Chap. VI. A NTIENT METAPHYSICS. 67 



fuch independent exiftence, but exift in other things, and yet of 

 thefe we form feparate ideas ; fo that, in this formation of ideas, we 

 divide things that are by nature indivifible, fuch as fiibftances and 

 their accidents, and which, by the fenfes, are always perceived toge- 

 tlier. Of accidents we form ideas, as well as oi fiihjlances, and by 

 the fame procefs of dividing and uniting. In this way we form the 

 idea of magnitude or quantity continuous, and of number or quantity 

 difcrete, and a more general idea ftill, that of quantity. And in the 

 fame manner we form ideas of the qualities of body, fuch as figure 

 and cohur. 



The number of fpeciefes, as well as of individuals, is infinite with 

 refpe£t to us and our comprehenfion, but not in the nature of 

 things: For as the univerfe is a fyftem, it can admit of nothing in- 

 finite, but every thing mufl have meafure and bounds. But though 

 the fpeciefes be infinite, with refpe£t to us, fcience has contrived, 

 (and a wonderful work of fcience it is), to reduce the genufes to cer- 

 tain clafles, and to number thefe clafles. This was a difcovery of the 

 Pythagorean fchool, and the greateft difcovery, in ray opinion, that 

 ever was made in philofophy, by which all the things in this univerfe 

 are clafTed and numbered. The work is very properly entitled, by 

 Archytas, the author of it, n.j. tou n*.T.t, that is. Of the ivbole of 

 Things ; but in the Treatife of Ariftotle, that we have on the fubje(fl, 

 and which is little more than the work of Archytas tranflated from 

 the Doric to the Attic, it is entitled, Of the Categories ; for, as he 

 makes it part of his logic, he gives thofe higheft genufes the name of 

 the Praedicates of Propofitions *. 



This progrefs of the human mind, from objeds of fenfe, with which 



I 2 all 



* Who would defire to know more of the Unlverfals of Archytas, and the Ca- 

 tegories of Ariftotle, may read the 3d book of vol. I, of this work, particularly the 

 firft three chapters. 



