Chap. X. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 171 



advanced in phllofophy as to wonder at what the vulgar never think 

 of, how this infinity of things could be ordered and arranged, reduced 

 to clafles and numbered as far as was pofTible, and thereby made the 

 fixed object of the contemplation of the human mind, which otherwife 

 w^ould be loft in the infinite number and variety of them. This 

 wonderful mafs of things, this formlefs infinite^ as Milton calls it, 

 never could have been arranged and fet in order in our minds, ex- 

 cept by thofe two faculties of our intellect, which I have elfewherc 

 mentioned *, Abftraclion and GeneraUi'Ziition, By abftraction we fe- 

 parate and difcriminate things, and fo C(; ifider every thing by itfelf^ 

 without which we could have no dillinct notion of any thing: And 

 in this way we form ideas of particular tilings, with which, as I 

 have faid, all our knowledge, in this ftate of our exiftence, begins. 

 Then by generallization we form ideas of fpeciefes and genufes, 

 and fo make one of matiy^ as Plato very properly expreifes it ; and 

 in this way we fet bounds to infinity, and make all the things, here 

 below, the fubjeds of art aad fcience. 



In this way I have given an account, and I hope a fatisfadory ac- 

 count, how general ideas are formed ; without which there can be 

 no fcience; for without them there can be neither propofition nor 

 fyllogifm. And what I have here faid will juftify an obfervation 

 made by Ariftotle concerning thefe ideas, which, to fuch readers as 

 have not ftudied the progrefs of the human mind in forming arts and 

 fciences, will appear very extraordinaiy. It is this, that they are formed 

 by Indu^ion^ or \i(Tay_o.^yn, as he calls itf. That we ufe induction very 

 much in reafoning, is obvious; but, I believe, no body, that has not ftu- 

 died Ariftotle, ever fuppofed that even the general ideas, which are the 

 fubjeds of reafoning, were formed by indudion. But it is clear that 

 they are fo formed, from the account I have given of their formation: 



Y 2 Eo^ 



* Vol. 4. of tliis work, p. 17. 



\ Lib. 6. De MoribuSf Cap. 3. infuie. 



