses and captivate our appetites, fail 
 not to fill our heads with lively and lasting ideas of that 
 kind. Here the mind needs not to be set upon getting 
 greater store ; thoy offer themselves fast enough, and 
 are usually entertained in such plenty and lodged so 
 carefully, that the mind wants room or attention for 
 others that it has more use and need of. To fit the 
 understanding, therefore, for such reasoning as I have 
 been above speaking of, care should be taken to fill it 
 with moral and more abstract ideas, for these not offer- 
 little corrcctlon.whlch mlKht bo predicated of writers of much higher 
 prntensions. 
 
 * On this 8u'>ject the philosopher spoke from his own experience, 
 aadiiriniihih •ssldence in Languedoc, he took much pains to in- 
 struct hlmselt In whatever concerned the habits and opinions of 
 the HuKuenota. Bee Lord King's Life of Locke. 
 
TDE CONDUCT OF 31 
 
 ing themselves to the senses, but being to be framed to 
 the understanding, people are generally bo neglectful of 
 a faculty they are apt to think wants nothing, that I 
 fear most men's minds are more unfurnished with such 
 ideas than is imagined. They often use the words, and 
 how can they be suspected to want the ideas ? What I 
 liare said in the third book of my essay will excuse me 
 from any other answer to this (juestion. But to convince 
 people of what moment it is to their understandings to 
 be furnished with such .abstract ideas, steady and settled 
 in them, give me leave to ask how any one shall be able 
 to know whether he be obliged to be just, if he has not 
 established ideas in his mind of obligation and of justice, 
 since knowledge consists in nothing but the perceived 
 agreement or disagreement of those ideas? and so of 
 all others the like which concern our lives and man- 
 ners.* And if men do find a difficulty to see the agree- 
 ment or disagreement of two angles which lie before 
 their eyes unalterable in a diagram, how utterly im- 
 possible will it be to perceive it in ideas that have no 
 other sensible objects to represent them to the mind but 
 sounds, with which they have no manner of conformity 
 and therefore had need to be clearly settled in the mind 
 themselves, if we Wf>uld make any clear judgment about 
 them I This, therefore, is one of the first things the 
 mind should be employed about in the right conduct of 
 the understanding, without which it is impossible it 
 should be c.ipable of reasoning right about those matters. 
 But in these, and all other ideas, care must be taken 
 that they harbor no inconsistencies, and that they have 
 a real existence where real existence is supposed, and 
 are not mere chimeras with a supposed existence. 
 
 10. Prejudice. — Every one is forward to complain of 
 the prejudices that mislead other men or parties, as if he 
 were free and had none of his own. This being objected 
 on all sides, it is agreed that it is a fault and a bin* 
 
 •The Indisponslbloness of knowlcdce was rendered more appar- 
 ent in the Hocrfttlcphlloftnphy, hytho doctrine that sclonoelB virtue, 
 which, thouRh paradoxleal at first sleht, may bo proved by Irrefrag- 
 able arKuments. In fact, when tho solonco of morals 1h undoretood 
 It will ho 80 evident that virtue leads to happiness that wo miebtM 
 well expect tho arithmetician to refuse to be tniided In his calcnla- 
 tlons by the science of numbers, as that he who is versed in the 
 knowledge of jjood and e\i! will prefer the evil to the good. Who- 
 ever sins, therefore, sins throuRh iKnorance, thouRh that Ignorance, 
 belnK often voluntary, Is itflelf a crime. On the subject ofjastlce, 
 
 Shich Plato maintains to be the greatest sood. see the Dial, de 
 Bimb. part vL pi>. 75—188, et seq. 
 
82 THE UNDERSTAND 0. 
 
 drance to knowledge. What uow is the cure ? No 
 other but this, that every man should let alone others' 
 prejudices and examine his own.* Nobody is convinced 
 of his by the accusation of another ; he recriminates by 
 the same rule, and is clear. The only way to remove 
 this great cause of ignorance and error out of the world 
 is, for every one impartially to examine himself. If 
 others will not deal fairly with their own minds, does that 
 make my errors truths ? or ought it to make me in love 
 with them and willing to impose on myself? If others 
 love cataracts in their eyes, should that hinder me from 
 couching of mine as soon as I can ? Every one declares 
 against blindness, and yet who almost is not fond of 
 that which dims his sigitt, and keeps the clear light 
 out of his mind, wiiiuh should lead him into truth and 
 knowledge ? False or doubtful positions, relied upon as 
 unquestionable maxims, keep tliose in the dark from 
 truth who build on them. Such are usually the pre- 
 judices imbibed from education, party, reverence, fash- 
 ion, interest, etc. This is tlie mote which every one sees 
 in his brother's eye, but never regards the beam in his 
 own. For who is there almost that is ever brought 
 fairly to examine his own principles, and see whetlier 
 they are such as will bear the trial ? But yot this should 
 be one of the first things 'every one should set about, 
 and be scrupulous in, who would lightly conduct his 
 understanding in the search of truth and knowledge. 
 
 To those who are willing to get rid of this great hin- 
 drance of knowledge (for to such only I wrile), to tho^e 
 who would shake off thi.s great and dangerous impostor, 
 prejudice, who dresses up falsehood in the likeness of 
 truth, and so dexterously hoodwinks men's minds as to 
 keep them in the dark with a belief that they are more 
 in the light than any that do not see with their eyes, I 
 shall offer this one mark whereby prejudice may be 
 known. He that is strongly of any opinion must sup- 
 pose (unless he be self-condemned) that his persuasion 
 is built upon good grounds, and that his assent is no 
 greater than what the evidence of the truth he holds 
 forces him to, and that they are arguments, and not incli- 
 nation or fancy, that make him so confident and pos- 
 itive in his tenets. Now if, after all his profession, he 
 
 •"Tout le monde trouve & reJIro on autruy, oe au'on trouve 
 ftredire ea luy. "—itoc/u/. Reflect. Mor. 33. 
 
THE CONDUCT OF 33 
 
 cannot bear any opposition to his opinion, if ho can- 
 not 80 much as give a patient hearing, much less ex- 
 amine and weigh the arguments on the other side, does 
 he not plainly confess it is prejudice governs him ? and 
 it is not the evidence of truth, but some lazy antici- 
 pation, some beloved presumption that he desires to 
 rest undisturbed in. For if what ho holds be, as he 
 gives out, well fenced with evidence, and he sees it to 
 be true, what need he fear to put it to the proof ? If 
 his opinion be settled upon a firm foundation, if the 
 arguments that support it and have obtained his assent 
 be clear, good, and convincing, why should he be shy to 
 have it tried whether they be proof or not ?* He whose 
 assent goes beyond this evidence, owes this excess of 
 his adherence only to prejudice; and does in effect own 
 it, when he refuses to hear what is offered against it, 
 declaring thereby that it is not evidence he seeks, but 
 the quiet enjoyment of the opinion he is fonjj of, with 
 a forward condemnation of all that may stand jn opposi- 
 tion to it, unheard and unexamined ; which, what is it 
 but prejudice? "qui aequum statuerit, parte inaudita, 
 alter&, etiamsi tpquum statuerit, baud (cquus fuerit." 
 He that would acquit himself in this case as a lover of 
 truth, not giving way to any preoccupation or bias that 
 may mislead him, must do two things that are not very 
 common nor very easy. 
 
 11. Indifferency. — First, he must not be in love with 
 any opinion, or wish it to be true till he knows it to be so; 
 and then he will not need to wish it; for nothing that 
 is false can deserve oUr good wishes, nor a desire that it 
 should have the place and force of truth ; and yet noth- 
 ing is more frequent than this. Men are fond of certain 
 tenets upon no other evidence but respect and custom, 
 and think they must maintain them or .all is gone, though 
 they have never examined the ground they stand on, nor 
 have ever made them out to themselves or can make 
 them out to others. We should contend earnestly from 
 the truth, but we should first be sure that it is truth, or 
 else we fight against (}od, who is the God of truth, and 
 
 • It may be regarded as one proof of the crreat rlfeness of preja- 
 dlces In eooiety. that argniere are In 111 repnte. Voltaire accordinfflr 
 remarks that the man who shonld hone to make his war in the 
 world bv the weapons of logic, would be as mad as Don Qnizote : 
 but In bis .work on Edncation. ijocke endeavors to show how arm- 
 ment0 mar be maintained In conversation withoal offence. <i>. 88^ 
 et«Hv> ^ 
 
34 THE UyDEHSTANDING. 
 
 do the work of the devil, who is the father and propagator 
 of lies ; and our zeal, though ever so wariUi will not 
 excuse us, for this is plainly prejudice. 
 
 12. Examine. — Secondly, he must do that which he 
 will find himself very averse to, as judging the thing 
 unnecessary, or himself incapable of doing it. He must 
 try whether his principles bo certainly true or not, and 
 how far he may safwly rely upon them. This, whether 
 fewer have the heart or the skill to do, I shall not 
 I determine, but this I am sure is that which every one 
 ought to do who professes to love truth, and would not 
 impose upon himself, which is a surer way to be made a 
 fool of than by being exposed to the sophistry of others. 
 The disposition to put any cheat upon ourselves works 
 constantly, and we are pleased with it, but are impatient 
 of being bantered or misled by others. The inability 
 I here speak of, is not any natural defect that makes 
 men incapable of examining their own principles. To 
 such, rules of conducting their understandings are use- 
 less, and that is the case of very few. The great num- 
 ber is of those whom the ill habit of never exerting their 
 thoughts has disabled ; the powers of their minds are 
 starved by disuse and have lost that reach and strength 
 which nature fitted them to receive from exercise. Those 
 who are in a condition to "iearn the first rules of plain 
 arithmetic, and could be brought to cast up an ordinary 
 sum, are capable of this, if they have but accustomed 
 their minds to reasoning ; but they that have wholly 
 neglected the exercise S their understandings in this 
 way, will be very far at first from being able to do it, and 
 as unfit for it as one unpractised in figures to cast up a 
 ahop-book, and perhaps think it as strange to be set about 
 it. And yet it must nevertheless be confessed to be a 
 wrong use of our understandings to build our tenets (in 
 things where we are concerned to hold the truth) upon 
 principles that may lead us into error. We take our 
 principles at hap-hazard upon trust, and without ever 
 having examined them, and then believe a whole system 
 upon a presumption that they are true and solid : and 
 what is all this but childish, shameful, senseless cre- 
 dulity ? 
 
 In these two things, viz., an equal indifferency for all 
 truth — I mean the receiving it, the love of it, as truth, 
 but not loving it for any other reason^ before wq knoNv 
 
• TIJE CONDUCT OF 35 
 
 it to be true — and in the examination of our principles, 
 and not receiving any for such, nor building on them, 
 till we are fully convinced as rational creatures of their 
 solidity, truth, and certainty, consists that freedom of 
 the understanding which is necessary to a rational 
 creature, and without which it is not truly an under- 
 standing. It is conceit, fanc}-, extravagance, anything 
 rather than understanding, if it must be under the con- 
 straint of receiving and holding opinions by the authority 
 of anythiug but their own, not fancied, but perceived 
 evidence. This was rightly called imposition, and is 
 of all other the worst and most dangerous sort of it. 
 For we impose upon ourselves, which is the strongest 
 imposition of all others, and we impose upon ourselves 
 in that part which ought with the greatest care to 
 be kept free from all imposition. The world is apt to 
 cast great blame on those who have an indifferency for 
 opinions, especially in religion. I fear this is the foun- 
 dation of great error and worse consequences. To be 
 indifferent which of two opinions is true, is the right 
 temper of the mind that preserves it from being imposed 
 on, and disposes it to examine with that indifferency 
 till it'has done its best to find the truth ; and this is 
 the only direct and safe way to it. But to be indifferent 
 whether we embrace falsehood or truth is the great road 
 to error. Those who are not indifferent which opinion 
 is true are guilty of this ; they suppose, without examin- 
 ing, that what they hold is true, and then think they 
 ought to be zealous for it. Those, it is plain by their 
 warmth and eagorness, are not indifferent for their own 
 opinions, but methinks are very indifferent whether 
 they be true or false, since they cannot endure to have 
 any doubts raised or objections made against them, and 
 it is visible they never nave made any themselves ; and 
 so never having examined them, know not, nor are 
 concerned, as they should be, to know whether they be 
 true or false.* 
 
 •On tho U>inn«>r of mind which Locke here denominates fndiffer- 
 enco, BiRhoi) ratrick (inotfiH from Arrian, and with approbation, a 
 Tory hoaiitlful passaee, which we subjoin In hia voraion: " Let us 
 Iwcin ovorythlnc without too much desire or aversation. Let us 
 not incline to this or tho other way; but behave ourselves like a 
 traveller, who when he comes to two ways, asks him whom he meets 
 next, which of those he shall take to such a place : havlnc no Inclin- 
 ation to the richt hand or to the left, but desiring only to know 
 the true and direct way that will carry him to his journey's eO'JU'* 
 (Mvlce to a Friend, p. ;7«.J ^ ' 
 
36 THE UNDEUaTANDINQ. 
 
 These are the common and most general miscarriageB 
 which I think men should avoid ot rectify in a right 
 conduct of their understandings, and should be particu- 
 larly taken care of in education. The business whereof 
 in respect of knowledge, is not, as I think, to perfect a 
 learner in all or any one of the sciences, but to give his 
 mind that freedom, that disposition, and those habits 
 that may enable him to attain any part of knowledge 
 he shall apply himself to, or stand in need of, in the 
 future course of his life. 
 
 This, and this only, is well principling, and not the 
 instilling a reverence and veneration for certain dogmas 
 under the specious title of principles, which are often so 
 remote from that truth ami evidence which belongs to 
 principles that they ought to be rejected as false and 
 erroneous, and often cause men so educated when they 
 come abroad into the world and find they cannot main- 
 tain the principles so taken up and rested in, to cast off 
 all principles, and turn perfect sceptics, regardless of 
 knowledge and virtue. 
 
 There are several weaknesses and defects in the un- 
 derstanding, either from the natural temper of tlie mind, 
 or ill habits taken up, which hinder it in its progress to 
 knowledge. Of these there are as many, possibly, to be 
 found, if tlte mind were tijoronghly studied, as there 
 are diseases of the body, each whereof clogs anddisablts 
 the understanding to some degree, and therefore deserves 
 to be looked after and cured. I shall set down some 
 few to excite men, especially those who make knowh'dge 
 their business, to look into themselves, and observe 
 whether they do- not indulge some weaknesses, allow 
 some miscarriages in the management of their intel- 
 lectual faculty which is prejudicial to them in the search 
 of truth. 
 
 VX Observations. — Particular matters of fact are the 
 undoubted foundations on which our civil and natural 
 knowledge is built : the benefit the understanding makes 
 of them is to draw from them conclusions which may be 
 as standing rules of knowledge, and consequently of 
 practice. The mind often makes not that benefit it 
 should of the information it receives from the accounts 
 of civil or natural historians, by being too forward or 
 too slow in making observations on the particular facts 
 recorded in them. 
 
TtlE CONDUCT OF 37 
 
 There are those who are very assiduous in reading, 
 and yet do not much advance their knowledge by it. 
 They are delighted with the stories that are told, and 
 perhaps can tell them again, for they make all they read 
 nothing but history to themselves ; but not reflecting 
 on it, not making themselves observations from what 
 they read, they are very little improved by all that crowd 
 of particulars that citiier pass through or lodge them- 
 selves in their understandings. They dream on in a con- 
 stant course of reading and cramming themselves ; but 
 not digesting anything, it produces nothing but a heap 
 of crudities. 
 
 If their memories retain well, one may Bay, they have 
 the materials of knowledge, but like those for building 
 they are of no advantage if there be no other use made 
 of them but to let them lie heaped up together. Op- 
 posite to these there are others, who lose the improve- 
 ment they should make of matters of fact by a quite 
 contrary conduct. They are apt to draw general con- 
 clusions and raise axioms from every particular they 
 meet with.* These make as little true benefit of history 
 as the other; nay, being of forward and active spirits, 
 receive more harm by it, it being of worse consequence to 
 steer one's thoughts by a wrong rule than to have none 
 at all, error doing to busy men much more harm than 
 ignorance to the slow and eluggish-f Between these, 
 those seem to do best who, taking material and useful 
 hints, sometimes from single matters of fact, carry them 
 in their minds to be judged of by what they shall find 
 in history to confirm or reverse their imperfect observa- 
 tions, which may be established into rules fit to be relied 
 on when they are justified by a sufficient and wary 
 induction of particulars. He that makes no such reflec- 
 tions on what he reads, only loads his mind with a 
 
 • Of tho two methods here described, the former Is that oT the Ger- 
 mans, the latter that of the French: and perhaps nearer home one 
 mieht find examples of both. Descartes sunplles In philosophy an 
 instance of hasty Reneralization, which perhaps betrayed htm into 
 most ot the errors that distioGrulsh his lanoKul but ineenions sti- 
 tem. 
 
 t This seems to bo an erroneous opinion, an imperfect nile being 
 In most cases better than no nile at all. Thncydides, a (jreater 
 master of civil wisdom than I/ocke himself, delivers by the mouth 
 of Cleon an important truth, where he says that a state possessing 
 Inferior lawsi but unswervinKly executed, is preferable to one with 
 l>etter institutions, which have not their due Influence. on practice: 
 fiyfii ypwv6fu9a in x*^!"*^^ 96(1011 dctr^roct xP**t^'^ w6Xti Kotivvmf 
 
88 TnK UNDKnSTANniNa. 
 
 rhapsody of tales, fih in winter nights for the entertain* 
 nient of others; and he tlmt will iiupruvo every matter 
 of fact into a mnxiin, will abound in contrary observa* 
 tions that can bo of no other use but to perplex and 
 pudder him if ho compares them, or else to misguide 
 him if he gives himself up to the authority of that which 
 for its novelty or for some other fancy best pleases 
 him. 
 
 14. liiaa. — Next to these wo may place those who 
 suffer their own- natural tempers and passions they are 
 possessed with to influence their judgments, especially 
 of men and things that may any way relate to their 
 present circumstances and interest. Truth is all simple, 
 all pure, will bear no mixture of anything else with it. 
 It is rigid and inflexible to any bye-interests, and so 
 should the understanding be, whoso use and excellency 
 lie in conforming itself to it. To think of everything 
 just as it is in itself is the proper business of the under- 
 standing, though it be not that which men always em- 
 ploy it tu. This all men at flrst hearing allow is the 
 right use every one should make of his understanding. 
 Nobody will be at such an open deflance with common 
 sense, as to profess that we should not endeavor to know 
 and think of things as they s^re in themselves, and yet 
 there is nothing more frequent than to do the contrary ; 
 and men are apt to excuse themselves, and think they 
 have reason to do so, if they have but a pretence that it 
 is for God, or a good cause; that is, in effect, for them- 
 selves, their own persuasion or party ; for those in their 
 turns the several sects of men, especially in matters of 
 religion, entitle God and a good cause. But God re- 
 quires not men to wrong or misuse their faculties for 
 him, nor to lie to others or themselves for his sake,* which 
 they purposely do who will not suffer their understand- 
 ings to have right conceptions of the things proposed to 
 them, and designedly restrain themselves from having 
 just thoughts of everj'thing, as far as they are concerned 
 to inquire. And as for a good cause, that needs not such 
 
 • The source of this romark is to bo found in Job, who, as quoted 
 by Lord Bacon (for tbo common version rung dilTorontly), inquires: 
 "Will you lie for Ood as ouo mau dothfor another to gratify him?" 
 His lordship's rofloctious on tho same subject are worthy of con- 
 sideration. " Certain it is that Ood works nothing in nature accord- 
 insr to ordinary course, but by second causes; and if they would 
 have it otherwise believed, it is a more imposture» under color of 
 piety to God, and nothing else but to offer unto the Author of truth 
 the unclean sacrifice of u lie." (Mag. Instaur. 1. 1.) 
 
THE CONDUCT OF 39 
 
 ill helps; if it be good, truth will support it, and it has 
 no need of fallacy or falsehood. 
 
 15. Arguments. — Very much of kin to this is the 
 hunting after arguments to make good one side of a 
 question, and wholly to neglect and refuse those which 
 favor the other side. What is this but wilfully to mis- 
 guide the understanding? and is so far from giving 
 truth its due value, that it wholly debases it; espouse 
 opinions that best comport with their power, profit, or 
 credit, and then seek arguments to support them? 
 Truth lighted upon this way, is of no more avail to ua 
 than error, for what is so taken up by us may be false 
 as well as true ; and he has not done his duty who has 
 thus stumbled upon truth in his way to preferment. 
 
 There is another but more innocent way of collecting 
 arguments very familiar among bookish men, which is to 
 furnish themselves with the arguments they meet with 
 pro and con in the questions they study. This helps 
 them not to judge right nor argue strongly, but only to 
 talk copiously on either side without being steady and 
 settled in their own judgments ; for such arguments 
 gathered from other men's thoughts, floating only in the 
 memory, are there ready indeed to supply copious talk 
 with some appearance of reason, but are far from helping 
 us to judge right.* Such variety of arguments only dis- 
 tract the understanding that relies on them, unless ii 
 has gone farther than such a superficial way of examin- 
 ing; this is to quit truth for appearance, only to serve 
 our vanity. The sure and only way to get true knowl- 
 edge is to form in our minds clear settled notions of 
 things, with names annexed to those determined ideas. 
 These we are to consider with their several relations and 
 habitudes, and not amuse ourselves with floating names 
 and words of indetermined signification which we can 
 use in several senses to serve a turn. It is in the per- 
 ception of the habitudes and respects our ideas have one 
 to another that real knowledge consists, and when a man 
 once perceives how far they agree or dis<agree one with 
 
 •Tho practice hero denoribod was In a cortnln doeroo that of the 
 ancient sophists, whoso dexterity was rivalled by Hudibras. of whom 
 it is said, that 
 
 " On pithor side he could dispute, 
 Confute, channe hands, and still confute." 
 The most lively picture of this kind of trifling occurs in the Euthy- 
 demos of Plato, where several of the class are introduced dlsnutinK 
 de omnibus rebu$ In a strain of comic extravagance worthy of Bhak- 
 speare. 
 
40 TUE UNDERSTANDING. 
 
 another, he will be able to judge of what other people 
 say, and will not need to be led by the arguineuts of 
 others, which are many of them nothing but plausible 
 sophistry. Tliis will tench him to state the question 
 right, and see whereon it turns, and thus he will stand 
 upon his own legs, and know by his own understanding. 
 Whereas by collecting and learning arguments by heart, 
 he will be but a retailer to others ; and when any one 
 questions the foundations they are built upon, he will bo 
 ilt a nonplus, and be fain to give up his implicit knowU 
 edge. 
 
 IG. JJastt. — Labor for labor-sake is against nature.* 
 The undortstunding, as wt-ll as all the otlier faculties, 
 choobt'S always the shurti'ttt way to its end, would pri's- 
 ontly obtaiit the knowlodgo it is al^out, and then sot 
 upon some new inquiry. lUit thid, whether laziness ur 
 haste, often misleads it and makes it content itself with 
 improper ways uf search, and such as will not serve the 
 turn ; sometimes it rests upon testimony when testimony 
 of right has nothing to do, because it is easier to believe 
 than tube Hcientiilcully instructed; sometimes it con- 
 tents itself with one argument, and rewts Hatinlled with 
 that as it were a demonstration, whereas the thing under 
 proof is not capable of demonstration, and thurefoio 
 must be submitted to the trial of probabilities, and all 
 the material arguments pro and con bo examined and 
 brought to a balance. In some cases the mind is deter- 
 mined hy probable topics in inquiries whore demonstra- 
 ti(»n nn^y be had. All these, and several others, which 
 la."iness, impatience, custom, and want of use and ntten- 
 tion lead n)en into, are misapplications of the under- 
 standing in the search of trutli. In every question, the 
 nature and manner of the proof it is capable of should 
 be considered, to make our inquiry su(;h as it should be. 
 This would save a great deal of frequently misemployed 
 pains, and lead us sooner to that discovery and posses- 
 sion of truth we are capable of. The multiplying variety 
 of arguments, especially frivolous ones, such as are all 
 that are merely verbal, is not oidy lost labor, but cum- 
 
 ♦ This is tho maxim of an indolout man, and examined by the 
 strict rules of philosophy will turn out to bo a mere fullucv; fur in 
 many thintjs we may with an ancient writer rtipeat " Labor i|)Mi 
 voluptas." In fact employment for employment's sake is eo far 
 from beint; against nature, that it is a thiuu we may everv day wit- 
 ness, though I will not deny that there are seasous iu wbiub happi- 
 uess appears to consist in the dolcefar nteiUe. 
 
OF rilE CONDUCT OF 41 
 
 K»-..-8 llio moniory to no purpose, <aiul servea only to hinder 
 it from seizing and liolding of the truth in all those cases 
 which are capable of demonstration. In such a way of 
 proof, the truth an<l certainty is seen, and the mindfully 
 possesses itself of it, when in the other way of assent it 
 only hovers about it, is amused with uncertainties. In 
 this superficial way, indeed, the mind is capable of more 
 variety of plausible talk, but is not enlarged, as it should 
 be, in its knowledge. It is to this same haste and im- 
 patience of the mind .also, that a not due tracing of the 
 arguments to their true foundation is owing; men see a 
 little, presume a great deal, and so jump to the conclusion. 
 This is a short way to fancy and conceit, and (if firmly 
 embraced) to opinionatry, but is certainly the farthest 
 way about to knowledge. For he that will know, must 
 by the connection of the proofs see the truth and the 
 ground it stands on ; and therefore if he has for haste 
 skipped over what he should have examined, he must begin 
 and go over all again, or else he will never come to 
 knowledge. 
 
 17. iJesultory. — Another fault of as ill consequence 
 as this, which proceed? also from laziness, with a mixture 
 of vanity, is the skipping from one sort of knowledge to 
 another.* Some men's tempers are quickly weary of 
 one thing. Constancy and assiduity is what they cannot 
 bear; the same stmly long continued in is as intolerable 
 to them, as the appearing long in the same clothes or 
 fashion is to a court-lady. 
 
 •On thi^ siihjoct vorv oxoollont oliBorvntions aro found soatterod 
 horo ond thoro f lir<>\iKh Lord IJiicon's writincs. In one of his opus- 
 (Mdn, outitlod " Holns for the Intollcetual rowers," ooi-ura tho raw 
 niatorial, aftorwanfs polisUod and oonvertod into a brilliant aphor- 
 ism In tlio " Advancemont of LoarninK" In tho former place he 
 say«: " ExorciHPs are to ho framed to the life: that Is to say, to work 
 ability in that kind whereof a man In the eoiirso of notion shall have 
 most use- The indirect and oblinuo exercises, which Ao per partes 
 and per ronnequenfiam, enable thoir faculties, which perhaps direct 
 exercise at first would but distort; and these have chiefly place 
 where tho faculty is weak, not per se but per nccidens ; as If want of 
 memory grow through licntnessof wit and want of fixed attention: 
 thon tho mathomatics or tho law helpoth. because they are thlnRS, 
 wherein if lh«» mind once roam, it cannot recover." (Works, vol. v. 
 |>. M29, et sor|.) In tho other passage to which I have referred, his 
 ideas acquire the followinR shape: '^ There is do defect in the facul- 
 ties Intellectual, but seemeth to have a nnipor cure contnlned in 
 the sumo studies: as for example, If a child »>e bird-wilted, that Is, 
 hath not the faculty of attention, the mathematics giveth a remedy 
 thereunto: for in them, if the wit be caueht away but a moment, 
 one Is to boKin anew. And as sciences nave a propriety toward 
 faculties for cure ar^d help, so faculties or powers nave a sympathy 
 towards sciences for oxcellency or speedy proHtlni?; and therefore 
 It is an Inquiry of Kr«at wisdom, what kinds of wits and natures are 
 raoat apt and proper for what scltntsca." (Advancement of I^eara* 
 
42 THE UNDERSTANDING. 
 
 18. Smattering. — Others, that they may seem uni* 
 versally knowing, get a little smattering in everything. 
 Both these may till their heads with superficial notions 
 of things, but are very much out of the way of attaining 
 truth or knowledge. 
 
 19. UnioersalUy, — I do not here speak against the 
 taking a taste of every sort of knowledge; it is certainly 
 very useful and necessary to form the mind ; but then 
 it must be done in a different way and to a different end. 
 Not for talk and vanity to fill the head with shreds of 
 ill kinds, that he who is possessed of such frippery may 
 be able to match the discourses of all he shall meet with 
 us if nothing could come amiss to him, and iiis head was 
 so well stored a magazine that nothing could be proposed 
 which he was not master of, and was readily furnished 
 to entertain any one on.* This is an excellency indeed 
 and a great one too, to have a real and true knowledge 
 in all or most of the objects of contemplation. lUit it isj 
 what the miikd of one and the same man can hardly 
 attain unto, and the in.stances are so few of those who 
 have in any measure approached towards it, that I know 
 not whether they are to be proposed as examples in the 
 ordinary conduct of the understanding. For a man to 
 understand fully the buaiiiessvf his particular calling in 
 the commonwealth, and of religion, which is his calling 
 as he is a man in the world, is usually enough to take up 
 his whole time : and there are few that inform them- 
 selves in these, which is every man's proper and peculiar 
 business, so to the bottom as they should do. lint though 
 this be so, and there are very few men that extend their 
 thoughts towards universal knowledge, yet I do not 
 doubt but if the right way were taken, and the methods 
 of inquiry were ordered as they should be, men of little 
 business and great leisure might go a great deal further 
 in it than is usually done. To turn to the business in 
 hand, the end and use of a little insight in those parts 
 of knowledge which are not a man's proper business, is 
 to accustom our minds to all sorts of ideas, and the 
 proper ways of examining their habitudes and relations. 
 
 ♦ Locko, tlioro eau bo littlo doubt, hnr(» Klunci^s at tb« praetli'n of 
 tho sophists, more piirticuliirly of Oooruiiis, wbo boasts iu I'bilo, 
 that for iiiiiny yefirsriootio bus prupostMl birii usiiiKle lunvtiiiostiou. 
 ' WifOf), S) XaifX(pu>v, Kal XAp vvi> Sif) ainii raOra iwyiyytWifxrjv, nal 
 7^w 6ri oiidiUixi wu i}pdiTr\K( Kaivbv oiiSiv iroWCiv iruir. Vof^f, 
 (Qp. III. 4.) Hoe also Cic. do Otut. iii. ;V4. 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OP 43 
 
 This gives the mind .1 freedom, and tlic exercising the 
 understanding in the several ways of inquiry and reason- 
 ing which the most skilful have made use of, teaches the 
 mind sagaciiy and wariness, and a suppleness to apply 
 itself more closely and dexterously to the bents and turns 
 of the matter in all its researches.* Besides, this uni- 
 versal taste of all the sciences with an indifferency be- 
 fore the mind is possessed with any one in particular, 
 and grown into love and admiration of what is made its 
 darling, will prevent another evil very commonly to be 
 observed in those who have from the beginning been 
 seasoned only by one part of knowledge. Let a man 
 be given up to the contemplation of one sort of knowl- 
 edge, and that will become everything. The mind will 
 take such a tincture from a familiarity with that object, 
 that everything else, how remote soever, will be brought 
 under the same view. A metaphysician will bring 
 ploughing and gardening immediately to abstract 
 notions, the history of nature shall signify nothing to 
 him.t An Jilchemist, on the contrary, shjill reduce 
 
 • Sumo cront writers, obsorvinctho connection which siibsists be- 
 tween all branches of knowledce, have contended that there is but 
 one sf lence, that of nature, and that it behooves the philosopher to 
 bo versed in the whole. This opinion was put forward by Condillac. 
 and appears to have been shared by IbifTon: i>iitCicoro, thouch he 
 well understood the relationship of the scienees, and conceived that 
 the perfeet orator ought to comprehend every one of them, saw no 
 advantage In this paradoxi<'al view of the subjeet. Several eurioiis 
 remarks l)earlni: immediatelyon the question mnv be found in that 
 very rare book, " I,o Voyaue a stonfbar," wliich, thouch I may else- 
 where have (luoted them, will not lie out of place here. "II me 
 rt'pondit," observes Herault de StVhelles. "qu'd ne faiilalt lire quo 
 les ouvraces prineipanx, mais les lire dans tons les cenres et dans 
 toutes les sciences, narcenu'elles sont parentes. comme <lit Cieeron, 
 pnrco que les vties de I'une peiivr'nts'appllquor iM'autre, quoi(iu'on 
 ne so|t pas destinf'* iV les exercer toutes. Ainsi, meme pour un jurl.s- 
 eonsulte, la connaissanee de I'art militaire. et do ses principales 
 opf^rations, ne serait pas inutile. Cost ce (jue j'ai fait, mtf aisait 
 I'auteur de I'histoiro naturelle: au fond I'Abb*? de C<indillac n fort 
 bien flit, h la ti'-te de sont quatrii^me volume ducoursdY'ducation. si 
 je no me trompe. (jn'il n'v a qu'une seulo science, la science de la na- 
 ture. M. do Buffon etait nu meme avis, sans citer I'Abb^ de Condillac, 
 qu'll n'ftlnio pas, ayant en jadls des discussions poli'miquos avcc, 
 lui: mais il ponso (jue toutes nos divisions et classifications sont 
 arbitraire; riue les matheniatiqu<5s elles-memos no sont que dea 
 arts qui tendont nu memo b»it. colul do B'appliquor A la nature, et 
 de la faire connaltre; qtie cela ne nouaeftrayo point au fiurplu«. 
 Ijos livres capitnux dans chaque cenre sont rares, et au total lis 
 pfiurralent nent-etre.se W'duire & uno cinquantaiDe d'ouvrages qu'll 
 8ufT\rait de nien mf^diter." (p. 52 et .seq.) 
 
 t In the same spirit the musical philosophers of Greece snppo.sed 
 the human soul to be nothintr but harmony; and in modem times 
 the ardent students of astrolojfy. Cardan among others, have 
 attempted to explain by their pretended seience the historical facta 
 of Bcrlpture. (8ee Buhle. Hist, de la Phil. Mod. 11. 738.) In like 
 manner a wild enthusiast of our own day Imagines himself able to 
 eiplaln all the mysteries ot nature and revelation by means of a 
 
44 THE UNDERSTANDING, 
 
 divinity to the maxims of his laboratory ; explain 
 morality by sal, sulphur and mercury, and allegorize the 
 scripture itself, and the sacred mysteries thereof, into 
 the philosopher's stone. And I heard once a man who 
 had a more than ordinary excellency in music seriously 
 accommodate Moses's seven days of the first week to the 
 notes of music, as if from thence had been taken the 
 measure and method of the creation. It is of no small 
 consequence to keep the mind from such a possession, 
 which I think is best done by giving it a fair and equal 
 view of the whole intellectual world, wherein it may see 
 the order, rank, and beauty of the whole, and give a just 
 allowance to the distinct provinces of the several sciences 
 in the due order and usefulness of each of them. 
 
 If this be that which old men will not tiiink neces- 
 sary, nor be easily brought to, it is fit at least that it 
 should be practiced in the breeding of the young. The 
 business of education, as I have already observed, is nut 
 as I think to make them perfect in any one of the 
 sciences, but so to open and dispose of their minds as 
 may best make them capable of any when they shall 
 apply themselves to it. If men are for a long time 
 
 Httlo movablo triunj,'lo. Ho soob nothing in hoavon or in earth hut 
 triiinglos. Buth politics and ielit,'iou «wurni with llyuros of tho 
 kind, uud thore is no diltltultvin uday sfiuuro whii'h may not l>o 
 at onoo romoviul liy nieaus of his WMudroiis iustruniont Another 
 Boutloinan, Mr. Wirginun, ulso in lovo witli triangicH, but in i-lowi 
 ussoeialion with eirclos, tMid(^avor.s to fainiliarizo to th« minds of 
 fhildrcu liy mmins of sunsililo llguroS Iho loftiest truths of ontology. 
 Tli« hotter to recommend his tniMiry, he has transiateil his whole 
 
 iihiJosophy of senso into a Hong, and si4 it to the tune of " Tlighland 
 iadilio" Auaiii, u printer turning i>reailier convtirted the ideas 
 ohtained by his former experience Intoillustrationsof the truths In* 
 pnx'laimed in his new cailint,'. Ho represcwited human life under 
 tho allegory of a »'omi>ltHo sentence: cliildhood, in this ingouious 
 vitnv of things, was a comma; youth a semicolon: manhoc.il ii 
 colon: umlileath a full stop. Even Franklin, the lirst philosopher of 
 Amcfrioa, was fain nn a very solemn occasion, to indidge in thi.s 
 quaint humor. Most readiMs, I imagine, are already well ac- 
 yuaiutodwith thu f(jllowing epitaph which ho wrote for himself: 
 
 The Bo<ly 
 
 of 
 
 Boujamin Franklin, 
 
 Printer, 
 
 (Liko tho cover of an olil book) 
 
 Its<'ontents torn out, 
 
 And stript of its lettering and gilding,) 
 
 Lies horo food fur worms ; 
 
 Yot the work itself shall not be lost, 
 
 For it will (as he believed) appear once more 
 
 In a new 
 
 And more beautiful edition, 
 
 Corrected and amended 
 
 by 
 
 The Author. 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 46 
 
 accustomed only to one sort or method of thoughts, 
 their mitids grow stiff in it, and do not reudily turn to 
 another.* It is therefore to give them this freedom that 
 1 think they should be made to look into all sorts of 
 knowledge, and exercise their understandings in so wide 
 a variety and stock of knowledge. liut I do not propose 
 it as a variety and stock of knowledge, but a variety and 
 freedom of thinking, as an increase of the powers and 
 activity of the mind, not as an enlargement of its posses- 
 sions. 
 
 20. Jieaditig, — This is that which I think great 
 readers are apt to be mistaken in. Those who have 
 read of everything are thought to understand every- 
 thing too, but it is not always so. Heading furnishes 
 the mind only with materials of knowletlge, it is thitik- 
 ing makes what wo read ours. We arc of the ruminat- 
 ing kind, and it is not enough to cram ourselves with a 
 great load of collections ; unless we chew them over 
 again they will not give us strength and nourishment. 
 There are indeed in s(»nie writers visible instance of 
 deep thoughts, close and acute reasoning, and ideas well 
 pursued.* The light these would give would be of 
 great use if their reader would observe and imitate 
 them ; all the rest at best are but particulars fit to be 
 turned into knowledge, but that can be done only by 
 our own meditation and examining the reach, force, <ind 
 coherence of what is said, and then as far as we ap- 
 prehend and see the connection of ideas so far it is ours; 
 without that it is but so much loose matter floating in 
 
 • Tho evils of n narrow «yn(om of odiicntion and Rtmly are no- 
 whfTO porhaps nion> visible than in the niontal habits of artists, 
 and profossioiinl men noufrally. Ari'iistuniod to one i-lass of ideas, 
 and with these bocomlnK by nse familiar, they f>ften remain almost 
 wholly iKHorant of other thincs; ami are eonseijuently regarded hy 
 philosophers and men of eiilarue<l experioneo as little better, out 
 of their own peculiar walk, than wo many childron. lirilliant ox- 
 coptions there have been, and always will be; but these only sorvo 
 by oontniHt to render tho condition of thoir a8Soelat<>H tho moro 
 remarkable. 
 
 * Tho art o( reading therefore Is no euarantoo that civilization 
 shall continue. The intelleettial condition of manliind de|>end8 
 upon their taste, which Is alway.4 (luctuatlnK; so that we need not 
 wonder at finding the Oreek« and Uomans sinkincto l)arbarism, 
 with Thueydides, riato, Demosthenes, ('icero and Tacitus on their 
 shelves, or In their hands. Amonu tho Burmese, the art of reading 
 l.s almost universal, but as tho books they Iouuko. over are trifling 
 and worthless, no habit.s of .study aro entrendored, and civilization 
 always remains in Its infancy. Nay, it is (niito possible for a nation 
 to retrograde towards tho savago state with HhaKspeare and Milton, 
 and IJacou and Locke constantly before their eyes. The question 
 always Is, do we read in search of wisdom, or simply to bo amused? 
 When the latt«r It the case, we are not far from aeoond ohlldhood< 
 
46 TUE UNDERSTANDING. 
 
 our braiD. The memory may be stored, but the judg- 
 ment is little better, aud the stock of knowledge not 
 increased by being able to repeat what others have said 
 or produce the arguments we have found in them. 
 Such a knowledge as this is but knowledge by hearsay, 
 J\ and the ostentation of it ia at best but talking by rote, and 
 jf very often upon weak and wrong principles. For allthat 
 jy' jpf^Cis to be found in books is not built upon true founda- 
 '^ i/Vi tions, nor always rightly deduced from the principles it 
 ^j> ^ , is protended to be built on. Such an examen as is 
 requisite to discover, that every reader's mind is not 
 forward to make, especially in those who have given 
 themselves up to a party, and only hunt for what they 
 can scrape together that may favor and support the 
 tenets of it. Such men wilfully exclude themselves 
 from truth, and from all true benefit to be received by 
 reading. Others of more indifforency often want atten- 
 tion and industry. The mind is backward in itself to 
 be at the pains to trace every argument to its original, 
 and to see upon what basis it stands and how firmly ; 
 but yet it is this that gives so much the advantage to 
 one man more than another in reading. The mind 
 should by severe rules be tied down to this, at first, 
 uneasy task: use and exercise will give it facility. So 
 that those who are accustomed to it readily, as it were 
 with one cast of the eye, take a view of the argument, 
 and presently, in most cases, see where it bottoms. 
 Thuse who have got this faculty, one may say, have got 
 the true key of books, and the clue to lead them through 
 the niizmaze of variety of opinions and authors to truth 
 and certainty. This young beginners should be entered 
 in, and showed the use of, that they might profit by their 
 reading. Those who are strangers to it will be apt to 
 think it . )o great a clog in the way of men's studies, 
 and they will suspect they shall make but small progress 
 if in the books they read they must stand to examine 
 and unravel every argument, and follow it step by 8te[> 
 up to its original. 
 
 I answer, this is a good objection, and ought to weigh 
 with those whose reading is designed for much talk and 
 little knowledge, and I have nothing to say to it.* liut 
 I am here inquiring into the conduct of the understand- 
 
 ♦ Tliis 0(11)1 conttinu't stiiWosraore forcibly at the root of the fallacy 
 th&D u tlioUHuud ariiumeata. 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 47 
 
 ing in its progress towards knowledge ; and to those 
 who aim at that I may say, that he who fair and softly 
 goes steadily forward in a course that points right, will 
 sooner he at his journey's end than he that runs after 
 every one he meets, though he gallop all day full speed.* 
 
 To which let mo add, that this way of thinking on 
 and profiting by what we read will be a clog and rub to 
 any one only in the beginning: when custom and exer- 
 cise have made it familiar, it will be despatched on moat 
 occasions without resting or interruption in the course 
 of our reading. The motions and views of a mind exer- 
 cised that way are wonderfully quick, and a man used to 
 such sort of reflections sees as much at one glimpse as 
 would require a long discourse to lay before another, and 
 make out in an entire and gradual deduction. Besides 
 that, when the first difficulties are over the delight and 
 sensible advantage it brings mightily encourages and 
 enlivens the mind in reading, which without this is very 
 improperly called study. 
 
 21. Intermediate Principles. — As a help to this, I 
 think it may be proposed, that for the saving the long 
 progression of the thoughts to remote and first prin- 
 ciples in every case, the mind should provide it several 
 stages ; that is to say, intermediate principles which it 
 might have recourse to in the examining those positions 
 that come in its way. These, though they are not oelf- 
 evident principles, yet if they have been made out from 
 them by a wary and unquestionable deduction, may be 
 depended on as certain and infallible truths and serve 
 as unquestionable truths to prove other points depend- 
 ing on them by a nearer and shorter view than remote 
 Jind general, maxims. " These may serve as landmarks 
 to show what lies in the direct way of truth, or is quite 
 beside it. And thus mathematicians do, who do not in 
 every new problem run it back to the first axioms, 
 through all the whole train of intermediate propositions. 
 Certain theorems that they have settled to themselves 
 upon sure demonstration, serve to resolve to them mul- 
 titudes of propositions which depend on them, and areas 
 firmly made out from thence as if the mind went afresh 
 over every link of the whole chain that ties them to first 
 self-evident principles. Only in other sciences great 
 
 • I owB mysf^lf partial, like Martin Luther, to the .Xsoplan school 
 of wiBdom, so that the reader will perhnpn pardon my almpUoltr U 
 I bore refor to the fable of the Hare and the TortotN, 
 
48 THE UNDBBaTAIfDING. 
 
 care is to be taken that they establiflh those interme* 
 diate principles with as much caution, exactness, and 
 indiiTerericy as mathetuaticians use in the settling any 
 cf their great theorems. When this is not done, but 
 men take up the principles in this or that science upon 
 credit, inclination, interest, etc., in haste, without due 
 examination and most unquestionable proof, they lay a 
 trap for themselves, and as much as in them lies, captivate 
 their understandings to mistake falsehood and error. 
 
 22. Partiality. — As there is a partiality to opinions, 
 it^hich, as we have alreudy observed, is apt to mislead 
 the understanding, so tliere is often a partiality to studies 
 which is prejudicial also to knowledge and improvement. 
 Those sciences wljich men are particularly versed in they 
 are apt to value and extol, as if that part of knowledge 
 which every one has acquainted himself with were that 
 alone which was worth the having, and all the rest were 
 idle and empty amusements, comparatively of no use or 
 importance. This is the effect of ignorance and not 
 knowledge, the being vainly puffed up with a flatulency 
 arising from a weak and narrow comprehension. It is 
 not amiss that every one should relish the science that 
 he has made his peculiar study ; a view of its beauties 
 and a sense of its usefulness carry a man on with the 
 more delight and warmth in Yhe pursuit and improve- 
 ment of it. But the contempt of all other knowledge, 
 as if it were nothing in comparison of law or physic, of 
 astronomy or chemistry, or perhaps some )'et meaner part 
 of knowledge wherein I have got some smattering or am 
 somewhat advanced, is not only the mark of a vain or 
 little mind, but does this prejudice in the conduct of the 
 understanding, that it coops up within narrow bounds', 
 and hinders it looking abroad into other provinces of 
 the intelleciual world, more beautiful possibly, and more 
 fruitful than that which it had till then labored in, 
 wherein it might find, besides new knowledge, ways or 
 hints whereby it might be enabled the better to culti- 
 vate its own. 
 
 23. Theology. — There is indeed one science (as they 
 are now distinguished) incomparably above all the rest, 
 where it is not by corruption narrowed into a trade or 
 faction for mean or ill ends and secular interests ; I 
 mean theology, which, containing the knowledge of 
 God and his creatures, our duty to him ard our fellow- 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 49 
 
 crciitures, and a view of our present and future state, is 
 the comprehension of all other knowledge directed to its 
 true end ; i.e., the honor and veneration of the Creator and 
 the happiness of mankind.* This is that noble study 
 which is every niati's duty, and every one that can be 
 called a rational creature is capable of. The works of 
 nature and the words of revelation display it to man- 
 kind in characters so large and visible, that those who 
 are not quite blind may in them read and see the first 
 principles and most necessary parts of it, and from 
 thence, as they h.-ive time and industry, may be enabled 
 to go on to the more .ibstruse parts of it, and penetrate 
 into those infinite depths filled with the treasures of 
 wisdom and knowledge. This is that science which 
 would truly enlarge men's minds were it studied or per- 
 mitted to be studied everywhere with that freedom, love 
 of truth, and charity which it teaches, and were not 
 made, contrary to its nature, the occasion of strife, fac- 
 tion, malignity, and narrow impositions. I shall say no 
 more here of this, but that it is undoubtedly a wrong 
 
 • Pinto, as Looko lilmsolf olsowhore observes, had even in Pnfran 
 times discovered that tlie hnpi>inpss of man consists in knowinK 
 Ood. Properly spcakinu indcc(l his whole philosophy Is based on 
 this conviction, and its object Is to raise and pvirlfy man so as to fit 
 him for the attainment of this knowledpe. St- Aupustine eocs one 
 step further, and conceives the love of God to be the crent wellsprinK 
 of human felicity. "I love thee, O my God I" he exclaims, ' thou 
 hast smitten my heart with thy word, and I have love<l thee. Nay, 
 the heavens and the earth, and all things contained therein, ad- 
 monish me on every side that I should love thee ; and thoy cease 
 not to say the same to all men also, so that they are inexcusable if 
 they do not love thee. But what do I love, when I love thee ? Not 
 the beauty of a body ; not the ttrace and comeliness of time ; not the 
 brightness of licht (and yet, O how friendly and agreeable is that 
 to these eyes! ) : not the sweet melodies of well-composed songs, nor 
 the fragrant odors of flowers, or unguents or costly spices; not 
 manna; not honey; not the embraces of the dearest and most 
 lovely person : these are not the things that I love, wb«n I love my 
 Ocvl. And yet I love a certain lighti and a certain voiae, and a cer- 
 tain grateful odor, and a certain food, and a kind of embracemont 
 when I love my God; the true light, the melody, the food, the satis- 
 f.action and einbracement of my Inward man. When that shines to 
 my soul which no place can contain: when that sounds which no 
 time can snatch away; when that scents which no wind can dis- 
 perse and scatter abroad: when I taste that which eating cannot 
 diminish : when I cleave to that which no fullness, no satiety, can 
 force away,— this is that which I love, when I lov« my God- And 
 what Is this? I asked the earth, and It said. I am not. I a.sked the 
 sea. and the deeps, and all living creatures, and they answered. 
 Wo are not thy God ; look above us, and Innuire after him. for here 
 he Is not. I asked the air. and all its inhabitants, yea, the heavens, 
 the sun, moon and stars, and thoy confessed, We are not him whom 
 thy soul soeketh. And I spake to all things whatsoever that stand 
 round about the gates of my flesh, saying, le tell me that re are not 
 my Ood, but tell mo something of him. And they all cried out with 
 a loud voice, ' He made us I ' " The translation here used is Bishop 
 Patrick's, in bis Advice to a Friend, p. 85, et seq. The original ocean 
 la the GoutessioDs. 
 
50 raiB UNDERSTANDING. 
 
 use of my understanding to make it the rule and meas- 
 ure of another man's, a use wliich it is neither fit for 
 nor capable of.* 
 
 24. Partiality. — This partiality, where it is not per- 
 mitted an authority to render all other studies insig- 
 nificant or contemptible, is often indulged so far as to be 
 relied upon and made use of in other parts of kubwl- 
 edge to which it does not at all belong, and wherewitli 
 it has no manner of affinity. Some men have so used 
 their heads to mathematical figures, that in giving apref- 
 ei-ence to the methods of that science, they introduce lines 
 and diagrams into their study of divinity or politic inqui- 
 ries, as if nothing could be known without them^ and 
 others accustomed to retired speculations run natiirul 
 philosophy into mctaphysicfil notions and the abscract 
 generalities of logic : and how ofteij may one nu'et with 
 religion and morality treated of in the ternts of th« 
 laboratory, and thought to bo improved by the method* 
 and notions of chemistry V t ^^"t he that will take caro 
 of the conduct of his understanding, to direct it rij,'lit 
 to the knowledge of things, must avoid those undue 
 mixtures, and not by a fDudness for what he has found 
 useful and necessary in one, transfer it to another 
 Kcience, where it serves only to perplex and confound 
 the understanding. It is a certain truth that " res 
 nolunt male administrari ; " it is no less certain "res 
 nolunt male intelligi." Things themselves are to be 
 considered as they are in tliemselves, and then they will 
 show us in wiiat way tliey are to be understood. For 
 to have right conceptions about them we must bring 
 our understandings to the inflexible nature and unalter- 
 able relations of things, and not endeavor to bring 
 things to any j)reconeeived notions of our own. 
 
 There is another partiality very commonly observ- 
 able in men of study no less prejudicial or ridiculous 
 than the former, and that is a fantastical aiul wild at- 
 tributing all knowledge to the ancients alone, or to the 
 
 • Tho roador will perhaps remark that what is hero said of theol- 
 ogy is a digrussiou evideutly iiisorted after the completion i)f thu 
 rest of tho book ; for " this partiality," evidently. In tho order of thn 
 author's oriirinal thoughts, followed immediately after " its owiii" 
 the wordn with which boctiou 22 concludes. 
 
 t It will lie observed, both hero and olsnwhore, that Locko is ex- 
 ceodiuKly liable to repeat himself. Of this defect he was very sen- 
 siblo, as aj)j)oar.s from his ctirrespoiidnnco witJi Mr. Molyiifitv 
 respecting the Essay on tho Human Undorstaudintf. (Work.N f"l. 
 1. vol. iii, p. 603.) See ante, 8 lu. 
 
or rut: coNtmcr or r,i 
 
 moderns. This raving upon antiquity in natter of 
 poetry, Horace has wittily described and exposed in 
 one of his satires.* The same sort of madness may 
 be found in reference to all the other sciences. Some 
 will not admit an opinion not authorized by men of old, 
 who were then all giants in knowledge. f Nothing is 
 is to be put into the treasury of truth or knowledge 
 which has not the stamp of Greece or Rome upon it, 
 and since their days will scarce allow that men have 
 been able to see, think or write. Others, with a like 
 extravagancy, contemn all that the ancients have left us, 
 and being taken with the modern inventions and discover- 
 ies, lay by all that went before, as if whatever is called 
 old must have the deoay of time upon it, and truth too 
 were liable to mould and rottenness. Men I think 
 have been much the same for natural endowments in 
 all times. Fashion, discipline, and education hrtve put 
 eminent differences in the ages of several countries : and 
 made one generation much differ from another in arts 
 
 • The witty nassfipo of thn Romnn satirist, to which Locke here 
 refers, oociirs in Papist. I. i. 34, ct w>a. It Is snmpwhat too lonjc to 
 be luRortpd ••ntlro, hut I Bubjoiii n few vorscH from Crooch's rough 
 but vigorous traiiKlation:— 
 
 " If lenRth of time will hotter vorsc liko wino. 
 Give it a briskf^r tasto. aud inako it line : 
 Corno tell inf» then, 1 would he gladly showed, 
 ' How many years will make a poem Rood: 
 One poot writ an hundred years ajro 
 What, is lio old. and therefore famed, or no? 
 Or Is ho now, and therefore bold appears? 
 Let's Mx upon a certain term of y<>ars. 
 He's yood that lived an hundre<i years aco. 
 Another wants hut ono. Is he so too ? 
 Or is ho now, and damned for that alone? 
 Well, he's pood too, and old. that wants bnt one. 
 And thus f II arpue on. and bate one mi>re. 
 And so by one and one waste all the store: 
 Aud so confute him, who esteems by years, 
 A noem'.s coodness from the date it bears, 
 Who not admires, nor yet aiiproves a line, . 
 But what is ohi, and death hath made divine." 
 On this snbiei-t Pindar dilTorcd very widely from the Romans, for 
 he prcferreu old wino and new sontrs. 
 
 1 The error hero exposed sprinps up very naturallv from the 
 fanlty Bchemes of study which have been above described. They 
 who devote themselves exchisi vely to the rea<llnR of ancient authors 
 necessarily consider them the best. The same thing is tnie of tho 
 lovers of modern times. It is only by impartially considorlne and 
 comparinK both that men can arrive at right conclusions. In the 
 present day tho admirers of antiquity are few, and there Is little 
 dauRer of their IncreasinK; but anions: them wo must reckon M. 
 H<>hoDl, the historian of Ancient Literature, who neems to Imajdne 
 that while orisrinal Konius fell to the lot of the Greeks, the moderns 
 have merely received for their iwrtlon the spirit of criticism. 
 
 IHIat do la Lit Orecouo, Int pp. 18 and 22. 1 Ho know nothing, it 
 B to be presumed, of Shakospoare, or Milton, or Ben Jonson. Beau-, 
 moDt and Fletcher, Dryden or Pope, though be should have beea 
 acquainted with the uame of Leibnitz. 
 
52 THE UNDERaTANDlNO. 
 
 and sciences: but truth is always the same; time altera 
 it not, nor is it the better or worse for being of ancient 
 or modern tradition. Many were eminent in former 
 ages of the world for their discovery and delivery of it ; 
 but though the knowledge they have left us be worth 
 our study, yet they exhausted not all its treasure ; they 
 left a great deal for the industry and sagacity of after- 
 ages, and so shall we. That was once new to them 
 which any one now receives with veneration for its 
 antiquity, nor was it the worse . for appearing as a 
 novelty; and that which is now embraced for its new- 
 ness will to posterity be old. but not thereb}' be less 
 true or less genuine.* There is no occasion on this 
 accou!jt to oppose the ancients and the moderns to one 
 another, or to be squeamish on either side. He that 
 wisely conducts his mind in the pursuit of knowledge, 
 will gather what lights and get what helps he can from 
 either of them, from whom they are best to be had, 
 without adoring the errors or rejecting the truth which 
 he may find mingled in them. 
 
 Another partiality d ay be observed in some to vulgar, 
 in others to heterodox tenets; some are apt to conclude 
 that what is the common opinion cannot but be true ; 
 so many men's eyes they think cannot but see right; so 
 many men's understandings 'of all sorts cannot be 
 deceived, and therefore will not venture to look beyond 
 the received notions of the place and age, nor have so 
 presumptuous a thought as to be wiser than their neigh- 
 bors. They are content to go with the crowd, and so 
 go easily, which they think is going right, or at least 
 serves them as well. But however, "vox populi vox 
 Dei " has prevailed as a maxim, yet I do not remember 
 whether God delivered his oracles by the multitude, or 
 nature truths by the herd. On the other side, some 
 fly all common opinions as either false or frivolous. 
 The title of many-headed beast is a sufficient reason to 
 them to conclude that no truths of weight or consequence 
 
 • In nnothor work I have romarkod that " when Mr. Benthani pub- 
 lished his DofoDCO of Usury, almost llfty years aeo, he was treated 
 as a visionary, and his uotlon.i wore despised. Time wont on. and 
 In the course of thirty or forty years some few came up with Mr. 
 Bcntham's position, aaid fonna it no longer so absurd as it had ap- 
 peared through the mist jf distance. Meanwhile the philosopher 
 was stretching away be'.>'.o them, inventing and discovering, and 
 still appearing in his new nonitlons as ludicrous as in the matter of 
 usury. When they cvoitaKe him again, they may again find him 
 rational," lAnat. of Koc \-A. i. p. 62.) 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 63 
 
 can be lodged there.* Vulgar opinions are suited to 
 %'ulgar capacities, and adapted to the end of those that 
 govern. t He that will know the truth of things must 
 leave the common and beaten track, which none but 
 weak and servile minds are satisfied to trudge along con- 
 tinually in. Such nice palates relish nothing but 
 strange notions quite out of the way : whatever is com- 
 monly received has the mark of the beast on it, and they 
 think it a lessening to them to hearken to it or receive 
 it: their mind runs only after paradoxes; these they 
 seek, these they embrace, these only they vent, and so 
 as they think distinguish themselves from the vulgar. 
 But common or uncommon are not the marks to di.s- 
 tinguish truth or falsehood, ajid therefore should not be 
 any bias to us in our inquiries. We should not judge 
 of things by men's opinions, but of opinions by things. 
 The multitude reason but ill, and therefore may be well 
 suspected, and cannot be relied on nor should be fol- 
 lowed as a sure guide ; but philosophers who have quitted 
 the orthodoxy of the community and the popular doc- 
 trines of their countries have fallen into as extravagant 
 and as absurd opinions as ever common reception coun- 
 tenanced. It would be madness to refuse to breathe 
 the common airor quench one's thirst with water because 
 the rabble use them to these purposes; and if there are 
 conveniencies of life which common tise reaches not, it 
 is not reason to reject them because they are not grown 
 into the ordinary fashion of the country, and every vil- 
 lager doth not know Ihem.t 
 
 Truth, whether in or out of fashion, is the measure of 
 knowledge and the business of the understanding ; what- 
 soever is besides that, however authorized by consent or 
 recommended by rarity, is nothing but ignorance or 
 something worse. 
 
 ♦ This was the error of Sir ThotnaR Browne and ColerldKo. the 
 latter of whom, as Hazlitt han remarked, had the knack of always 
 preferrinK the unknown to the know^n. 
 
 t An observation worthy of MachlavelH. It has always been the 
 policy of rulers to engender and perpetuate amonc their subjects 
 contempt and hatred of nelehliorlnK nations: and these prejudices 
 may sometime prove useful, as the vulgar notion that one EnRllsh- 
 man can at any time beat two Frenchmen, has often, as Chester- 
 field remarks, led to the achievement The French on the other 
 hand nourish prejudices of the same kind, and a little schoolboy 
 Munchausen once remarked that a French jjiant of his acquaintance 
 had broken an EnKlishman in two like a raw carrot. 
 
 t Cicero somewhere observes that there la no opinion so foolish 
 but that it has obtained the approbation of some one among the 
 philosophers. 
 
54 THE UNJJEKSTANDING, 
 
 Another sort of partiality there is whereby men impose 
 upon themselves, and by it make their reading little 
 useful to themselves, I mean the making use of the opin- 
 ions of writers and laying stress upon their authorities 
 wherever they find them to favor their own opinions. 
 
 There is nothing almost has done more harm to men 
 dedicated to letters than giving the name of study to read- 
 ing, and making a man of great reading to be the same 
 with a man of great knowledge, or at least to be a title 
 of honor. All tiiat can be recorded in writing are only 
 facts or reasonings. Facts are of three sorts : 1. Merely 
 of natural agents observable in the ordinary operations 
 of bodies one upon another, whether in the visible course 
 of things left to themselves, or in experiments made by 
 them, applying agents and patients to one another after 
 a peculiar and artificial manner. 2. Of voluntary agents, 
 more especially the actions of men in society, which 
 makes civil and moral history. 3. Of opinions. 
 
 In these three consists, as it seems to me, that which 
 commonly has the name of learning; to which perhaps 
 some may add a distinct head of critical writings, which 
 indeed at bottom is nothing but matter of fact, and re- 
 solves itself into this, that such a man or set of men 
 used such a word or phrase in such a sense, i. e., that 
 they made such sounds the ni^-ks of such ideas.* 
 
 Under reasonings I comprehend all the discoveries of 
 general truths made by human reason, whether found by 
 intuitiun, demonstration, or probable deductions. And 
 this is that which is, if not alone, knowledge (because 
 the truth or probability of particular propositions maybe 
 known too), yet is, as may be supposed, most p»X)perly 
 the business of those who pretend to improve their under- 
 standings and niake themselves knowing b}' reading. 
 
 Books and reading are looked upon to be the great 
 helps of the understanding and instruments of knowl- 
 edge, as it must be allowed that they are ; and 3'et I 
 beg leave to question whether these do not prove a hin- 
 drance to many, and keep several bookish men from 
 attaining to solid and true knowledge. This I think I 
 m.ay be permitted to say, that there is no part wherein 
 ihe understanding needs a more careful and weary con- 
 
 * This is a very imporftnt defluition of criticism, applying only to 
 ^ne of tho meanest of 5t8 branches. By criticism wo mean thH 
 passiuK of just and accurate judi/monts on worlvs of art, each of 
 which creates a now fact and establishes a new opiniou. 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 66 
 
 duct than in tho use of books, without which they will 
 prove rather innocent ainusenienta than profitable employ- 
 ments of our time, and bring but small additions to our 
 knowledge.* 
 
 There is not seldom to be found," even amongst those 
 who aim at knowledge, who with an unwearied industry 
 employ their whole time in books, who scarcely allow 
 themselves time to cat or sleep, but read, and read, and 
 read on, yet make no great advances in real knowledge, 
 though there be no defect in their intellectual faculties 
 to which their little progress can bo imputed. Themis- 
 t.ike here is, that it is usually supposed that by read- 
 ing, tho author's knowledge is transfused into the reader's 
 understanding; and so it i.o, but not by bare reading, but 
 
 ♦ It rpoiilros nuiPh wisdom to dlpcovor tho trno iisc of rondinu; 
 Imt precisely tho Rnnio thliiK mny bo hi\U\ of ovory otiior rond to 
 knowlfMlco, cnrnmorco with the world Vioinp as little profitable to 
 the careless and iinreflectinc as rondlnR itfself. Tho habit of read- 
 inunnd study Honietlnies Krows In tho most philosophical mlndR 
 Into ft passion. It was thus with IJayle, who siteakInK of tho elTocfH 
 of sturfy upon health, and how much bettor It is to bo satisfied with 
 nioderato application rather than Injure one's constitution, ex- 
 claims, however—" Houroux, jo lo dis oncoro un coup, cehil qui est 
 bI robusto qu'il pout (^tudi<»r miotorze o\\ quinze noures cbaque 
 jour, sans 6tro jamais malado 1 (Diet, Hist, et C'rit. art. Hall. rem. 
 11.) The author of tho discourse on tho Life of Mr, Anoillon, makes 
 spvoral long and judicions comments on his mode of study. H» 
 read, it seems, books of all kinds, romances even, old and new; but 
 it was his opinion that ho derived benefit from them all; and he 
 often used to repeat tho words attributed to VirKil: "Aurum ex 
 sfercoro Knnii oolliKo." In certain careless authors things of a 
 singular nature, ho thonght, were sometiinosto be met with, which 
 could 1)0 foulid nowhere else, liut although ho read all kinds of 
 books, he bestowed application on such only as were important; 
 running through tho lighter sort, as the Latin proverb has it, "sicut 
 canis ad Nilum biliens ot fugians," but perusing the others fre- 
 quently and with exactitude and care. He gathered from the first 
 reading tho general iilea of a book, but looked to the second for the 
 discovery of its beauties. His exact manner of observing what ho 
 rea<l, renderofl iuiifiPH, which many great men have called " the 
 ^oulx nfbnokst," of little or no use to liim ; for he had. besides, a very 
 faithful memory, ami especially that loral memory so valuable to 
 literary men. Ho was not always in tho habit of reading books 
 from l)eginnlng to end : but sometimes chose to search to the bot- 
 tom tho subjects of which they treated, in which case he had to con- 
 sult a number of anthorH. " II vovait souvent la m^mo chose dans 
 difTt^rens ouvrages; mals cola no lo d<5goutalt pas; au contrairo, il 
 disalt que e' (5talt commo autant do nouvellos couches do couleurs 
 qui formalent rid«5o qu'il avail concuo qui la mettaient dans une 
 enth^'ro perfection." Ho had a largo table In tho middle of bis study.' 
 which was usually covered with open books. Tho celebrated Fra 
 I'aolo studied In tho same manner; never discontinuing his ro- 
 searchos until he had made tho comparison of authorities, of places, 
 times, and opinions; ami this ho «lld to free himself from doubt, 
 and from all occasion of again thinking on tho same subject. An- 
 elllon kept a <H)mmonplace book, though Goveau, Balmaslus, Ma- 
 nage, and others stigmatized the practice as mischievous, and an 
 obstAclo to real learning. On this question I am inclined to side 
 with AnclUon and the multitude, though undoubtedly an author 
 may trust to« much to his commonplace t)ook. (Bee Bayle> t 1. art. 
 AncllloD. rem. 0.) 
 
66 THE UNVEIiSTANDINQ. 
 
 by reading and understanding what he wrote. Whereby 
 I mean, not barely comprehending wlmt is affirmed or 
 denied in each proposition (though that great readers 
 do not always think themselves concerned precisely to 
 do), but to see aud follow the train of his reasonings, 
 observe the strength and clearness of their connectiun, 
 and examine upon what they bottom. Without this a 
 man may read the discourses of a very rational author, 
 written in a language and in prupositions that he very 
 well understands, and yet acquire not one jot of his 
 knowledge, which, consisting only in the perceived, 
 certain, or prob.-vble connection of the ideas made use of 
 in his reasonings, the reader's knowledge is no further 
 increased than lie perceives that; so much as he sees (if 
 this connection, so much he knows of the truth or proba- 
 bility of that authi»r's opinions. 
 
 All that he relies on without this perception he takes 
 upon trust, upon the author's credit, without any knowl- 
 edge of it at all. This makes me nut at all wonder to 
 see some men so abouml in citations and build so much 
 upon authorities, it being the sole foundation on which 
 the}' bottom most of their own tenets; so that in effect 
 they have but a second-hand or implicit knowledge,!, e. 
 are in the right if such an one from whoui they 
 borrowed it were in the right in that opinion which 
 they took from him ; wliieh indeed is no knowledge 
 at all. Writers of this or former ages may bo good 
 witnesses of matters of fact which they deliver, which 
 we may do well to take upon their authority; but their 
 credit can go no further than this; it cannot at all 
 atfect the truth and falsehood of opinions which have 
 no other sort of tri.al but reason and j>roof. which they 
 themselves nuide use of to make themselves knowing; 
 and so must others too that will part.ake in their knowl- 
 edge. Indeed it is is an advantage that they have been 
 at the pains to find out the proofs and lay tliem in that 
 .order that may show the truth or jirobahility of their 
 conclusions, and for this we owe them great acknowl- 
 edgments for saving us the pains in searching out 
 those proofs which they have coUei'ted for us, and which 
 possibly after all our pains we might not have found nor 
 been able to have set them in so good a light as that 
 which they left them us in. Upon this account we are 
 mightily beholden to iudicious writers of all ages for 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 67 
 
 those discoveries and discourses they have left behind 
 them for our instruction if we know liow to make a 
 right use of them, which is not to run them over in a 
 hasty perusal, and perhaps lodge their opinions or some 
 remarkable passages in our memories, but to enter into 
 their reasonings, examine their proofs, and then judge 
 of the truth or falseliood, probability or improbability 
 of what they advance, not by any opinion we have 
 entertained of the author, but by the evidence he pro- 
 duces and the conviction he affords us drawn from things 
 themselves. Knowing is seeing, and if it be so, it is 
 madness to persuade ourselves that we do so by another 
 man's eyes, let him use ever so many words to tell us 
 that what he asserts is very visible. Till we ourselves 
 see it with our own eyes and perceive it by our own 
 understandings, we are as much in the dark and as void of 
 knowledge as before, let us believe any learned author 
 as much as we will. 
 
 Euclid and Archimedes are allowed to be knowing 
 and to have demonstrated what they say, and yet who- 
 ever shall read over their writings without perceiving 
 the connection of their proofs, and seeing what they show, 
 though he may understand all their words, yet he is not 
 the more knowing : ho may believe, indeed, but does 
 not know what they say, and so is not advanced one jot 
 in mathematical knowledge by all his reading of those 
 approved mathematicians. 
 
 25. Haste. — The eagerness and strong bent of the 
 mind after knowledge, if not warily regulated, is often 
 a hindrance to it. It still presses into further discov- 
 eries and new objects, and catches .it the variety of 
 knowledge, and therefore often stays not long enough 
 on what is before it to look into it as it should, for haste 
 to pursue what is yet out of sight. He that rides post 
 through a country may be able from the transient view 
 to tell how the general parts lie, and may be able to 
 give some loose description of here a mountain and 
 there a plain, here a morass and there a river, wood- 
 land in one part and savannahs in another. Such 
 superficial ideas and observations as these he may collect 
 in galloping over it; but the more useful observations 
 of the soil, plants, animals, and inhabitants, with their 
 several sorts and properties, must necessarily escape 
 him ; and it is seldom men ever discover the rich mines 
 
68 THM! UNDERSTA^DtNO. 
 
 without 80IU6 digging. Nature commonly lodges her 
 treasure and jewels in rocky ground. If the matter be 
 knotty and the sense lies deep, the mind must stop and 
 buckle to it, and stick upon it with labor and thought 
 and close contemplation, and not leave it till it has 
 mastered the difficulty and got possession of truth. 
 But here care must be taken to avoid the other 
 extreme ; a man must not stick at every useless nicety^ 
 and expect mysteries of science in every trivial question 
 or scruple that he may raise. He that will stand to pick 
 up and examine every pebble that comes in his way, is 
 as unlikely to return enriched and laden with jewels, 
 as the other that travelled full speed. Truths are not 
 the better nor the worse for their obviousness or dif- 
 ficulty, but their value is to be measured by their use- 
 fulness and tenden cy. Insignificant observations should 
 not take up any of our minutes, and those that enlarge 
 our view and give light towards further and useful dis- 
 coveries, should not be neglected, though they stop our 
 course and spend some of our time in a fixed atten- 
 tion. 
 
 There is another haste that does often and will mis- 
 lead the mind if it be left to itself and its own conduct. 
 The understanding is naturally forward, not only to 
 learn its knowledge by variety (which makes it skip 
 over one to get speedily to another part of knowledge), 
 but also eager to enlarge its views by running too fa.st 
 into general observations and conclusions without a due 
 examination of particulars enough whereon to found 
 those general axioms.* This seems to enlarge their 
 stock, but it is of fancies, not realities ; such tlieories ; 
 built upon narrow foundations, stand but weakly, and 
 if they fall not of thoniselves, are at least very hardly 
 to be suj)ported against the assaults of opposition. And 
 thus men being too hasty to erect to themselves general 
 notions and ill-grounded theories, find themselves de- 
 ceived in their stock of knowledge when they come to 
 examine their hastily assumed maxims themselves or 
 to have them attacked by others. General observation.s 
 drawn from particulars are the jewels of knowledge, conj- 
 prehending great store in a little room ; but they are 
 therefore to be made with the greater care and caution, 
 lest if we take counterfeit for true our loss and shame be 
 
 * See ante, uuto 1, p. lo. 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 59 
 
 the greater when our stock comes to a severe scrutiny.* 
 One or two particuhirs may suggest hints of inquiry, 
 and they do well to take those hints ; but if they turn 
 tliem into conclusions, and make them presently general 
 rules, they are forward indeed, but it is only to impose 
 on themselves by propositions assumed for truths with, 
 out sufficient warrant. To make such observations is, 
 as has been already remarked, to make the head a maga^ 
 zine of materials which can hardly be called knowledge, 
 or at least it is but like a collection of lumber not reduced 
 to use or order; and he that makes everything an obser- 
 vation has the same useless plenty and much more false- 
 1»0(k1 mixed with it. The extremes on botli sides are to 
 be avoided, and he will be able to give the best account 
 of his studies who keeps his understanding in the right 
 mean between them. 
 
 26. Anticipation. — Whether it bo aloveof that which 
 brings the first light and information to their minds, 
 and want of vigor and industry to inquire ; or else that 
 men content themselves with any appearance of knowl- 
 edge, right or wrong, which when they have once gob 
 they will hold fast; this is visible, that many men give 
 themselves up to the first anticipations of their minds, 
 and are very tenacious of the opinions that first possess 
 them ; they are as often fond of their first conception as 
 of their first-born, and will by no means recede from the 
 judgment they have once made, or any conjecture or con- 
 ceit which they have once entertained. This is a fauU in 
 the conduct of the understanding, since this firmness or 
 rather stiffness of the mind is not from an adherence to 
 truth, but a submission to prejudice. It is an unreas- 
 onable homage paid to prepossession, whereby we show a 
 reverence not to (what we pretend to seek) truth, but 
 what by liaphazard we chance to light on, be it what it 
 will. This is visibly a preposterotis use of onr faculties, 
 and is a downright prostituting of the mind to resign 
 it thus and put it under the power of the first-comer. 
 This can never be allowed or ought to be followed as a 
 
 • Tho practice on which this »>oautlful flgnro Is founded still pre- 
 vails in the East, and niust always prevail in despotic oountrioH, 
 where men are often com polled by necessity tn couceal all their 
 riches ahout their persons and fly for their lives, SometimeH, where 
 therlRhts of the harem are revered, itreat men heap their wealth 
 In the form of jewels upon females ofthelr family, whoso persons 
 are eenoraliy hold sacred In the East For this reason Warren 
 Hastings' plunder of the Bemim was ro«arded with peculiar abhor* 
 reuce la lodla. 
 
CO TIIK UNDEliSTANDINO, 
 
 riglit way to knowledge, till the understanding (whose 
 business it is to conform itself to what it finds in the 
 objects wit}iuiit)can by its own opinionatry change that, 
 and make the unalterable nature of things comply with 
 its own hasty determinations, which will never be. 
 Whatever we fancy, tilings keep their course, and the 
 habitudes, correspondences, and relations keep the same 
 to one another. 
 
 27. liesigiiation. — Contrary to these, but by a like 
 dangerous excess on the other side, are those who always 
 resign their judgment to the last man they heard or 
 read.* Truth never sinks into these men's minds nor 
 gives any tincture to them, but cameleon-like they taku 
 the color of what is laid before them, and as soon lt•^r' 
 and resign it to the next that hapi)cns to come iit thtMr 
 way. Tlie order wherein opinions are proposed or 
 received by us is no rule of their rectitude, nor ought 
 to be a cause of their preferi-nce. First or last in this 
 case is the effect of cliance, and not the measure of truth 
 or falsehood. This every one must confess, and there- 
 fore should in the pursuit of truth keep his nwnd free 
 from the influence of any such accidents. f A man may 
 as reasonably draw cuts for his tenets, regulate his ))er- 
 suasion by the cast of a die, as«take it up for its novelty, 
 or retain it because it had his first assent and he was 
 never of another mind. Well-weighed reasons are to 
 determine the judgment; tlujse the mind should be 
 always ready to hearken and submit to, and by their 
 testimony and suffrage entertain or reject any tenet 
 indifferently, whether it be a perfect stranger or an old 
 acquaintance. 
 
 28. Practice. — Thor.gh the faculties of the mind are 
 improved by exercise, yet they must not be put to a 
 stress beyond their strength. "Quid valeant humeri, 
 quid ferre recusent,"| must be made the uieasure of 
 every one's understanding who has a desire not only to 
 
 • Of this failitiK Pope used to plcail guilty, obHervlntf, jocularly 
 porhniiH, tliat in thooloey he always a«reod in opiuiun wUh the la-st 
 author he nsad. 
 
 t A Hiinilar thought ocpurs somowhore In Plato, who observes that 
 In all discussions wo should hold ou"* minds froe to bo oarriod 
 whithorsoover wo may by the stream of Dur roaw>uing. Dr. Mlddlo- 
 ton makes a remark of liko import in the preface, if I rightly re- 
 member, of his Free In<iuiry. 
 
 % Which UuHcornmon tnus translat/^s (Ars. Poet. 394, et soq.):— 
 " Antl often try what weight you can support, 
 \uii what your shoulders are too weak to bear." 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF f,l 
 
 perform well but to keep tip the vigor of his faculties, 
 and not to balk his uii(K'rstaiulii)g by what is too hard 
 for it. The mind by being engaged in a task beyond 
 its strength, like the body Btrained by lifting at a 
 weight too heavy, has often its force broken, and thereby 
 gets an unaptnessor an aversion to anj' vigorous attempt 
 ever after.. A sinew cracked seldom recovers its former 
 strength, or at least the tenderness of the sprain remains 
 a good while after, and the memory of it longer, and 
 leaves a lasting caution in the man not to put the part 
 quickly again to any robust employment. So it fares 
 in the mind once jaded by an attempt above its power; 
 it either is disabled for the future, or else checks at 
 any vigorous undertaking ever after, at least is very 
 hardly brought to exert its force again on any subject 
 that requires thought and meditation. The understand- 
 ing should be brought to the difficult and knotty parts 
 of knowledge that try the strength of thought and a 
 full bent of the mind by insensible degrees, and in such 
 a gradual proceeding nothing is too hard for it.* Nor 
 let it be objected that such a slow progress will never 
 reach the extent of some sciences. It is not to be 
 imagined how far constancy will carr}' a man ; however, 
 it is better walking slowly in a rugged way than to break 
 rt leg and be a cripple. Ho that begins with the calf 
 may carry the ox, but he that will at first go to take 
 up an ox may so disable himself as not be able to lift 
 up a calf after that. When the mind by insensible 
 degrees has brought itself to attention and close think- 
 ing, it will be able to cope with difficulties and master 
 them without any prejudice to itself, and then it may 
 go on roundly. Every abstruse problem, every intricate 
 question, will not baffle, discourage or break it. But 
 though putting the mind unprepared upon an unusual 
 stress that may discourage or damp it for the future 
 ought to be avoided, yet this must not run it by an 
 over-great shyness of difficulties into a lazy sauntering 
 about ordinary and obvious things that demand no 
 thought or application. This debases and enervates the 
 
 • In the RAme Bi>!rit Milton, In hln Tractate on Edueatlon, con- 
 demns the prepontorons p'^ctlce of " forclnR the empty wltfl of chil- 
 dren to rompoBc themes, vorHes, and oraMonn, which ar« the actu 
 of ripoflt juflKment. and the flnal work of a head filled by long read- 
 InK and observing, with elegant maxims, and copious Invention. 
 These are not matters to be wrung from poor strlpiinRS, like blood 
 out of the nose or the plucking of untimely fruit" 
 
62 THE UNDEIiSTANDlNQ, 
 
 understandiug, makes it weak and unfit for labor. This 
 is a sort of hovering about the surface of things with- 
 out any insight into them or penetration ; and when the 
 mind nas been once habituated to this lazy recumbency 
 and satisfaction on the obvious surface of things, it is 
 in danger to rest satisfied there and go no deeper, since 
 it cannot do it without pains and digging. He tliat 
 has for some time accustomed himself to take up with 
 what easily offers itself at first view, has reason to fear 
 he shall never reconcile himself to the fatigue of turning 
 and tumbling things in his mind to discover their more 
 retired and more valuable secrets. 
 
 It is not strange that methods of learning which 
 scholars have been accustomed to in their beginning 
 aiid entrance upon the sciences should influence them 
 all their lives, and be settled in their minds by an over- 
 ruling reverence; especially if they be such as universal 
 use has established. Learners must at first be believers, 
 and their master's rules having been once made axioms 
 to them, it is no wonder they should keep that dignity, 
 and by the authority they have once got, mislead those 
 who think it sufticient to excuse them if they go out of 
 their way in a well-beaten track. 
 
 29. Words. — I have copiou*ly enough spoken of the 
 abuse of words in another place,* and therefore shall 
 upon this reflection, that the sciences are full of them, 
 warn those that would conduct their understandings 
 right not to take any term, howsoever authorized by the 
 language of the schools, to stand for anything till they 
 have an idea of it. A word may be of frequent use and 
 great credit with several authors, and be by them made ust; 
 of as if it stood for some real being; but yet, if he that 
 reads cannot frame any distinct idea of that being, it is 
 certainly to him a mere empty sound without a meaning, 
 and lie learns no more by all that is said of it or attributed 
 to it than if it were affirmed only of that bare empty 
 sound. They who would advance in knowledge, and 
 not deceive and swell themselves with a little articulated 
 air, should lay down this as a fundamental rule, not to 
 take words for things, nor supi»oso that names in books 
 signify real entities in nature, till they can frame clear 
 
 * This i.4 fully treated of in tho Essay on tho Human Umlerstand- 
 Ing. Book iii. chap. 10,11. Tho wlioln book, howovor. has lefurviico 
 to the same sulijoot. (.'oniparo also Bishop Borkoloy a lutroductlou 
 to the rduuiplos of Human Kuowloduo. 
 
OF TftE CONDUCT OF 63 
 
 »nd distinct ideas of those entities. It will not per- 
 haps be allowed, if I should set down "substantial 
 forms '' and " intentional species," as such that may 
 justly bo suspected to be of this kind of insignificant 
 terms. But this I am sure, to one that can form no 
 determined ideas of what they stand for, they signify 
 nothing at all, and all that he thinks he knows about 
 them is to him so much knowledge about nothing, and 
 amounts at most but to be a learned ignorance. It is 
 not without all reason supposed that there are many 
 such empty terms to be found in some learned writers, 
 to which they had recourse to etch out their systems, 
 where their understandings could not furnish them 
 with conceptions from things. But yet I believe the 
 supposing of some realities in nature answering those 
 and the like words, have much perplexed some and 
 quite misled others in the study of nature. That which 
 in any discourse signifies, ** I know not what," should 
 be considered *•! know not when." Where men have 
 any conceptions, they ca^i, if they are never so abstruse 
 or abstracted, explain them and the terms they use for 
 them. For our conceptions being nothing but ideas, 
 which are all made up of simple ones, if they cannot give 
 us the ideas their words stand for it is plain they have 
 none. To what purpose can it be to hunt after his con- 
 ceptions who has none, or none distinct? he that knew 
 not what he himself meant by a learned term, cannot make 
 us know anything by his use of it, let us beat our heads 
 about it never so long. Whether we are able to com- 
 prehend all the operations of nature and the manners of 
 them, it matters not to inquire, but this is certain, that 
 we can comprehend no more of them than we can dis- 
 tinctly conceive, and therefore to obtrude terms where 
 we have no distinct conceptions, as if they did contain, 
 or rather conceal something, is but an artifice of learned 
 vanity to cover a defect in an hypothesis or our under- 
 standings. Words are not made to conceal, but to 
 declare and show something ; where they are by those 
 who pretend to instruct otherwise used, they conceal 
 indeed something; but that that they conceal is nothing 
 but the ignorauce, error, or sophistry of the talker, for 
 there is in truth nothing else under them.* 
 
 • Upon this pblloRophical obBorvatlon was erected the wittv con- 
 tmdictloB of Ooldsmlth, commonly nttribiited to Talleyrand, that 
 tanguase was given to man to conceal his thoughts. 
 
64 THE UNVERSTANLINQ. 
 
 30. Wanderinff. — That there is a constant Buccession 
 and flux of ideas in our minds I have observed in the 
 Cornier part of this essay, and every one may take notice 
 of it in himself. Tiiis, I suppose, may deserve some 
 part of our care in t]ie conduct of our understandings ; 
 and I think it may be of groat advantage if we can by 
 use get that power over our minds, as to be able to 
 direct that train of ideas, that so, since there will new 
 ones perpetually come into our thoughts by a constant 
 succession, we may be able by choice so to direct them, 
 that n.one may come in view but such as are pertinent 
 to our present inquiry, and in such order as may be most 
 useful to the discovery we are upon; or, at least, if some 
 foreign and unsought ideas will offer themselves, that 
 yet we might be able to reject them and keep them from 
 taking off our minds from its present pursuit, and hinder 
 them from running away with our thoughts quite from 
 the subject in hand. This is not, I suspect, so easy to 
 be done as perhaps ma}' be imagined ; and yet, for aught 
 I know, this may be, if not the chief, yet one of the great 
 differences that carry some men in their reasoning so 
 far beyond others, where they seem to be naturally of 
 equal parts, A proper and effectual remedy for this 
 wandering of thoughts I would be glad to find. He 
 that shall propose such an one'would do great service to 
 the studious and contemplative part of mankind, and 
 perhaps help unthinking men to become thinking. 1 
 must acknowledge that hitherto I have discovered no other 
 way to keep our thoughts close to their business, but the 
 endeavoring as much as we can, and by frequent attention 
 and application, getting the habit of attention and appli- 
 cation. He that will observe children will find that even 
 when they endeavor their utmost they cannot keep their 
 minds from straggling. The way to cure it, I am satis- 
 fied, is not angry chiding or beating, for that presently 
 fills their heads with all the ideas that fear, dread, or 
 confusion can offer to them. To bring back gently 
 their wandering thoughts, by leading them into the path 
 and going before them in the train they should pursue, 
 without any rebuke, or so much as taking notice (where 
 it can be avoided) of their roving, I suppose, would 
 sooner reconcile and inure them to attention than all 
 these rougher methods, which more distract their tliought, 
 
OF THE (JO \ DUCT OF Of) 
 
 and hindering the application they would promote, intro* 
 duce a contrary habit.* 
 
 |31. Distinction. — Distinction and division are (if I 
 mistake not the iniportof the words) very different things; 
 the one being the perception of a difference that nature haa 
 jdaced in things; the other, our making a division where 
 there is yet none ; at least if it may be permitted to 
 consider them in this sense, I think I may say of them 
 that one of them is the most necessary and conducive to 
 true knowledge that can be ; the other, when too ihuch 
 made use of, serves only to puzzle and confound the 
 understanding. To observe every the least difference 
 that is in things argues a quick and clear sight, and 
 this keeps the understanding steady and right in its way 
 to knowledge. Put though it be useful to discern every 
 variety that is to be found in nature, yet it is not con- 
 venient to consider every difference that is in things, 
 and divide them into distinct classes under every such 
 difference. This will run us, if followed, into partic- 
 ulars (for every individual has something that differ- 
 ences it from another), and we shall be able to est.ablish 
 no general truths, or else at least shall be apt to per- 
 plex the mind about them. The collection of several 
 things into several classes gives the mind more general 
 and larger views, but we must take care to unite them 
 only in that, and, so far as they do agree, for so far the}^ 
 may be united under the consideration, for entity itself, 
 that comprehends all things, as general as it is, may 
 afford us clear and rational conceptions. If we would 
 weigh and keep in our minds what it is we are consider- 
 ing, that would best instruct us when we should or 
 should not branch into further distinctions, which are 
 not to be taken only from a due contemplation of things, 
 to which there is nothing more opposite than the art of 
 
 • Upon this siibjoct ho has spokon at oonsldorablo loneth In bis 
 ThoiiKhts on Education, whoro soo, In my nntos, the opinions of 
 Montaljmo. Bishop Pfttrick has likew'so, In his Advioo to a Frlond. 
 a ploasant nasaneo to thn samo piirposo. Hpoaklnaof our attempts 
 nnreasonanly to compol onrsolvos to roilcious monltatlon, ho savB; 
 "As a chilli, you may havo ob^orvod, when ho cannot think of his 
 loRson, tho moro his t^achnr chides and calls upon him. tho more 
 nlocklHhly ho stands, and the further It Is t)Pat outlof his momory: 
 so It Is very frriauontly with tho natural spirits of ovorv one of us. 
 Thoy are so opprossod and stupid at cortafn seasons that If wo labor 
 to set thorn In motion. It doth but dispose them tho more to stand 
 stock Btlll. But If we lot thorn alone, and for that timo leave them, 
 thoT will be like the same child, who In a short timo comes to him- 
 self, and Is able to say bis los.son perfectly. They would eo whither 
 ire would have thorn, and perhaps run before us." (83, ei sor^.) 
 
 5 
 
(Hi THE UyUlCHSTANDlNQ. 
 
 verbal distinctions made at pleasure in learned and art 
 trarily invented terms, to be applied at a venture, wii 
 out comprehending or conveying any distinct notiuii 
 and so altogether fitted to artificial talk or empty nui 
 in dispute, without any clearing of difficulties or adviin> 
 in knowledge. Whatsoever subject we examine ai. 
 would get knowledge in, we should, I think, make 
 general and as large as it will bear; nor can there I 
 any danger of this, if the idea of it be settled and di-t< 
 mined; for, if that be so, we shall easily distinguish 
 i from any other idea, though comprehended under li 
 1 same name. For it is to fence against the entangl 
 ments of equivocal words, and the great art of sophist i 
 which lies in them, that distinctions have been nui 
 tiplied, and their use thought so necessary. But Iki 
 every distinct abstract idea a distinct known name, tin i 
 would be little need of these multiplied scholastic d. 
 tinctions, though there would be nevertheless as mur 
 need still of the mind's observing the differences that a i 
 in things, and discriminating them thereby one fr>>: 
 another. It is not therefore the right way to kiin\\ 
 edge to hunt after and fill the head with abundance 
 artificial and scholastic distinctions, wherewith learin 
 men's writings are often filled : wo sometimes find wli. 
 they treat of so divided and subdivided that the niii 
 of the most attentive reader loses the sight of it, as it 
 more than probable the writer himself did ; for in thin- 
 crumbled into dust it is in vaiia to effect or pretir 
 order, or expect clearness. To avoid confusion by t 
 few or too many divisions, is a great skill in thinkii 
 as well as writing, which is but the copying our though', 
 ^yt what are the boundaries of the mean between tl 
 two vicious excesses on both hands, 1 think is hard 
 set down in words: clear and distinct ideas are all tl. 
 I yet know able to regulate it. But as to verbal »L 
 tinctions received and applied to common terms, i. i 
 equivocal words, they are more properly, I think, t 
 business of criticisms and dictionaries than of r. 
 knowledge and philosophy, sijice they for the most p.i 
 explain tlie meaning of words, and give us their sevn 
 aignifications. The dexterous management of terui 
 and being able to fend and prove with them,* 1 kno 
 
 • To fend and prove, 1,6., to wranfile. (YlUlltigo. Maw Lin 
 
or rUE CONDUCT OF 67 
 
 has and does pass in the world for a great part of Iearn< 
 ing; but it is learning distinct from knowledge, for 
 knowledge consists only in perceiving the habitudes and 
 relations of ideas one to another, which is done without 
 words ; the intervention of a sound helps nothing to 
 it. And hence we see that there is least use of dis- 
 tinctions where there is most knowledge, I mean in 
 mathematics, where men have detormined ideas without 
 knowing names to them, and so there being no room for 
 equivocations, there is no need of distinctions. Tn argu- 
 ing, the opponent uses as comprehensive and equivocal 
 terms as he can, to involve his adversary in the doubtful- 
 ness of his expressions : this is expected, and therefore 
 the answer on his side makes it his play to distinguish as 
 much as he can, and thinks he can never do it too much ; 
 nor can he indeed in that way wherein victory may be 
 had without truth and without knowledge. This seems to 
 me to be the art of disputing. Use your words as cap- 
 tiously as you can in your arguing on one side, and 
 apply distinctions as much as you can on the other side 
 to every term, to nonplus your opponent, so that in this 
 sort of scholarship, there being no bounds set to dis- 
 tinguishing, some men have thought all acuteness to have 
 lain in it, and therefore in all they have read or thought 
 on, their great business has been to amuse themselves 
 with distinctness, and multiply to themselves divisions; 
 at least, more than the nature of the thing required. 
 There seems to me, as I said, to be no other rule for 
 this but a due and right consideration of things as they 
 are in themselves. He that has settled in his mind 
 determined ideas, with names affixed to them, will bo 
 able both to discern their differences one from another, 
 which is really distinguishing; and where the penury of 
 words affords not terms answering every distinct idea, 
 will be able to apply proper distinguishing terms to the 
 comprehensive and equivocal names he is forced to make 
 use of. This is all the need I know of distinguishing 
 terms, and in such verbal distinctions each term of the 
 distinction, joined to that whole signification it dis- 
 tinguishes, is but a distinct name for a distinct idea. 
 Where they are so, and men have clear and distinct 
 conceptions that answer their verbal distinctions, they 
 are right, and are pertinent as far as they serve to clear 
 anything in the aabject under coQ9ideratioa. And this 
 
68 THE UNDEBSTANDINQ. 
 
 is that which seems to me the proper and only measar* 
 of distinctions and divisions, which he that will con- 
 duct his understanding right must uot look for in the 
 acuteness of invention nor the authority of writers, but 
 will find only in the consideration of things themselves, 
 whether he is led into it by his own meditations or the 
 information of books. 
 
 An aptness to jumble things together wherein can be 
 found any likeness, is a fault in the understanding on 
 the other side which will not fail to mislead it, and by 
 thus lumping of things, hinder the mind from distinct 
 and accurate conceptions of them. 
 
 32. /Similes. — To which let me here add another near 
 of kin to this, at least in name, and that is letting the 
 mind, upon the suggestion of any i»ew notion, run im- 
 mediately after similes to make it the clearer to itself, 
 which, though it may be a good way and useful in the 
 explaining our thoughts to others, yet it is by no means 
 a right method to settle true notions of anything in 
 ourselves, because similes always fail in some part, and 
 come short of that exactness which our conceptions 
 should have to things if we would think aright. This 
 indeed makes men plausible talkers, for those are 
 always most acceptable in dis(;our8e who have the way 
 to let their thoughts into other men's minds with the 
 greatest ease and facility ; whether those thoughts are 
 well formed and correspond with things matters not; 
 few men care to be instructed but at an easy rate. They 
 who in their discourse strike the fancy, and take the 
 hearer's conceptions along with them as fast as their 
 words flow, are the applauded talkers, and go for the 
 only men of clear thoughts. Nothing contributes so 
 much to this as similes, whereby men think they them- 
 selves understand better, because they are the better 
 understood. But it is one thing to think right and 
 another thing to know the right way to lay our thoughts 
 before others with advantage and clearness, be they 
 right or wrong. Well-chosen similes, metaphors, and 
 allegories, with method and order, do this the best of 
 anything, because being taken from objects already 
 known and familiar to the understanding, they are con- 
 ceived as fast as spoken, and the correspondence being 
 ooncluded, the thing they are brought to explain and 
 elucidate is thought to be understood too. Thus fancy 
 
OF THK CONDUCT OF 69 
 
 passes for knowledge, and what is prettily said is mis- 
 taken for solid. I say not this to decry metaphor, or 
 with design to take away that ornament of speech : my 
 business here is not with rhetoricians and orators, but 
 with philosophers and lovers of truth, to whom I would 
 beg leave to give this one rule whereby to try whether 
 in the application of their thoughts to anything for the 
 improvement of their knowledge, they do in truth com- 
 prehend the matter before them really such as it is in 
 itself. The way to discover this is to observe whether, 
 in the laying it before themselves or others, they make 
 use only of borrowed representations and ideas foreign 
 to the things which are applied to it by way of accom- 
 modation, as bearing some proportion or imagined like- 
 ness to the sabject under consideration. Figured and 
 metaphorical expressions do well to illustrate more 
 abstruse and unfamiliar ideas which the mind is not yet 
 thoroughly accustomed to, but then they must be made 
 use of to illustrate ideas that we already have, not to paint 
 to us those which we yet have not. Such borrowed and 
 allusive ideas may follow real and solid truth, to set it 
 off when found, but must by no means be set in its 
 place and taken for it. If all our search has yet reached 
 no further than simile and metaphor, we may assure 
 ourselves we rather fancy than know, and have not yet 
 penetrated into the inside and reality of the thing, be 
 it what it will, but content ourselves with what our 
 imaginations, not things themselves, furnish us with. 
 
 33. Assent. — In the whole conduct of the understand- 
 ing, there is nothing of more moment than to know 
 when and where, and how far to give assent, and pos- 
 sibly there is nothing harder. It is very easily said, 
 »nd nobody questions it, that giving and withholding 
 our assent and the degrees of it should be regulated by 
 the evidence which things carry with them; and yet we 
 see men are not the better for this rule ; some firmly em- 
 brace doctrines upon slight grounds, some upon no 
 grounds, and some contrary to appearance : some admit 
 of certainty, and are not to be moved in what they 
 hold ; others waver in everything, and there want not 
 those that reject all as uncertain.* What then shall 
 
 * Talleyrand erred on this point, for be Is said never to bave be« 
 lleved anything. The extravaffaQoes of the ancient soeptlos are veil 
 known. 
 
TO THE VNDERSTANDINa. 
 
 a novice, an inquirer, a straDger do in the case ? I 
 answer, use his eyes. There is a correspondence in 
 things, and agreement and disagreement in ideas, dis- 
 cernible in very different degrees, and there are eyes 
 in men to see thorn if they pleuse ; only their eyes may 
 be dimmed or dazzled, and the discerning sight in them 
 impaired or lost. Interest and passion dazzle; the 
 custom of arguing on any side, even against our per- 
 suasions, dims the understanding, and makes it by 
 degrees lose the faculty of discerning clearly between 
 truth and falsehood, and so of adhering to the right 
 side. It is not safe to play with error and dress it up 
 to ourselves or others in the shape of truth. The miud 
 by degrees loses its natural relish of real solid truth, is 
 reconciled insensibly to anything that can be dressed 
 up into any faint appearance of it ; and if the fancy be 
 allowed the place of judgment at first in sport, it after- 
 wards comes by use to usurp it, and what is recom- 
 mended by this flatterer (that studies but to please) is 
 received for good. There are so many ways of fallacy, 
 such arts of giving colors, ajjpearances, and resem- 
 blances by this court-dresser, the fancy, that he who is 
 not wary to admit nothing but truth itself, very careful 
 not to make his mind subservient to anything else, can- 
 not but be caught. lie that has a raind to believe, has 
 half assented already ; and he that by often arguing 
 against his own sense imposes falsehood on others, is 
 not far from believing himself. This takes away the 
 great distance there is betwixt truth and falsehood ; it 
 brings them almost together, and makes it no great odds 
 in things that approach so near which you take ; and 
 when things are brought to that pass, passion, or 
 interest, etc., easily, and without being perceived, deter- 
 mine which shall be the right. 
 
 34. Indifferency. — I have said above that we should 
 keep a perfect indifferency for all opinions, not wish 
 any of them true, or try to make them appear so, but 
 being indifferent, receive and embrace them according 
 as evidence, and that alone, gives the attestation of 
 truth. They that do thus, i.e., keep their minds indif- 
 ferent to opinions, to be determined only by evidence, 
 will always find the understanding has perception 
 enough to distinguish between evidence and no evi- 
 dence, betwixt plain and doubtful ; and if they neither 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 71 
 
 give nor refuse their assen*/ but by that measure, they 
 will be safe in the opinions they have. Which being 
 perhaps but few, this caution will have also this good in 
 it, that it will put them upon considering, and teach 
 them the necessity of examining more than they do ; 
 without which the mind is but a receptacle of incon* 
 sistencies, not the storehouse of truths. They that d» 
 not keep up this indifferency in themselves for all but 
 truth, not supposed, but evidenced in themselves, put 
 colored spectacles before their eyes, and look on things 
 through false glasses, and then think themselves excused 
 in following the false appearances which they them- 
 selves put upon them. I do not expect that by thi» 
 way the assent should in every one be proportioned to 
 the grounds and clearness wherewith every truth is 
 capable to be made out, or that men should be perfectly 
 kept from error ; that is more than human nature can 
 by any means be advanced to; I aim at no such unat- 
 tainable privilege : I am only speaking of what they 
 should do, who would deal fairly with their own minds, 
 and make a right use of their faculties in the pursuit 
 of truth ; we fail them a great deal more than they fail 
 us. It is mismanagement more than want of abilitiei 
 that men have reason to complain of, and which they 
 actually do complain of in those that differ from them. 
 He that by indifferency for all but truth, suffers not his 
 assent to go faster than his evidence, nor beyond it, 
 will learn to examine, and examine fairly instead of 
 presuming, and nobody will be at a loss or in danger 
 for want of embracing those truths which are necessary 
 in his station and circumstances. In any other way 
 but this all the world are born to orthodoxy ; they imbibe 
 at first the allowed opinions of their country and 
 party, and so never questioning their truths not one of 
 a hundred ever examines.* They are applauded for 
 presuming they are in the right. He that considers, is 
 a foe to orthodoxy, because possibly be may deviate from 
 some of the received doctrines there. And thus men, 
 without any industry or acquisition of their own, inherit 
 local truths (for it is not the same everywhere) and are' 
 inured to assent without evidence. This influences 
 
 *The reader will here be reminded of the well-known bon-mot of 
 Warbarton. who. on being asked, What is orthodoxy ? replied, It is 
 my doxy, while heterodoxy is every other man's doxy. 
 
72 TBE UNDERSTANDINO. 
 
 further than is thought, for what oae of a hundred of 
 the xealous bigots in all parties ever examined the 
 tenets he is so stiff in, or ever thought it his business 
 or duty so to do ? It is suspected of lukewarmness to 
 suppose it necessary, and a tendency to apostacy to go 
 about it. And if a man can bring nis mind once to be 
 positive, and fierce for positions whose evidence he has 
 never once examined, and that in matters of greatest con- 
 cernment to him, what shall keep him from this short and 
 easy way of being in the right in cases of less moment ? 
 Thus we are taught to clotiie our minds as we do our 
 bodies, after the fashion in vogue, and it is accounted 
 fantasticaluess, or something worse, not to do so.* This 
 custom (which who dares oppose?) makes the short- 
 sighted bigots and the warier sceptics, as far as it pre- 
 vails: and those that break from it are in danger of 
 heresy: for taking the whole world, how much of it doth 
 truth and orthodoxy possess together ? Though it is by 
 the last alone (which has the good luck to be every- 
 where) that error and heresy are judged of: for argument 
 and evidence signify nothing in the case, and excuse no- 
 where, but are sure to be borne down in all societies by the 
 infallible orthodoxy of the place. Whether this be tht 
 way to truth and right assent, ]et the opinions that take 
 place and prescribe in the several habitable parts of the 
 earth declare. I never saw any reason yet why truth 
 might not be trusted on its own evidence : I am sure if 
 that be not able to support it there is no fence against 
 error, and then truth and falsehood are but names that 
 stand for the same things. Evidence therefore is that 
 by which alone every man is (and sliould be) taught to 
 
 •In fact, men thlDk In packs as jackals hunt. On thia subject I 
 formerly published some obMorvutions, on(» or two of which may bo 
 haro repeated- Ilavinjf noticed the rapid cliauRos in faith and pruc- 
 tice which durin" the last century have taken place in France, I 
 add, "when public opinion is thus fluctuating. Individuals huvo 
 some dlftlculty iu nroscrviuK themselves from tlie charpro of sinttu- 
 larity, to which all such persons are obnoxious as maintain durint: 
 these sudden cLan^es a sober and steady mind. There are. how- 
 ever, but very few in any country entertaintnn thoughts and opin- 
 ions that ouKht nally to bo termed singular. For, although there 
 be uotbinL' too ab ura for men to believe conjointly with others, 
 they dread to embrace it alone, In silencu and solitude. Men hav«« 
 always thouKht and believed in masses, under the standanl of 
 intellectual despots, in the same manner as they Hght in masse-, 
 beneath the banners of political desnots. ThrouBhout the wholu 
 earth, you may observe opinions ana ideas, like swarms of boe.H, 
 clust«rinK together upon particular spots, or as If, like certain trees 
 and plants, taey were iQaigeaous to the soil." (Anat of 8oc. i. tM> 
 ut seci.) 
 
OF TUB CONDUCT OF 73 
 
 regulate his assent, who is then, and then only, in the 
 right way when he follows it. 
 
 Men deficient in knowledge are usually in one of 
 these three states : either wholly ignorant, or as doubting 
 of some proposition they have either embraced formerly, 
 or are at present inclined to ; or, lastly, they do with 
 assurance hold and profess without ever having examined 
 and being convinced by well-grounded arguments. 
 
 The first of these are in the best state of the three, 
 by having their minds yet in their perfect freedom and , 
 indifferency, the likelier to pursue truth the better, hav- 
 ing no bias yet clapped on to mislead them. 
 
 35. For ignorance, with an indifferency for truth, is 
 nearer to it than opinion with ungrounded inclination, 
 which is the great source of error; and they are more in 
 danger to go out of the way who are marching under the 
 conduct of a guide that it is a hundred to one will mis- 
 lead them, than he that has not yet t.aken a step, and is 
 likelier to be prevailed on to inquire after the right 
 way. The last of the three sorts are in the worst con- 
 dition of all ; for if a man can be persuaded and fully 
 assured of anything for a truth, without having examined, 
 what is there that he may not embrace for truth ? and 
 if he has given himself up to believe a lie, what means 
 is there left to recover one who can be assured without 
 examining ? To the other two, this I crave leave to 
 say, that as he that is ignorant is in the best state of 
 the two, so he should pursue truth in a method suitable 
 to that state; i. e., by inquiring directly into the nature 
 of the thing itself, without minding the opinions of others, 
 or troubling himself with their questions or disputes 
 about it ; but to see what he himself can, sincerely 
 searching after truth, find cut. He that proceeds upon 
 other principles in his inquiry into any sciences, though 
 he be resolved to examine them and juage of them freely, 
 does yet at least put himself on that side, and post him- 
 self io a party which he will not quit till he be beaten 
 out; by which the mind is insensibly engaged to make 
 what defencd he can, and so is unawares biassed. I do 
 not say but a man should embrace some opinion when 
 he has examined, else he examines to no purpose ; but 
 the surest and safest way is to have no opinion at all 
 till he has examined, and that without any the least 
 regard to the opinions or systems of other men about 
 
74 THK UNDSRSTANDING. 
 
 it. For example, were it my business to understand 
 physic, would not the aafe and readier way be to con- 
 sult nature herself, and inform myself in the history of 
 diseases and their cures, than espousing the principles 
 of the dogmatists, methodists, or chemists, to engage in 
 all the disputes concerning either of those systems, and 
 suppose it to be true, till 1 have tried what they can say 
 to beat me out of it ?♦ Or, supposing that Hippocrates, 
 or any other book, infallibly contains the whole art of 
 physic ; would not the direct way be to study, read, and 
 consider that book, weigh and compare the parts of it 
 to find the truth, rather than espouse the doctrines of any 
 
 f)arty ? who, though they acknowledge his authority, 
 lave already interpreted and wire-drawn all his text to 
 tlieir own sense; the tincture whereof when I have 
 imbibed, I am more in danger to misunderstand his true 
 meaning, than if I had come to him with a mind unpre- 
 possessed by doctors and commentators of my sect, whose 
 reasonings, interpretation, and language which I have 
 been used to, will of course make all chime that way, 
 and make another, and perhaps the genuine, moaning 
 of the autlior seem harsh, strained, and uncouth to me. 
 For words having naturally none of their own, carry 
 that signification to the hearer that he is used to put 
 upon them, whatever be the sense of him tliat uses them. 
 This, I think, is visibly so; and if it bo, he that begins 
 to have any doubt of any of his tenets, which he received 
 without examination, ought as much as he can, to put 
 himself wholl}' into this state of ignorance in reference 
 to that question ; and throwing wholly by all his former 
 notions, and the opinions of others, examine, with a per- 
 fect indifferenc}', the question in its source, without any 
 inclination to either side or anj' regard to his or others* 
 unexamined opinions. This I own is no easy thing to 
 do ; but I am not inquiring the easy way to opinion, but 
 the right way to truth, which they must follow who will 
 deal fairly with their own understandings and their own 
 souls. t 
 
 • Locko so solilom alludes to medicine or physicians, that few not 
 acnuftintod with the history of hJH life would 8uppo3e him to have 
 studi«(d jiliysiu professionally, and to have been only prevented by 
 the weakiioss of his constitution from enteriun on the practice of it. 
 Kee his Life prefixed to the Reasonableness of Christianity, p. vili 
 — xi. 
 
 t In this papsaKe we have much of the earnest elociuence of Plato, 
 who, in his mH,tchlo8s iatroducUoo to the Protagoras, describes 1q 
 
OF TrtK CONDVCT OF 76 
 
 30. Question. — I'lio iiidiffcreiicy that I here propose 
 will also enable tlicin to state the question right which 
 they are in doubt about, without which they can never 
 come to a fair and clear decision of it. 
 
 37. Perseverance. — Another fruit from this indiffer- 
 ency, and the considering things in themselves abstract 
 from our own opinions and other men's notions and dis- 
 ooursos on tlieni, will be that each man will pursue his 
 thoughts in that method which will be most agreeable 
 to the nature of the thing, and to his apprehension of 
 what it suggests to him, in which he ouglit to proceed 
 with regularity and conatancy, until he come to a well- 
 grounded resolution wherein he may acquiesce. If it be 
 objected that this will require every man to be a scholar, 
 and quit all his other business and betake himself wholly 
 to study, I answer, I propose no more to any one than 
 he has time for. Some men's state and condition require 
 no great extent of knowledge ; the necessary provisions 
 for life swallows the greatest part of their time. But 
 one man's want of leisure is no excuse for the oscitancy • 
 and ignorance of those who have time to spare ; and 
 every one has enougli to get as much knowledgtj as is 
 required and expected of him, and he that does not that 
 IS in love with ignorance, and is accountable for it. 
 
 38. Presumption. — The variety of distempers in 
 men's minds is as great as of those in their bodies ; 
 some are epidemic, few escape them ; and every one too, 
 if lie would look into himself, would find some defect 
 of his particular genius. There is scarce anyone with- 
 out some idiosyncrasy that he suffers by. This man 
 presumes upon his parts, that they will not fail him at 
 time of need ; and bo thinks it etperfluous labor to 
 make any provision before hand. His understanding 
 is to him like Fortunatus'a purse, which is always to 
 furnish him, without ever putting anything into it be. 
 forehitnd ; and so he sits still satisfied, without endeavor- 
 ing to store his understanding with knowledge. It is 
 the spontaneous product of the country, and what need 
 
 fflw words the Imnitnentdantrer of adrolttinir error into themlDd. 
 BocrateB. there as elnowhere in his disciple's writings tho prinnipal 
 lnt«rlooutor, observes to Hlppooraten, desirous of beooming a 
 hoaror of ProtaRoras, ^\«t Ti)i» fvxV "f^' vavreO wapwx*^' 
 $tpawt^iu Mpi iit ^^t, voinffTii 6 ri H wort 6 (ro^i^r^f l#rt, 
 Bavfiifom' Ai* *( cl99a koI rei n rovr* iypotU, edit tru wafioMvt 
 .r^¥\l/vxii9ol99a,ovr AKaKturpdyfMU. T. I. p. 1B8, Beltk.)-ED. 
 
76 TBS UNDEBSTANDtNO. 
 
 of labor in tillage ? Such men may spread their native 
 richea before the ignorant ; but they were best not to 
 come to stress and trial with the skillful. Wo are born 
 ignorant of everything. The superficies of things that 
 surround them make impressions on the negligent, but 
 nobody penetrates into the inside without labor, attention, 
 and industry.* Stones and timber grow of themselves, 
 and yet there is no uniform pile with symmetry and con- 
 venience to lodge in without toil and pains. God has 
 made the intellectual world harmonious and beautiful 
 without us ; but it will never come into our heads all at 
 once ; we must bring it home piecemeal and there set 
 it up by our own industry, or else we shall have noth- 
 ing but darkness and a chaos within, whatever order 
 and light there be in things without us. 
 
 39. Despondency. — On the other side, there are 
 others that depress their own minds, despond at the 
 first difficulty, and conclude that the getting an insight 
 in any of the sciences, or making any progress in knowl- 
 . edge further than serves their ordinary business, is 
 above their capacities. These sit still, because they think 
 they have not legs to go; as the others I last mentioned 
 do, because they think they have wings to fly, and can 
 soar on high when they please. To these latter one 
 may for answer apply the proverb, " use legs and have 
 legs," Nobody knows what strength of parts he has 
 till he has tried them. And of the understanding one 
 may most truly say, that its force is greater generally 
 than it thinks, till it is put to it. " Yiresque acquirit 
 eundo." 
 
 And therefore the proper remedy here is but to set 
 the mind to work, and apply the thoughts vigorously to 
 the business ; for it holds in the struggles of the mind 
 .as in those of war, *'dum putant se vincere vicere.'' A 
 persuasion that we shall overcome any difficulties that 
 we meet with in the sciences seldom fulls to carry ns 
 through them. Nubody knows the strength of his 
 . mind, and the force of stead}' and regular ajtplication, 
 till he has tried. This is certain, he tliat sets out upon 
 weak legs, will not only go further, but grow stronger 
 too than one who, with a vigorous constitution and 
 firm limbs, only sits still. 
 
 * It la XoDophoD, I bolieTe^bo says that the eods sell good thingti 
 to maa for sweat and toil.— Kd. 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF T* 
 
 Something of kii\ to thfs men may observe in them- 
 selvea, when the mind frights itself (as it often does) 
 with anything reflected on in gross, and transiently 
 viewed confusedly and at a distance. Things thus 
 offered to the mind carry the show of nothing but diffi- 
 culty in them, and are Miought to be wrapt up in im- 
 penetrable obscurity. But the truth is,* these aro 
 nothing but spectres that the utidorstanding raises to 
 itself to flatter its own laziness. It sees nothing dis- 
 tinctly in things remote and in a huddle; and therefore 
 concludes too faintly, that thfre is nothing more clear 
 to be discovered in them. It is but to approach nearer, 
 and that mist of our own raisiing that wnveloped them 
 will remove; and those that in that mist appeared hid- 
 eous giants not to be grappled with, will be found to be 
 of the ordinary and natural size and shape.* Things 
 that in a remote and confused view seem verj' obscure, 
 must be approached by gentle and reguli^r steps ; and 
 what is most visible, easy, and obvious \'\ them first 
 considered. Reduce them into their distinct parts; and 
 then in their due order bring all that shouM be known . 
 concerning every one of those parts int?^> plain and 
 simple questions ; and then what was thought obscure, 
 perplexed, and too hard for our weak par*'?, will lay 
 itself open to the understanding in a fair vi^w and let 
 the mind into that which before it was awed with, and 
 kept at a distance from, as wholly mysterious. I appeal 
 to my reader's experience, whether this .*as never 
 happened to him, especially when, busy on one thing, 
 he has occasionally reflected on another. I ^sk him 
 whether he has never thus been soared with 9- sudden 
 opinion of mighty difficulties, which yet have vanished, 
 when he has seriously and methodically applied himself 
 to the consideration of this seeming terrible *«ubject ; 
 and there has been no other matter of astoniahment 
 left, but that he amused himself with so discouraging a 
 prospect of his own raising, about a matter which in 
 the handling was found to have nothing in it more 
 Btrange nor intricate than several other things which 
 he had long since, and with ease, mastered. This 
 experience would teach us how to deal with such bug* 
 
 * Omne Isaotnm pro magnlfloo. 
 'TIb diBtanoe lends enchantment to the Tlew, 
 And clothes the mountain with Its azure bos.— En. 
 
78 THE UNDERSTANDINO. 
 
 bears another time, which should rather serve to excite 
 our vigor than enervate our industry. The surest way 
 for a learner is this, as in all other cases, is not to ad- 
 vance by jumps and large strides ; let that which he 
 Hets himself to learn next be indeed the next, i.e., as 
 nearly conjoined with what he knows already as is 
 possible; let it be distinct, but not remote from it ; let 
 it be new, and what he did not know before, that the 
 uitderstundiitg may advance; but let it be as little at 
 once as may be, that its advances may bo clear and sure. 
 Al) the ground that it gets this way it will hold. This 
 distinct gradual gruwtli in knowledge is firm and sure ; 
 it caiTie.s its own light with it in every step of its pro- 
 gression in an easy and urderly train ; than which there 
 is nothing of more use to the understanding. And 
 though this perhaps may seem a very slow and linger- 
 ing way to knowledge, yet 1 dare confidently affirm, 
 that whoever will try it in himself, or any one he will 
 teach, shall find the advances greater in this method, 
 than they would in the same space of time have been 
 in any other he could have taken. The greatest part 
 of true knowledge lies iu a distinct perception of things 
 in tliemselves distinct. And some men give more clear 
 light and knowledge by the bare distinct stating of a 
 question than others by talkin'g of it in gross, whole 
 hours together. In this, they who so state a question 
 do no more but separate and disentangle, the parts of 
 it one from another, and lay tlieni, wlien so disentangled, 
 in their due order. This often, without any more ado, 
 resolves the duubt, and shows the mind where the truth 
 lies. The agreement or disagreement of the ideas iu 
 question, when they are once separated and distinctly 
 considered, is, in many cases, presently received, and 
 thereby clear and lasting knowledge gained ; whereas 
 things in gross taken up together, and so lying together 
 in confusion, can produce in the mind but a confused, 
 which in effect is no, knowledge ; or at least, when it 
 comes to be examined and made use of, will prove little 
 better than none. I therefore t:ike the liberty to repeat 
 here again what I have said elsewhere, that in learning 
 anything, as little should be proposed to the mind at 
 once as is possible; and that being understood and 
 fully mastered, to proceed to the next adjoining part, 
 yet unknown, simple, unperplexed proposition, belong- 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 79 
 
 iog to the matter in hand, and tending to the clearing 
 what is principally designed. 
 
 40. Analogij. — Analogy is of great use to the mind 
 in many cases, especially in natural philosophy ; and 
 that part of it cniefly which consists in happy and 
 successful experiments. But here we must take care 
 that we keep ourselves within that wherein the analogy 
 consists. For example : the acid oil of vitriol is found 
 to be good in such a case, therefore the bpirits of nitre 
 or vinegar may be used in the like case. If the good 
 effects of it be owing wholly to the acidity of it, the trial 
 may be justified ; but if there be something else besides 
 the acidity in the oil of vitriol, which produces the good 
 we desire in the case, we mistake that for analogy whtch 
 is not, and suffer our understanding to be misguided by 
 a wrong supposition of analogy where there is none. 
 
 41. Association. — Though I have, in the second book 
 of my Essay concerning Human Understanding, treated 
 of the associations of ideas ; yet having done it th»re 
 historically, as giving a view of underst.inding in this 
 as well as its several other ways of operating, rather 
 than designing there to inquire into the remedies that 
 ought to be applied to it ; it will, under this latter con- 
 sideration, afford other matter of thought to those who 
 have a mind to instruct themselves thoroughly in the 
 right way of conducting their understandings; and that 
 the rather, because this, if I mistake not, is as freqilent 
 a cause of mistake and error in us as perhaps anything 
 else that can be named ; and is a disease of the mind as 
 hard to be cured as any, it beitig a very hard thing to 
 convince any one that tilings are not so, and naturally 
 so, as they constantly appear to him. 
 
 By this one easy and unheeded miscarriage of the 
 understanding, sandy and loose foundations become in- 
 fallible principles, and will not suffer themselves to be 
 touched or questioned ; such unnatural connections be- 
 come by custom as natural to the mind as sun and light, 
 fire and warmth go together, and seem to carry with them 
 as natural an evidence as self-evident truths themselves. 
 And where then shall one with hopes of success begin 
 the cure?* Many men firmly embrace falsehood for 
 
 'Compare with the above the followlnir nAnsacre from Lord Bacon : 
 ''It is not oDlrthe dlfBcalty and labor which men talce in flndin« 
 oat of truth; nor again, that, when it in found, it imposeth upon 
 men's thoughts, that doth bring lies la favor, but a aatural uouoa 
 i»omi0t love of the He Iteelt 
 
80 ZS£ UKDMItSlA2iDlKQ, 
 
 truth ; not only because they never thought otherwise, 
 but also because, thus blinded as they huve been from 
 the beginning, they never could think otherwise ; at 
 least without a vigor of mind able to coiitest the empire 
 of habit, and look into its own principles; a freedom 
 which few men have the notion of in themselves, and 
 fewer are allowed the practice of by others ; it being the 
 great art and business of the teachers and guides in 
 most sects to suppress, as much as they can, this funda- 
 mental duty which every man owes himself, and is the 
 first steady step towards right and truth in the whole 
 train of his actions and opinions. This would give one 
 reason to suspect, that such teachers are conscious to 
 themselves of the falsehood or weakness of the tenets 
 they profess, since they will not suffer the grounds 
 whereon they are built to be examined ; whereas those 
 who seek truth only, and desire to own and propagate 
 nothing else, freely expose their principles to the test ; 
 are pleased to have them examined ; give men leave to 
 reject them if they can ; and if there be anything weak 
 and unsound in them, are willing to have it detected, 
 that they themselves, as well as others, may not lay any 
 stress upon any received proposition beyond what the 
 evidence of its truths will warrant and allow.* 
 
 " One of the lator schools of tho Grecia\is f^xamlneth the matter, 
 and Is at a stand to think what ishould bo in it, that men should love 
 lies, where neither they make for pleasure, as with poets, nor for 
 advantuKe, as with the merchant; but for tho lie's sake- But lean- 
 not tell : this same truth is a naked and open dayllMht, that doth not 
 show tho mascjues, and mummeries, and triumphs of the worldi 
 half so stately and daintily as eandle lij;ht. Truth may perhaps 
 come to tho price of a pearl, that showeth best by day; but it will 
 not rise to tho price of a dlamontl or carbuncle, that ehoweth boat 
 In varied li«ht. A mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure." But 
 if there be a pleasure in lying, or in believing a lie, there Is also, 
 very fortunately, no small delight in the discovery and reception of 
 truth. Montaigne's remarks on this subject are worthy of consider- 
 ation. "Que siguitlo CO refrain? fM un lini glissant et coulant aua- 
 pendons noire a'eance : car com me dit Euripides, 
 I Los opuvres do Dieu en diverses, 
 
 I Faqons nous donnent des traverses; 
 
 pemblablo a celuy tiu'Empodoclcs semoit souvout en boh livres, 
 poranie agit6 d'uno divine fureur et forc(5 do la vdrit^- Non twii, 
 ffiova ne sciitoiis n>»i, lunt.t ne royons rifu, toiili'ti vtioxes tioua sunt oc- 
 <ntUes, il n'eyi est auciine de la laqueUe nous puixsons establir quelle elle 
 'est. llevonant h. ce mot divin, cogitationes inortalinm (imida et inrer- 
 Ue ad iiiventiones nostr(B et proiiidi/ntiit. 11 ne faut pas trouver 
 estrange, si gents de.sesperez de la prinse n'ont pas laiss^ d'avolr 
 plaisir a la chasse, Testude estant do sol une occupation nlaisanta: 
 et h\ iilaisante,riuenarmy les voluptez, lesStoiciens defendentaussi 
 celle oui vlent de 1 oxercitatlon do I'esprit, y voulont de la bride, et 
 trouvent de rintemporance a trop bcavoir. Vol. v. p. 44, et saa.)— 
 
 *riatu, in hIsGorglas, has put eentiments strongly resombllng 
 lij* abyvtf iutQ the moutlj of bocrates, whoi having graphically 
 
OF WE CONDUCT OF 81 
 
 There is, I know, a grcut fault among all sorts of 
 people of principling tlieir children and scholars ; which 
 at least, when looked into, amounts to no more but 
 making them imbibe their teachers' notions and tenets 
 by an implicit faith, and firmly to adhere to them, 
 whether true or false. What colors may be given to 
 this, or of what use it may be when practised upon the 
 vulgar destined to labor, and given up to the service of 
 their bellies, I will not here inquire. But as to the in- 
 genious part of mankind, whose condition allows them ' 
 leisure, and letters, and inquiry after truth, I can see no 
 other right way of principling them, but to take heed, 
 as much as may be, that in their tender years, ideas 
 that have no natural cohesion come not to be united in 
 their heads; and that this rule be often inculcated to 
 them to be their guide in the whole course of cheir 
 lives and studies, viz., that they never suffer any ideas 
 to be joined in their understandings in any otlier or 
 stronger combination than what their own nature and 
 correspondence give them; and that they often examine 
 those that they find linked together in their minds, 
 whether this association of ideas be from the visible 
 agreement that is in the ideas themselves, or from the 
 habitual and prevailing custom of the mind joining them 
 thus together in thinking. 
 
 This is for caution against this evil, before it be 
 thoroughly riveted by custom in the understanding; 
 but he that would cure it when habit has established it 
 must nicely observe the very quick and almost imper- 
 ceptible motions of the mind in its habitual actions. 
 What I have said in another place about the change of 
 the ideas of sense into those of judgment may be proof of 
 tliis. Let any one, not skilled in painting, be told when 
 he sees bottles and tobacco-pipes, and other things so 
 painted, as they are in some places shown, that he does 
 not see protuberances, and you will not convince him 
 but by the touch ; he will not believe that by an insta- 
 
 described the noiRy and wrnnKHnfir toDO of ordinary disputants, 
 exclaims. " But what manner of men am I ? Why I am one of those 
 who. when in error love U) be refuted, and who nave equal dolJKht 
 In refutintr the errors of others; nor is it more pleasant to mo to r«- 
 fute than to bo refuted. On the contrary. I account It a greater sat- 
 isfaction. Inasmuch as the advantace Ik greater to ho dellvorcd from 
 the extreme of evil, than to deliver others; and truly I consider no 
 evil incident to human nature so Rrlevous as to entertain false 
 opinions concerning the subject we have here under diBcussion." 
 (mttltl. p.)i6.)-£D. 
 
 6 
 
83 TBE UNDERaTASLlSa. 
 
 iieoua legerdemain of hia own thoughts, oue idea ii 
 substituted for another. How frequent inotuncea luay 
 one meet with of this in the arguings of the learned, 
 who not seldom, in two ideas that they have been ac- 
 customed to join in their minds, substitute one for the 
 other ; and I am apt to think, often without perceiving 
 it themselves! This, whilst they are under the deceit 
 of it, makes them incapable of conviction, and they 
 applaud themselves as zealous champions for truth, when 
 indeed they are contending for error And the confu- 
 sion of two different ideas, which a customary connection 
 of them in their minds hath made to them almost one, 
 fills thuir heads with fulsu views, and their reasonings 
 with fiilse consequences. 
 
 42. lAiUacics. — Right understanding consists in the 
 discovery and adherence to truth, and that in the per- 
 c»'ption of the visible or probable agreement or disa- 
 greement of ideas, as they arc afhrmed and denied one 
 of another. From whence it is evident, that the right 
 use and conduct of the understanding, whose business is 
 
 Surely truth and nothing else, is, that the mind should 
 e kejjt in a perfect indifferency, not inclining to either 
 side, any further than evidence settles it by knowl- 
 edge, or the over-balance of probability gives it the 
 turn of assent and belief; but yet it is very hard to 
 meet with any discourse wherein one may not perceive 
 the author not only maintain (for that is reasonable and 
 fit) but inclined and biassed to one side of the question, 
 with marks of a desire that that should be true. If it 
 be asked me, how authors who have such a bias and 
 le^n to it may be discovered ; I answer, by observing 
 how in their writings or arguings they are often led by 
 their inclinations to change the ideas of the question, 
 either by changing the terms, or by adding and joining 
 others to them, whereby the ideas under consideration 
 are so varied as to be more serviceable to their purpose, 
 and to be thereby brought to an easier and nearer agree- 
 ment, or more visible and remoter disagreement one 
 with another. This is plain and direct sophistry ; but 
 1 am far from thinking that wherever it is found it is 
 made use of with design to deceive and mislead the 
 readers. It is visible that men's prejudices and inclin- 
 ations by this way impose often upon themselves ; and 
 their affections for truth, under their prepossession in 
 
OF THE CONDUCT OF 83 
 
 favor of one ^de, is the very thing that leads them fruiii 
 it. IncliDation suggests and slides into tlieir discourse 
 favorable terras, which introduce favorable ideas ; till 
 at last by this means that is concluded clear and evi- 
 dent, thus dressed up, which taken in its native state, 
 by making use of none but the precise determined ideas, 
 would find no admittance at all. The putting these 
 glosses on what they affirm, these, as they thought hand- 
 some, easy, and graceful explications of what they are 
 discoursing on, is so much the character of what is 
 called and esteemed writing well, that it is very hard to 
 think that authors will ever be persuaded to leave what 
 .servos so well to propagate their opinions, and procure 
 themselves credit in the world, for a more jejune and 
 dry way of writing, by keeping to the same terms pre- 
 cisely annexed to the same ideas ; a sour and blunt stiff- 
 ness tolerable in mathematicians only, who force their 
 way, and make truth prevail by irresistible demon- 
 stration.* 
 
 But yet if authors cannot be prevailed with to quit 
 the looser, though more insinuating ways of writing; if 
 they will not think fit to keep close to truth and in- 
 struction by unvaried terms and plain unsophisticated 
 arguments ; yet it concerns readers not to be imposed 
 on by fallacies and the prevailing ways of insinuation. 
 To do this, the surest and most effectual remedy is to 
 fix in the mind the clear and distinct ideas of the ques- 
 tion stripped of words ; and so likewise in the train of 
 argumentation, to take up the author's ideas, neglecting 
 his words, observing how they connect or scpiirate those 
 in question. He that does this will be able to cast off 
 all that is superfluous ; he will see what is pertinent, 
 what coherent, what is direct to, what slides by, the 
 question. This will readily show him all the foreign 
 ideas in the discourse, and where they were brought in } 
 
 •Authors destro to be road, which they would not l>e If ther 
 adopted the ciwt-lron style of tho laathematioianA. The blame 
 therefore, if blame thoro Ihj, roHts with human nature itself; for 
 tuthors have only the choice of uot t>eiDk read at all, and conso- 
 
 SneDtly of impartijiK no truth, or of so clothinir the trhths they 
 ellver that they may sometimoB, by unwary ooservera. l)e con- 
 founded with error. I am not indeed convinced that a barren style, 
 
 would Dot be less true to nature than one drawn In black. And in 
 reasonincr, as the philosopher a few sections beu:k appearn to allow, 
 metaphoni ana ■Imilea afford a powerful aid in the eluoldatton ol 
 tnitn.— u>. 
 
84 THX VlfDXRSTAIfDXNQ. 
 
 and tnough chey perhaps daceled the wri^r, yet he will 
 perceive that they give nu light iior etreDgth to his 
 reasonings. 
 
 This, though it be the shortest and easiest way of 
 reading books with profit, and keeping one's self from 
 being misled by great names or plausible discourses; 
 yet it being hard and tedious to those who have not ac- 
 customed tliemselves to it, it is not to be expected that 
 every one (amongst those few who really pursue truth) 
 should this way guard his understanding from being 
 iuiposed on by the wilful, or at least undesigned sophis- 
 try, which creeps into most of the books of argument. 
 Tbey that write against their conviction, or that, next 
 to them, are resolved to maintain the tenets of a party 
 they were engaged in, cannot be supposed to reject any 
 arms that may help to defend their cause, ;ind therefore 
 such should be read with the greatest cuutiun. And 
 they who write for opinions they are sincerely persuaded 
 of and believe to be true, think they may so far allow 
 themselves to indulge their laudable affection to truth, 
 as to permit their esteem of it to give it the best colors, 
 and set it off with the best expressions and dress they 
 can, thereby to gain it the easiest entrance into the 
 minds of their readers, and fix i'c deepest there. 
 
 One of those being the stafce of mind we may justly 
 suppose most writers to be in, it is fit their readers, who 
 apply to them for instruction, should not lay by that 
 caution which becomes a sincere pursuit of truth, and 
 should make them always watchful against whatever 
 might conceal or misrepresent it. If they have not the 
 skill of representing to theniselvos the author's sense by 
 pure ideas separated from sounds, and thereby divested 
 of the false lights and deceitful ornaments of speech ; 
 this yet they should do, they should keep the precise 
 question steadily in their minds, carry it along with 
 them through the whole discourse, and suffer not the 
 least alteration in the terms, either by addition, sub- 
 traction, or substituting any other. This every one can 
 do who has a mind to it; and he that has not a mind to 
 it, it is plain, makes his understanding only the ware- 
 house of other men's lumber : I mean false and uncon- 
 cluding reasonings, rather than a repository of truth for 
 his own use, which will prove substantial, and stand 
 him in stead, when he has occasion for it. And whether 
 
OF THE CONDUtT OF 85 
 
 such an one deals fairly by his own mind, and conducts 
 his own understanding right, I leave to his own under- 
 Btitncling to judg**.* 
 
 43. Funaamental Verities. — The mind of man being 
 very narrow, and so slow in making acquaintance with 
 things, and taking in new truths, that no one man is 
 capable, in a much lotiger life than ours, to know all 
 truths, it becomes our prudence, in our search after 
 knowledge, to employ our thoughts about fundamental 
 and material questions, carefully avoiding those that 
 are trifling, and not suffering ourselves to be diverted 
 from our main even purpose, by those that are merely inci- 
 dental. How much of many young men's time is thrown 
 away in purely logical inquiries I need not mention. 
 This is no better than if a man, who was to be a painter, 
 should spend all his time in examining the threads of 
 the several cloths he is to paint upon, and counting the 
 hairs of each pencil and brush he intends to use in the 
 laying on of his colors. Nay, it is much worse than for 
 a young painter to spend his apprenticeship in such use- 
 less niceties ; for he, at the end of all his pains to no pur- 
 pose, finds that it is not painting, nor any help to it, and so 
 is really to no purpose ; whereas men designed for scholars 
 have often their heads so filled and warmed with disputes 
 on logical questions, that they take those airy, useless no- 
 tions for real and substantial knowledge, and think their 
 understandings so well furnished with science, that 
 they need not look any further into the nature of things, 
 or descend to the mechanical drudgery of experiment 
 and inquiry. This is so obvious a mismanagement 
 of the understanding, and that in the professed way to 
 knowledge, that it could not be passed by ; to which 
 might be joined abundance of questions, and the way 
 of handling of them in the schools. What faults in 
 particular of this kind every man is or may be guilty 
 of would be infinite- to enumerate; it suffices to have 
 shown that superficial and slight discoveries, and obser- 
 rations that contain nothing of moment in themselves, 
 nor serve as clues to lead us into further knowledge, 
 should not be thought worth our searching after. 
 
 There are fundamental truths that lie at the bottom, 
 the basil npou which a great many others rest, and in 
 
 -^' 
 
 on this snbject Baocui's two Bseays. on "GaoQitig," and 
 lom for a Man's self."— Eo. 
 
86 THB UNDEHSTANDiyQ. 
 
 which they have their coDaiatency. These are teemiDg 
 truths, rich in store, with which they furnish the mind, 
 and, like the lights of heaven, are not only beautiful 
 and entertaining in themselves, but give lignt and evi- 
 dence to other things, that without them could not be 
 seen or known. Such is that admirable discovery of 
 Mr. Newton, that all bodies gravitate to one another, 
 which may be counted as the basis of natural philosophy ; 
 which, of what use it is to the understanding of the 
 great frame of our solar system, he has to the astonish- 
 ment of the learned world shown ; and how much further 
 it would guide us in other things, if rightly pursued, is 
 not yet known. Our Saviour's great rule, that " we 
 should love our neighbor as ourselves," is such a funda- 
 mental truth for the regulating human society, that I 
 think by that alone one might without difficulty deter- 
 mine all the cases and doubts in social morality. These 
 and such as these are the truths we should endeavor to 
 find out, and store our minds with. Which leads me to 
 another thing in the conduct of the understanding that 
 is no less necessary, viz. 
 
 44. Bottoming, — To accustom ourselves, in any ques- 
 tion proposed, to examine and find out upon what it 
 bottoms. Most of the difficulties that come in our way, 
 when well considered and traoed, lead us to some prop- 
 osition, which, known to bo true, clears the doubt, and 
 gives an easy solution of the question ; what topical 
 and superficial arguments, of which there is store to be 
 found on both sides, filling the head with variety of 
 thoughts, and the mouth with copious discourse serve 
 only to amuse the understanding, and entertain company, 
 without coming to the bottom of the question, the only 
 place of rest and stability for an inquisitive mind, whose 
 tendency is only to truth and knowledge. 
 
 For example, if it be demanded whether the grand 
 seignior can lawfully take what he will from any of his 
 people ? this question cannot be resolved without com- 
 ing to a certainty whether all men are naturally equal 
 for upon that it turns ; and that truth well settled in 
 the understanding, and carried in the mind through the 
 various debates concerning the various rights of men in 
 society, will go a threat way in putting an end to them, 
 and showing on which side the truth is. 
 
 45. Tranaferrinff of Thoughti. — There is scarcwly 
 
OF THE coy DUCT OF 87 
 
 anything more for tho irapvovement of knowledge, for 
 the case of life, and the despatch of business, than for a 
 man to be able to dispose of his own thoughts; and there 
 18 scarcely anything harder in the whole conduct of the 
 understanding than to get a full mastery over it. The 
 mind, in a waking man, has always some object that 
 it applies itself to ; which when we are lazy or uncon- 
 cerned, we can easily change, and at pleasure transfer 
 our thoughts to another, and from thence to a third, 
 which has no relation to either of the former. Hence 
 men forwardly conclude, and frequently say, nothing is 
 80 free as thought, and it were well it were so; but the 
 contrary will be found true in several instances ; and 
 there are many cases wherein there is nothing more resty 
 and ungovernable than our thoughts : they will not be 
 directed what objects to pursue, nor be taken off from 
 those they have once fixed on, but run away with a man 
 in pursuit of those ideas they have in view, let him do 
 what he can. 
 
 I will not here mention again what I have above taken 
 notice of, how hard it is to get the mind, narrowed by a 
 custom of thirty or forty years' standing to a scanty 
 collection of obvious and common ideas, to enlarge it- 
 self to a more copious stock, and grow into an acquaint- 
 ance with those that would afford more abundant mat- 
 ter of useful contemplation ; it is not of this I am here 
 speaking. The inconveniency I would here represent, 
 and find a remedy for, is the difficulty there is some- 
 times to transfer our minds from one subject to another, 
 in cases where the ideas are equally familiar to us. . 
 
 Matters that are recommended to our thoughts by any 
 of our passions, take possession of our minds with a kind 
 of authority, and will not be kept out or[dislodged ; but, 
 as if the passion that rules were for the time the sheriff 
 of the place, and came with all the posse, the understand- 
 ing is seized and taken with the object it introduces, as 
 if it had a legal right to be alone considered there.* 
 There is scarcely anybody I think of so calm a temper 
 who hath not some time found this tyranny on his un- 
 derstanding, and suffered under tho inconvenience of it. 
 Who is there almost whose mind, at some time or otber^ 
 
 *"..... one mMter passion In the bre«at. 
 Like Aaron's serpent, swallows np the rest" 
 
 E$$av on Man, flp. U.- M. 
 
88 THE UNDERSTANDING. 
 
 love or anger, fear or grief, has not so fastened to gome 
 clog that it could not turn itself to any other object ? I 
 call it a clog, for it hang» upon the miud so as to hinder 
 its vigor and activity iu the pursuit of other contem- 
 • platiuns ; and advances itself little or not at all iu the 
 knowledge of the thing which it so closely hugs and 
 constantly pores on. Men thus possessed are sometimes 
 as if they were so in the worse sense, and lay under the 
 power of an enchantment. They see not what passes 
 before their eyes, hear not the audible discourse of the 
 contipany, and when by any strong application to them 
 they are roused a little, they are like men brought to 
 themselves from some remote region ; whereas iu truth, 
 they come no further than their secret cabinet within, 
 where they have been wholly taken up with the puppet, 
 which is for that time appointed for their entertainment. 
 The shame that such dumps cause to well-bred people, 
 when it carries them away from the company, where 
 they should bear a part in the conversation, is a suffi- 
 cient argument that it is a fault in the conduct of our 
 understanding not to have that power over it as to make 
 uae^of it to|tho8e purposes and on those occasions wherein 
 we have need of its assistance. The mind should be 
 always free and ready to turn itself to the variety of 
 objects that occur, and allow thehi as much consideration 
 as shall for that time be thought fit. To be engrossed 
 so by one object as not to be prevailed on to leave it for 
 another that we judge fitter for our contemplation, is to 
 make it of no use to us. Did this state of mind remain 
 always so, every one would, without scruple, give it the 
 name of perfect madness ; and whilst it docs last, at 
 whatever intervals it returns, such a rotation of thoughts 
 about the same object no more carries us forward towards 
 the attainment of knowledge, than getting upon a mill- 
 ht^rse whilst he jogs on in his circular track would carry 
 a man a journey. 
 
 I grant something must be allowed to legitimate pas- 
 sions and to natural inclinations. Every man, besides 
 occasional affections, has beloved studies, and those the 
 mind will more closely stick to; but yet it is best that 
 it shoulc' he always at liberty, and under the free dis- 
 posal of the man, and to act how^ and upon what he 
 directs. This we should endeavor to obtain unless w© 
 would be content with such a flaw in our understanding 
 
OF Tim CONDUCT OF 89 
 
 that sometimes we should be, as it were, without it; for 
 it is very little better than so in cases where we cannot 
 make use of it to those purposes we would, and which 
 stand in present need of it. 
 
 But before fit remedies can be thought on for this 
 disease we must know the several causes of it, and there- 
 by regulate the cure, if we will hope to labor with suc- 
 cess. 
 
 One we have already instanced in, whereof all men 
 that reflect have so general a knowledge, and so often an 
 experience in themselves, that nobody doubts of it. A 
 prevailing passion so pins down our thoughts to the 
 object, and concern of it, that a man passionately in love 
 cannot bring himself to think of his ordinary affairs, or 
 a kind mother drooping under the loss of a child, is not 
 able to bear a part as she was wont in the discourse of 
 the company or conversation of her friends. 
 
 But, though passion be the most obvious and general, 
 yet it is not the only cause that binds up the understand- 
 ing, and confines it for the time to one object, from 
 which it will not be taken off. 
 
 Besides this, we may often find that the understand- 
 ing, when it has a while employed itself upon a subject 
 which either chance or some slight accident offered to 
 it, without the interest or recommendation of any'passion, 
 works itself into a warmth, and by degrees gets into a 
 career, wherein like a bowl down a hill, it increases its 
 motion by going, and will not be stopped or diverted ; 
 though, when the heat is over, it sees all this earnest 
 application was about a trifle not worth a thought, and 
 all the pains employed about it lost labor. 
 
 There is a third sort, if I mistake not, yet lower 
 than this; it is a sort of childishness, if I may so 
 say, of the understanding, wherein, during the fit, it 
 plays with and dandles some insignificant puppet to no 
 end, nor with any design at all, and yet cannot easily 
 be got o£f from it. Thus some trivial sentence, or 
 a scrap of poetry, will sometimes get into men's heads, 
 and make such a charming there, that there is no still- 
 ing of it ; no peace to be obtained, nor attention 
 to anything else, but this impertinent guest ^ill take 
 up the mind and possess tbe thoughts in spite of all 
 endeavors to eet rid of it. Whether every one hath 
 experimented in themselves this troublesome intrusion 
 
90 THE UNLSasTANDlNO. 
 
 of aome frisking ideas which thus importune the un<le^ 
 standing, and hinder it from being better employed, 
 I know not. But persons of very good parts, and 
 those more than one, I have heard speak and complain 
 of it themselves. The reason I have to make this 
 doubt, is from what I have known in a case something 
 of kin to this, though much older, and that is of a sort 
 of visions that some people have lying quiet, but per- 
 fectly awake, in the dark, or with their eyes shut. It 
 is a great variety of faces, most commonly very odd 
 ones, that appear to them in a train one after another ; 
 so that having had just the sight of the one, it im- 
 mediately passes away to give place to another, that 
 the same instant succeeds, and has as quick an exit as 
 its leader : and so they march on in a constant suc- 
 cession ; nor can any one of them by any endeavor be 
 stopped or restrained beyond the instant of its appear- 
 ance, but is tluust out by its follower, which will have 
 its turn. Concerning this fantastical phtinomcuon I 
 have talked with several people, whereof some have 
 been perfectly acquainted with it, and others have been 
 80 wholly strangers to it that they could hardly be 
 • brought to conceive or believe it. I knew a lady of ex- 
 cellent parts, who had got past thirty without having 
 ever had the least notice of any such thing; she was so 
 great a stranger to it, that when she heard me and 
 another talking of it, could scarcely forbear thinking 
 we bantered her: but some time after, drinking a large 
 dose of dilute tea ( as she was ordered by a physician ) 
 going to bed, she told us at next meeting, that she had 
 now experimented what o»ir discourse had much ado 
 to persuade her of. She had seen a great variety of 
 faces in a long train, succeeding one another, as we had 
 described ; they were all strangers and intruders, such 
 as she had no acquaijitance with before, nor sought 
 after then ; and as they came of themselves, they went 
 too ; none of them stayed a moment, nor could be de- 
 tained by all the endeavors she could use, but went on 
 in their solemn procession, just appeared and then 
 vanished. This odd phenomenon seems to have a me- 
 chanical cause, and to depend upon the matter and mo- 
 tiuu of the blood or animal spirits. 
 
 \\'hen the fancy is bound by passion, I know no way 
 to set the mind free and at liberty to prosecute what 
 
OF TnJi CONDUCT OF 91 
 
 thoughts the man would make choice of, hut to allay 
 the present passion, or counterbalance it with another; 
 which ia an art to be got by study, and acquaintance 
 with the passions. 
 
 Those who find themselves apt to be carried away 
 with the spontaneous current of their own thoughts, 
 not excited by any passion or interest, must be very 
 wary and careful in all the instances of it to stop it, 
 and never humor their minds in being thus triflingly 
 busy.* Men know the value of their corporeal liberty, 
 and therefore suffer not willingly fetters and chains to 
 be put upon them. To have the mind captivated is, 
 for the time, certainly the greater evil of the two, and 
 deserves our utmost care and endeavors to preserve the 
 freedom of our better part. In this case our pains will 
 not be lost; striving and struggling will prevail, if we 
 constantly on all such occasions make use of it. We 
 must never indulge these trivial attentions of thought; 
 as soon as we find the mind makes itself the business 
 of nothing, we should immediately disturb and check 
 it, introduce new and more serious considerations, and 
 not leave till we have beaten it off from the pursuit it 
 was upon. This, at first, if we have let the contrary prac- 
 tice grow to a habit, will perhaps be difficult ; but con- 
 stant endeavors will by degrees prevail, and at last make 
 it easy. And when a man is pretty well advanced, and 
 can command his mind off at pleasure from incidental 
 and undesigned pursuits, it may not be amiss for him 
 to go on further, and make attempts upon meditations 
 of greater moment, that at the last he may have a full 
 power over his own mind, and be so fully master of his 
 own thoughts as to be able to transfer them from one sub- 
 ject to another, with the same ease that he can lay by any- 
 thing he has in his hand, and take something else that 
 he has a mind to in the room of it. This liberty of mind 
 is of great use both in business and study, and he that 
 has got it will have no small advantage of ease and 
 despatch in all that is the chosen and useful employ- 
 ment of his understanding. ,. 
 
 • In my etory of Lnolfer. I have endeavored "to describe the state 
 of mind arisinff out of the neglect of this caution. One train of 
 idea/* constantly operntinK on the fancy, produces first, a distaste 
 for all ordinary and healthy pleasures : next, deranites the health| 
 and then the intellect, and terminates by caasing a promatare ana 
 ▼loleot death. 
 
92 THS VNDERSTANDJNO. 
 
 The third and last way which I mentioned the mind 
 to be sometimes taken up with, I mean the chiming of 
 some particular words or sentence in the memory, and, 
 as it were, making a noise in the head, and the like, 
 seldom happens but when the mind is lazy, or very 
 loosely and negligently employed. It were better 
 indeed to be without such impertinent and useless 
 repetitions : any obvious idea, when it is roving care* 
 lessly at a venture, being of more use, and apter to 
 suggest something worth consideration, than the in- 
 significant buzz of purely empty sounds. But since 
 the rousing of the mind, and setting the understanding 
 on work with some degree of vigor, does for the most 
 part presently set it free from those idle oompanioDS, it 
 may not be amiss whenever we find ourselves troubled 
 with them, to make use of so profitable a remedy that is 
 always at band. 
 
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