where he learnt. The idea of this remarkable piece of houfhold-stuff had fo mixed itself with the turns and steps of all his dances, that though in that chamber he could dance excellently well, yet it was only whilst that trunk was there; nor could he perform well in any other place, unlefs that or fome fuch other trunk had its due pofition in the room. If this story fhall be fufpected to be dreffed up with fome comical circumftances, a little beyond precife nature; I anfwer for myfelf that I had it fome years fince from a very fober and worthy man, upon his own knowledge, as I report it: and I dare fay, there are very few inquifitive perfons, who read this, who have not met with accounts, if not examples of this nature, that may parallel, or at least juftify this.

Let the

Its influence

on intellec tual habits.

§. 17. Intellectual habits and defects this way contracted, are not lefs frequent and powerful, though lefs obferved. ideas of being and matter be ftrongly joined either by education or much thought, whilft these are ftill combined in the mind, what notions, what reasonings will there be about feparate fpirits? Let custom from the very childhood have joined figure and fhape to the idea of God, and what abfurdities will that mind be liable to about the Deity?

Let the idea of infallibility be infeparably joined to any person, and these two conftantly together poffefs the mind; and then one body, in two places at once, fhall unexamined be fwallowed for a certain truth, by an implicit faith, whenever that imagined infallible perfon dictates and demands affent without inquiry.

§. 18. Some fuch wrong and unnatural combinations of ideas will be found to efta- in different Obfervable blish the irreconcilable oppofition between fects. different fects of philofophy and religion;

for we cannot imagine every one of their followers to impose wilfully on himself, and knowingly refufe truth offered by plain reafon. Intereft, though it does a great deal in the cafe, yet cannot be thought to work whole focieties of men to fo univerfal a perverfeness, as that every one of them to a man fhould knowingly main

tain falfhood: fome at least must be allowed to do what all pretend to, i. e. to purfue truth fincerely; and therefore there must be something that blinds their understandings, and makes them not fee the falfhood of what they embrace for real truth. That which thus captivates their reafons, and leads men of fincerity blindfold from common fenfe, will, when examined, be found to be what we are fpeaking of: fome independent ideas, of no alliance to one another, are by education, cuftom, and the conftant din of their party, fo coupled in their minds, that they always appear there together; and they can no more feparate them in their thoughts, than if there were but one idea, and they operate as if they were fo. This gives fense to jargon, demonftration to abfurdities, and confiftency to nonfenfe, and is the foundation of the greatest, I had almoft faid of all the errours in the world; or if it does not reach fo far, it is at least the most dangerous one, fince fo far as it obtains, it hinders men from feeing and examining. When two things in themselves disjoined, appear to the fight conftantly united; if the eye fees these things riveted, which are loofe, where will you begin to rectify the mistakes that follow in two ideas, that they have been accuftomed fo to join in their minds, as to fubftitute one for the other, and, as 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 errour; and the confufion of two different ideas, which a customary connexion of them in their minds hath to them made in effect but one, fills their heads with false views, and their reasonings with falfe confequences.

Conclufion.

§. 19. Having thus given an account of the original, forts, and extent of our ideas, with feveral other confiderations, about these (I know not whether I may fay) inftruments or materials of our knowledge; the method I at firft propofed to myself would now require, that I fhould immediately proceed to show what ufe the understanding makes of them, and what knowledge we have by them. This was that

which, in the first general view I had of this fubject, was all that I thought I fhould have to do: but, upon a nearer approach, I find that there is so close a connexion between ideas and words; and our abstract ideas, and general words, have fo conftant a relation one to another, that it is impoffible to fpeak clearly and diftinctly of our knowledge, which all confifts in propofitions, without confidering, firft the nature, ufe, and fignification of language; which therefore must be the bufinefs of the next book.

§. I.

Man fitted to

form articulate founds.

OD having defigned man for a fociable creature, made him not only with an inclination, and under a neceffity to have fellowship with thofe of his own kind; but furnished him alfo with language, which was to be the great inftrument and common tie of fociety. Man therefore had by nature his organs fo fashioned, as to be fit to frame articulate founds, which we call words. But this was not enough to produce language; for parrots, and feveral other birds, will be taught to make articulate founds diftinct enough, which yet, by no means, are capable of language.

To make

them figns of

ideas.

§. 2. Befides articulate founds therefore, it was farther neceffary, that he should be able to use these founds as figns of internal conceptions; and to make them ftand as marks for the ideas within his own mind, whereby they might be made known to others, and the thoughts of men's minds be conveyed from one to another. §. 3. But neither was this fufficient to make words fo useful as they ought to be. neral figns,

'To make ge.

It

It is not enough for the perfection of language, that founds can be made figns of ideas, unless thofe figns can be fo made ufe of as to comprehend several particular things for the multiplication of words would have perplexed their use, had every particular thing need of a diftinct name to be fignified by. To remedy this inconvenience, language had yet a farther improvement in the use of general terms, whereby one word was made to mark a multitude of particular existences: which advantageous ufe of founds was obtained only by the difference of the ideas they were made figns of: thofe names becoming general, which are made to ftand for general ideas, and thofe remaining particular, where the ideas they are used for are particular.

§. 4. Befides thefe names which ftand for ideas, there be other words which men make ufe of, not to fignify any idea, but the want or abfence of fome ideas fimple or complex, or all ideas together; fuch as are nihil in Latin, and in English, ignorance and barrennefs. All which negative or privative words cannot be faid properly to belong to, or fignify no ideas: for then they would be perfectly infignificant founds; but they relate to pofitive ideas, and fignify their abfence.

Words ultimately derived from fuch as fignify fenfible ideas.

§. 5. It may alfo lead us a little towards the original of all our notions and knowledge, if we remark how great a dependence our words have on common fenfible ideas: and how thofe, which are made ufe of to ftand for actions and notions quite removed from fenfe, have their rife from thence, and from obvious fenfible ideas are transferred to more abftrufe fignifications; and made to ftand for ideas that come not under the cognizance of our fenfes: v. g. to imagine, apprehend, comprehend, adhere, conceive, instil, difguft, difturbance, tranquillity, &c. are all words taken from the operations of fenfible things, and applied to certain modes of thinking. Spirit, in its primary fignification, is breath: angel a meffenger: and I doubt not, but if we could trace them to their fources, we should find, in all languages, the names, which ftand for things that fall not under our fenfes, to have

had

had their firft rife from fenfible ideas. By which we may give fome kind of guess what kind of notions they were, and whence derived, which filled their minds who were the first beginners of languages: and how nature, even in the naming of things, unawares fuggefted to men the originals and principles of all their knowledge: whilft, to give names that might make known to others any operations they felt in themselves, or any other ideas that came not under their fenfes, they were fain to borrow words from ordinary known ideas of fenfation, by that means to make others the more easily to conceive thofe operations they experimented in themselves, which made no outward fenfible appearances: and then when they had got known and agreed names, to fignify thofe internal operations of their own minds, they were fufficiently furnished to make known by words all their other ideas; fince they could confift of nothing, but either of outward fenfible perceptions, or of the inward operations of their minds about them: we having, as has been proved, no ideas at all, but what originally come either from fenfible objects without, or what we feel within ourfelves, from the inward workings of our own spirits, of which we are confcious to ourfelves within.

Diftribution.

§. 6. But to understand better the ufe and force of language, as fubfervient to instruction and knowledge, it will be convenient to confider,

First, To what it is that names, in the ufe of language, are immediately applied.

Secondly, Since all (except proper) names are general, and fo ftand not particularly for this or that fingle thing, but for forts and ranks of things; it will be neceffary to confider, in the next place, what the forts and kinds, or, if you rather like the Latin names, what the fpecies and genera of things are; wherein they confift, and how they come to be made. Thefe being (as they ought) well looked into, we fhall the better come to find the right ufe of words, the natural advantages and defects of language, and the remedies that ought to be used, to avoid the inconveniences of obfcurity