CHAPTER XIII. 



DISCRIMINATION AND COMPARISON. 



It is matter of popular observation that some men have 

 sharper senses than others, and that some have acuter 

 minds and are able to 'spht hairs' and see two shades of 

 meaning where the majority see l:)ut one. Locke long ago 

 set apart the facidty of discrimination as one in which men 

 differ individually. What he wrote is good enough to quote 

 as an introduction to this chapter: 



"Another faculty we may take notice of in our minds is that ot 

 discerning and distinguishing between the several ideas it has. It is 

 not enough to have a confused perception of something in general : un- 

 less the mind had a distinct perception of different objects and their 

 quaUties, it would be capable of very little knowledge ; though the 

 bodies that affect us were as busy about us as they are now% and the 

 mind were continually employed in thinking. On this faculty of dis- 

 tinguishing one thing from another depends the evidence and certainty 

 of several even very general propositions, which have passed for innate 

 truths ; because men, overlooking the true cause why those propositions 

 find universal assent, impute it wholly to native uniform impressions ; 

 whereas it in truth depends upon this clear discerning faculty of the 

 mind, wnereby it perceives two ideas to be the same or different. But 

 of this more hereafter ? 



" How much the imperfection of accurately discriminating ideas one 

 from another lies either in the dulness or faults of the organs of sense, 

 or w-ant of acuteness, exercise, or attention in the understanding, or 

 hastiness and precipitancy natural to some tempers, I will not here ex- 

 amine : it suffices to take notice that this is one of the operations that 

 the mind may reflect on and observe in itself. It is of that conse- 

 quence to its other knowledge, that so far as this faculty is in itself 

 dull, or not rightly made use of for the distinguishing one thing 

 from another, so far our notions are confused, and our reason and 

 judgment disturbed or misled. If in having our ideas in the memory 

 ready at hand consists quickness of parts ; in this of having them un- 

 confused, and being able nicely to distinguish one thing from another 

 where there is but the least difference, consists in a great measure the 

 exactness of judgment and clearness of reason which is to be observed 

 in one man above another. And hence, perhaps, may be given som? 



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