and reduced in their signification (as they must be where they signify any thing) to determined collections of the simple ideas they do or should stand for, those disputes would not end of themselves, and immediately vanish. I leave it then to be considered, what the learning of disputation is, and how well they are employed for the advantage of themselves or others, whose business is only the vain ostentation of sounds,; i. e. those who spend their lives in disputes and controversies. When I shall see any of those combatants strip all his terms of ambiguity and obscurity (which every one may do in the words he uses himself;) I shall think him a champion for knowledge, truth, and peace, and not the slave of vain glory, ambition or a party.

§ 8. 1. Remedy, to use no word without an idea.

To remedy the defects of speech before-mentioned to some degree, and to prevent the inconveniences that follow from them, I imagine the observation of these following rules may be of use, till somebody better able shall judge it worth his while, to think more maturely on this matter, and oblige the world with his thoughts on it.

First, A man should take care to use no word without a signification, no name without an idea for which he makes it stand. This. rule will not seem altogether needless to any one who shall take the pains to recollect how often he has met with such words, as instinct, sympathy, and antipathy, &c. in the discourse of others, so made use of, as he might easily conclude, that those that used them had no ideas in their minds to which they applied them; but spoke them only as sounds, which usually served instead of reasons on the like occasions. Not but that these words, and the like, have very proper significations in which they may be used; but there being no natural connection between any words and any ideas, these, and any other, may be learned by rote, and pronounced or writ by men, who have no ideas in their minds, to which they have annexed them, and for which they make them stand; which is necessary they should, if men would speak intelligibly even to themselves alone.

§ 9. 2. To have distinct ideas annexed to them in modes. SECONDLY, It is not enough a man uses his words as signs of some ideas; those ideas he annexes them to, if they be simple, must be clear and distinct; if complex must be determinate, i. e. the precise collection of simple ideas settled in the mind, with that sound annexed to it, as the sign of that precise determined

collection, and no other. This is very necessary in names of modes, and especially moral words, which having no settled objects in nature, from whence their ideas are taken, as from their original, are apt to be very confused. Justice is a word in every man's mouth, but most commonly with a very undetermined loose signification: which will always be so, unless a man has in his mind a distinct comprehension of the component parts that a complex idea consists of; and if it be decompounded, must be able to resolve it still on, till he at last comes to the simple ideas that make it up and unless this be done, a man makes an ill use of the word, let it be justice, for example, or any other: I do not say, a man needs stand to recollect and make this analysis at large, every time the word justice comes in his way: but this at least is necessary, that he have so examined the signification of that name, and settled the idea of all its parts in his mind, that he can do it when he pleases. If one, who makes his complex idea of justice, to be such a treatment of the person or goods of another, as is according to law, hath not a clear and distinct idea what law is, which makes a part of his complex idea of justice, it is plain his idea of justice itself will be confused and imperfect. This exactness will, perhaps, be judged very troublesome; and therefore most men will think they may be excused from settling the complex ideas of mixed modes so precisely in their minds. But yet I must say, till this be done, it must not be wondered that they have a great deal of obscurity and confusion in their own minds, and a great deal of wrangling in their discourses with others.

§ 10. And conformable in substances.

In the names of substances, for a right use of them, something more is required than barely determined ideas. In these the names must also be conformable to things, as they exist; but of this I shall have occasion to speak more at large by and by. This exactness is absolutely necessary in inquiries after philosophical knowledge and in controversies about truth. And though it would be well too, if it extended itself to common conversation, and the ordinary affairs of life; yet I think that is scarce to be expected. Vulgar notions suit vulgar discourses; and both, though confused enough, yet serve pretty well the market and the wake. Merchants and lovers, cooks and tailors, have words wherewithal to despatch their ordinary affairs; and so, I think, might philosophers and disputants too, if they had a mind to understand, and to be clearly understood.

11. 3. Propriety.

THIRDLY, It is not enough that men have ideas, determined ideas, for which they make these signs stand; but they must also take care to apply their words, as near as may be, to such ideas as common use has annexed them to. For words, especially of languages already framed, being no man's private possession, but the common measure of commerce and communication, it is not for any one, at pleasure, to change the stamp they are current in, nor alter the ideas they are affixed to; or at least, when there is a necessity to do so, he is bound to give notice of it. Men's intentions in speaking are, or at least should be, to be understood; which cannot be without frequent explanations, demands, and other the like incommodious interruptions, where men do not follow common use. (Propriety of speech is that which gives our thoughts entrance into other men's minds with the greatest ease and advantage; and therefore deserves some part of our care and study, especially in the names of moral words. The proper signification and use of terms is best to be learned from those, who in their writings and discourses appear to have had the clearest notions, and applied to them their terms with the exactest choice and fitness. This way of using a man's words according to the propriety of the language, though it have not always the good fortune to be understood, yet most commonly leaves the blame of it on him, who is so unskilful in the language he speaks, as not to understand it, when made use of as it ought to be.

§ 12. 4. To make known their meaning.

FOURTHLY, But because common use has not so visibly annexed any signification to words, as to make men know always certainly what they precisely stand for: and because men, in the improvement of their knowledge, come to have ideas different from the ordinary and received ones, for which they must either make new words (which men seldom venture to do, for fear of being thought guilty of affectation or novelty) or else must use old ones in a new signification: therefore, after the observation of the foregoing rules, it is sometimes necessary, for the ascertaining the signification of words, to declare their meaning, where either common use has left it uncertain and loose (as it has in most names of very complex ideas) or where the term being very material in the discourse, and that upon which it chiefly turns, is liable to any doubtfulness or mistake.

§ 13. And that three ways.

As the ideas men's words stand for, are of different sorts; so the way of making known the ideas, they stand for, when there is occasion, is also different. For though defining be thought the proper way to make known the proper signification of words; yet there are some words that will not be defined, as there are others, whose precise meaning cannot be made known but by definition; and perhaps a third, which partake somewhat of both the other, as we shall see in the names of simple ideas, modes, and substances.

§ 14. 1. In simple ideas, by synonymous terms, or showing. FIRST, When a man makes use of the name of any simple idea, which he perceives is not understood, or is in danger to be mistaken, he is obliged by the laws of ingenuity, and the end of speech, to declare his meaning, and make known what idea he makes it stand for. This, as has been shown, cannot be done by definition; and therefore, when a synonymous word fails to do it, there is but one of these ways left. First, Sometimes the naming the subject, wherein that simple idea is to be found, will make its name be understood by those who are acquainted with that subject, and know it by that name. So, to make a countryman understand what fueillemorte color signifies, it may suffice to tell him, it is the color of withered leaves falling in autumn. Secondly, But the only sure way of making known the signification of the name of any simple idea, is by presenting to his senses that subject which may produce it in his mind, and make him actually have the idea that word stands for.

§ 15. 2. In mixed modes, by definition.

SECONDLY, Mixed modes, especially those belonging to morality, being most of them such combinations of ideas, as the mind puts together of its own choice, and whereof there are not always standing patterns to be found existing; the signification of their names cannot be made known, as those of simple ideas, by any showing; but in recompense thereof, may be perfectly and exactly defined. For they being combinations of several ideas, that the mind of man has arbitrarily put together, without reference to any archetypes, men may, if they please, exactly know the ideas that go to each composition, and so both use these words in a certain and undoubted signification, and perfectly declare, when there is occasion, what they stand for. This, if well considered, would lay great blame on those, who make not their discourses about moral things very clear and distinct. For since the precise signification of the

names of mixed modes, or, which is all one, the real essence of each species is to be known, they being not of nature's but man's making, it is a great negligence and perverseness to discourse of moral things with uncertainty and obscurity; which is more pardonable in treating of natural substances, where doubtful terms are hardly to be avoided, for a quite contrary reason, as we shall see by and by.

§ 16. Morality capable of demonstration.

UPON this ground it is, that I am bold to think, that morality is capable of demonstration, as well as mathematics: since the precise real essence of the things moral words stand for, may be perfectly known; and so the congruity or incongruity of the things themselves be certainly discovered, in which consists perfect knowledge. Nor let any one object, that the names of substance are often to be made use of in morality, as well as those of modes, from which will arise obscurity. For as to substances, when concerned in moral discourses, their divers natures are not so much inquired into, as supposed; v. g. when we say, that man is subject to law, we mean nothing by man, but a corporeal rational creature: what the real essence or other qualities of that creature are, in this case, is no way considered. And therefore, whether a child or change-, ling be a man in a physical sense, may amongst the naturalists be as disputable as it will, it concerns not at all the moral man, as I may call him, which is this immoveable unchangeable idea, a corporeal rational being. For were there a monkey, or any other creature to be found, that had the use of reason to such a degree as to be able to understand general signs, and to deduce consequences about general ideas, he would no doubt be subject to law, and in that sense be a man, how much soever he differed in shape from others of that name. The names of substances, if they be used in them as they should, can no more disturb moral than they do mathematical discourses where, if the mathematician speaks of a cube or globe of gold, or any other body, he has his clear settled idea which varies not, though it may by mistake be applied to a particular body to which it belongs not.

§ 17. Definitions can make moral discourses clear.

THIS I have here mentioned by the by, to show of what consequence it is for men, in their names of mixed modes, and consequently in all their moral discourses, to define their words when there is occasion: since thereby moral knowledge may be brought to so great clearness and certainty. And it must be great want of