not guided by an understanding agent, should frequently constitute the bodies of any species of animals: in these and the like cases, I think, nobody that considers them can be one jot at a stand which side to take, nor at all waver in his assent. Lastly, when there can be no supposition (the thing in its own nature indifferent, and wholly depending upon the testimony of witnesses) that there is as fair testimony against, as for the matter of fact attested; which by inquiry is to be learned, v. g. whether there was one thousand seven hundred years. ago such a man at Rome as Julius Cæsar: in all such cases, I say, I think it is not in any rational man's power to refuse his assent; but that it necessarily follows, and closes with such probabilities. In other less clear cases, I think, it is in man's power to suspend his assent; and perhaps content himself with the proofs he has, if they favour the opinion that suits with his inclination or interest, and so stop from farther search. But that a man should afford his assent to that side, on which the less probability appears to him, seems to me utterly impracticable, and as impossible, as it is to believe the same thing probable and improbable at the same time.

Where it is in our power

§. 16. As knowledge is no more arbitrary than perception; so, I think, assent is no to suspend it. more in our power than knowledge. When the agreement of any two ideas appears to our minds, whether immediately, or by the assistance of reason, I can no more refuse to perceive, no more avoid knowing it, than I can avoid seeing those objects which I

turn my eyes to, and look on in day-light: and what upon full examination I find the most probable, I cannot deny my assent to. But though we cannot hinder our knowledge, where the agreement is once perceived, nor our assent, where the probability manifestly appears. upon due consideration of all the measures of it: yet we can hinder both knowledge and assent, by stopping our inquiry, and not employing our faculties in the search of any truth. If it were not so, ignorance, errour, or infidelity could not in any case be a fault. Thus in some cases we can prevent or suspend our assent; but! can a man, versed in modern or ancient history, doubt

whether there is such a place as Rome, or whether there was such a man as Julius Cæsar? Indeed there are mil. lions of truths, that a man is not, or may not think himself concerned to know; as whether our king Richard the Third was crooked, or no; or whether Roger Bacon was a mathematician, or a magician. In these and suchlike cases, where the assent one way or other is of no importance to the interest of any one; no action, no concernment of his, following or depending thereon; there it is not strange, that the mind should give itself up to the common opinion, or render itself to the first comer. These and the like opinions are of so little weight and moment, that, like motes in the sun, their tendencies are very rarely taken notice of. They are there, as it were, by chance, and the mind lets them float at liberty. But where the mind judges that the proposition has concernment in it; where the assent or not assenting is thought to draw consequences of moment after it, and good and evil to depend on choosing or refusing the right side; and the mind sets itself seriously to inquire and examine the probability; there, I think, it is not in our choice to take which side we please, if manifest odds appear on either. The greater probability, I think, in that case will determine the assent: and a man can no more avoid assenting, or taking it to be true, where he perceives the greater probability, than he can avoid knowing it to be true, where he perceives the agreement or disagreement of any two ideas.

If this be so, the foundation of errour will lie in wrong measures of probability; as the foundation of vice in wrong measures of good.

§. 17. Fourthly, the fourth and last wrong 4. Authority. measure of probability I shall take notice

of, and which keeps in ignorance or errour more people than all the other together, is that which I mentioned in the foregoing chapter; I mean, the giving up our assent to the common received opinions, either of our friends or party, neighbourhood or country. How many men have no other ground for their tenets, than the supposed honesty, or learning, or number, of those of the same profession ? As if honest or bookish men could not

err, or truth were to be established by the vote of the multitude: yet this with most men serves the turn. The tenet has had the attestation of reverend antiquity, it comes to me with the passport of former ages, and therefore I am secure in the reception I give it: other men have been, and are of the same opinion (for that is all is said) and therefore it is reasonable for me to embrace it. A man' may more justifiably throw up cross and pile for his opinions, than take them up by such measures. All men are liable to errour, and most men are in many points, by passion or interest, under temptation to it. If we could but see the secret motives that influence the men' of name and learning in the world, and the leaders of parties, we should not always find that it was the embracing of truth for its own sake, that made them espouse the doctrines they owned and maintained. This at least is certain, there is not an opinion, so absurd, which a man may not receive upon this ground. There is no errour to be named, which has not had its professors and a man shall never want crooked paths to walk in, if he thinks that he is in the right way, where. ever he has the footsteps of others to follow.

Men not in so many er

§. 18. But, notwithstanding the great noise is made in the world about errours rours as ima- and opinions, I must do mankind that right, gined. as to say there are not so many men in errours and wrong opinions, as is commonly supposed. Not that I think they embrace the truth: but indeed, because concerning those doctrines they keep such a stir about, they have no thought, no opinion at all. For if any one should a little catechise the greatest part of the partizans of most of the sects in the world, he would not find, concerning those matters they are so zealous for, that they have any opinions of their own: much less would he have reason to think, that they took them upon the examination of arguments, and appearance of probability. They are resolved to stick to a party, that. education or interest has engaged them in; and there, like the common soldiers of an army, show their courage and warmth as their leaders direct, without ever examining or so much as knowing the cause they contend:

for. If a man's life shows, that he has no serious regard. for religion; for what reason should we think, that he beats his head about the opinions of his church, and troubles himself, to examine the grounds of this or that doctrine? It is enough for him to obey his leaders, to have his hand and his tongue ready for the support of the common cause, and thereby approve himself to those,. who can give him credit, preferment or protection in that society. Thus men become professors of, and combatants for those opinions they were never convinced of, nor proselytes to; no, nor ever had so much as floating in their heads: and though one cannot say, there are fewer improbable or erroneous opinions in the world than there are; yet it is certain, there are fewer that actually assent to them, and mistake them for truth, than is imagined.

Of the Division of the Sciences.

§. 1. ALL that can fall within the com- Three sorts. pass of human understanding, being either,

first, the nature of things as they are in themselves, their relations, and their manner of operation: or, secondly, that which man himself ought to do, as a rational and voluntary agent, for the attainment of any end, especially happiness: or, thirdly, the ways and means, whereby the knowledge of both the one and the other of these is attained and communicated: I think, science. may be divided properly into these three sorts.

6. 2. First, the knowledge of things, as 1. Physica. they are in their own proper beings, their

constitution, properties and operations; whereby I mean not only matter and body, but spirits also, which have their proper natures, constitutions, and operations, as well as bodies. This, in a little more enlarged sense of the word, I call queix, or natural philosophy. The end of this is bare speculative truth; and whatsoever can

afford the mind of man any such, falls under this branch, whether it be God himself, angels, spirits, bodies, or any of their affections, as number, and figure, &c.

2. Practica.

§. 3. Secondly, Пgaxlix, the skill of right applying our own powers and actions, for the attainment of things good and useful. The most considerable under this head is ethics, which is the seeking out those rules and measures of human actions, which lead to happiness, and the means to practise them. The end of this is not bare speculation, and the know ledge of truth; but right, and a conduct suitable to it. Σημειωτική. §. 4. Thirdly, the third branch may be called Eurinn, or the doctrine of signs, the most usual whereof being words, it is aptly enough termed also Aoyix, logic; the business whereof is to consider the nature of signs, the mind makes use of for the understanding of things, or conveying its knowledge to others. For since the things the mind contemplates are none of them besides itself, present to the understanding, it is necessary that something else, as a sign or representation of the thing it considers, should be present to it; and these are ideas. And because the scene of ideas that makes one man's thoughts, cannot be laid open to the immediate view of another, nor laid up any where but in the memory, a no very sure repository; therefore to communicate our thoughts to one another, as well as record them for our own use, signs of our ideas are also necessary. Those which men have found most convenient, and therefore generally make use of, are articulate sounds. The consideration then of ideas and words, as the great instruments of knowledge, makes no despicable part of their contemplation, who would take a view of human knowledge in the whole extent of it. And perhaps if they were distinctly weighed, and duly considered, they would afford us another sort of logic and critic, than what we have been hitherto acquainted with.

This is the first division of the objects

of knowledge.

§. 5. This seems to me the first and most general, as well as natural division of the objects of our understanding. For a man can employ his thoughts about nothing, but either the contemplation of things them