39* ON A NATURAL SYSTEM 



phrafes, it was apprehended that the 

 fcience would be involved in great confufion, 

 and that their number would create confident 

 ble difficulties ; and it was like wife alledged, 

 that the moll ancient writings would, by thu 

 mems, be tendered unintelligible, and all the 

 fcience they contained condemned to oblivion. 

 lint fuch evils, at leall not all of them, fctin not 

 to be a ncccfliiry confequence. The oldefl 

 Writings, efpeciully thole on alchemy, are aliuoll 

 all of them incomprehcniiblc: \Vhatcver there- 

 tore will anfwer to probable conjecture, or will 

 admit of a certain and determinate explication* 

 might be more eafily underllood, if t run I poled 

 according to the nature of the fubjecl, and the 

 fenfc of this or that denomination being once 

 extracted, it might be prefcrved in a book ap- 

 propriated to the purpole. As to what relates 

 to the dread of the introduction of new names, 

 it would undoubtedly be well grounded were 

 not all writers to fuller them to be regulated in 

 the fame manner. In this cafe the new names 

 adapted to the nature of things would readily 

 infmuiite themfelvcs, and be uiuveriitHy jeceiv^ 

 cd. 



Surely, it is highly improper that the noblell 

 fcience, which conllitutes, as it were, the very 

 efience of natural philofophy, ihould deliver 

 truths of the greateil importance in the moil 

 ubfurd of all languages, livery country jn.Eu- 



