18 DISCOURSE ON THE STUDY 



CHAP. II. 



OF ABSTRACT SCIENCE AS A PREPARATION FOR THE 

 STUDY OF PHYSICS. A PROFOUND ACQUAINTANCE 

 WITH IT NOT INDISPENSABLE FOR A CLEAR UNDER- 

 STANDING OF PHYSICAL LAWS. HOW A CONVICTION 



OF THEIR TRUTH MAY BE OBTAINED WITHOUT IT. 



INSTANCES. FURTHER DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT. 



(13.) SCIENCE is the knowledge of many, orderly 

 and methodically digested and arranged, so as to 

 become attainable by one. The knowledge of reasons 

 and their conclusions constitutes abstract, that of 

 causes and their effects, and of the laws of nature, 

 natural science. 



(14.) Abstract science is independent of a system 

 of nature, of a creation, of every thing, in short, 

 except memory, thought, and reason. Its objects 

 are, first, those primary existences and relations 

 which we cannot even conceive not to be, such as 

 space, time, number, order, &c. ; and, secondly, 

 those artificial forms, or symbols, which thought 

 has the power of creating for itself at pleasure, 

 and substituting as representatives, by the aid of 

 memory, for combinations of those primary objects 

 and of its own conceptions, either to facilitate the 

 act of reasoning respecting them, or as convenient 

 deposits of its own conclusions, or for their com- 

 munication to others. Such are, first, language, 

 oral or written ; its conventional forms, which con- 

 stitute grammar, and the rules for its use in argument, 



