when they informed us that nature was terribly afraid of a vacuum, and that it was the cause why the water would not fall out of a long tube if it was turned upside down the moderns as well as the ancients fall often into this fallacy, when they positively assign the reasons of natural appearances, without sufficient experiments to prove them.. : Astrologers are overrun with this sort of fallacies, and they cheat the people grossly by pretending to tell fortunes, and to deduce the cause of the various occurrences in the lives of men from the various positions of the stars and planets, which they call aspects. When comets aud eclipses of the sun and moon are construed to signify the fate of princes, the revolution of states, famine, wars, and calamities of all kinds, it is a fallacy that belongs to this rank of sophisms. There is scarce any thing more common in human life than this sort of deceitful argument. If any two accidental events happen to concur, one is presently made the cause of the other. If Titius wronged his neighbour of a guinea, and in six months after he fell down and broke his leg, weak men will impute it to the divine vengeance on Titius for his former injustice. This sophism was found also in the early days of the world: for when holy Job was surrounded with uncommon miseries, his own friends inferred that he was a most heinous criminal, and charged him with aggravated guilt as the cause of his calamities; though God himself by a voice from heaven solved this uncharitable sophism, and cleared his servant Job of that charge. How frequent is it among men to impute crimes to wrong persons? We too often charge that upon the wicked contrivance and premeditated malice of a neighbour, which arose merely from ignorance, or from unguarded temper. And on the other hand, when we have a mind to excuse ourselves, we practise the same sophism, and charge that upon our inadvertence or our ignorance, which perhaps was designed wickedness. What is really done by a neces sity of circumstances, we sometimes impute to choice. And again, we charge that upon necessity, which was really desired and chosen... Sometimes a person acts out of judgment in opposition to his inclination; another person perhaps acts the same thing out of inclination, and against his judgment. It is hard for us to determine with assurance what are the inward springs and secret causes of every man's conduct: and therefore we should be cautious and slow in passing a judgment, where the case is not exceeding evident: and if we should mistake, let it rather be on the charitable than on the censorious side. It is the same sophism that charges mathematical learning with leading the minds of men to scepticism and infidelity, and as unjustly accuses the new philosophy of paving the way to heresy and schism. Thus the reformation from Popery has been charged with the murder and blood of millions, which in truth is to be imputed to the tyranny of the princes and the priests, who would not suffer the people to reform their sentiments and their practices according to the word of God. Thus Christianity in the pri mitive ages was charged by the Heathens with all the calamities which befel the Roman empire, because the Christians renounced the Heathen gods and idols. The way to relieve ourselves from those sophisms, and to secure ourselves from the danger of falling into them, is an honest and diligent enquiry into the real nature and causes of things, with a constant watchfulness against all those prejudices that might warp the judgment aside from truth in that enquiry. V. The next is called fallacia accidentis, or a sophism wherein we pronounce concerning the nature and essential properties of any subject according to something which is merely accidental to it. This is a-kin to the former, and is also very frequent in bu man life. So if opium or the Peruvian bark has been imprudently or unsuccessfully, whereby the patient has received injury, some weaker people absolutely pronounce against the use of the bark or opium upon all occasions whatsoever, and are ready to call them poison. So wine has been the accidental occasion of drunkenness and quarrels ; learning and printing may have been the accidental cause of sedition in a state; the reading of the bible by accident has been abused to promote heresies or destructive errors; and for these reasons they have been all pronounced evil things. Mahomet forbade his followers the use of wine; the Turks discourage learning in their dominions; and the Papists forbid the scripture to be read by the laity. But how very unreasonable are the inferences, and the prohibitions which are built upon them! VI. The next sophism borders upon the former; and that is, when we argue from that which is true in particular circumstances to prove the same thing true absolutely, simply, and abstracted from all circumstances; this is called in the schools a sophism a dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter; as, that which is bought in the shambles is eaten for dinner; raw meat is bought in the shambles, therefore raw meat is eaten for dinner. Or thus, Livy writes fables and improbabilities when he describes prodigies and omens: therefore Livy's Roman history is never to be believed in any thing. Or thus, there may be some mistake of transcribers in some part of scripture: therefore scripture alone is not a safe guide for our faith. This sort of sophism has its reverse also; as when we argue from that which is true simply and absolutely to prove the same thing true in all particular circumstances whatsoever*: as if a traitor should argue from the sixth commandment, Thou shalt not kill a man, to prove that he himself ought not to be hanged: or if a madman should tell me I ought not to withhold his sword from him, because no man ought to withhold the property of another. These two species of sophisms are easily solved by shewing the difference betwixt things in their absolute nature, and the same things surrounded with peculiar circumstances, and considered in regard special times, places, persons, and occasions; or by shewing the difference between a moral and meta. physical universality, and that the proposition will hold good in one case, but not in the other. VII. The sophisms of composition and division come next to be considered. * This is arguing from moral universality, which admits of some exceptions, in the same manner as may be argued from metaphysical or a natural universality, which admits of no exceptions. The sophism of composition is when we infer any thing concerning ideas in a compounded sense, which is only true in a divided sense. And when it is said in the gospel that Christ made the blind to see, and the deaf to hear, and the lame to walk, we onght not to infer hence, that Christ performed contradictions; but those who were blind before were made to see, and those who were deaf before were made to hear, &c. So when the scripture assures us the worst of sinners may be saved, it signifies only, that they who have been the worst of sinners may repent and be saved, not that they shall be saved in their sins. Or if any one should argue thus, two and three are even and odd; five are two and three: therefore five are even and odd. Here that is very falsely inferred concerning two or three in union, which is only two of them divided. The sophism of division is when we infer the same thing concerning ideas in a divided sense, which is only true in a compounded sense; as, if we should pretend to prove that every soldier in the Grecian army put an hundred thousand Persians to flight, because the Grecian soldiers did so. Or if a man should argue thus; five is one number; two and three are five: therefore two and three are one number. This sort of sophism is committed when the word All is taken in a collective and a distributive sense, without a due distinction; as, if any one should reason thus; all the musical instruments of the Jewish temple made a noble concert; the harp is a musical instrument of the Jewish temple, therefore the harp made a noble concert. Here the word All in the major is collective, whereas such a conclusion re"quires that the word All should be distributive. It is the same fallacy when the universal word All ́ or No refers to species in one proposition, and to individuals in another; as, all animals were in Noah's ark; therefore no animals perished in the flood: whereas in the premise all animals signifies every kind of animals, which does not exclude or deny the drowning of a thousand individuals. VIII. The last sort of sophisins arises from our abuse of the ambiguity of words, which is the largest and most extensive kind of fallacy; and indeed several of the former fallacies might be reduced to this head. When the words or phrases are plainly equivocal, they are called Sophisms of Equivocation; as, if we should argue thus, he that sends forth a book into the light, desires it to be read; he that throws a book into the fire, sends it into the light: therefore he that throws a book into the fire desires it to be read. This sophism, as well as the foregoing, and all o the like nature, are solved by shewing the different senses of the words, terms, or phrases. Here Light in the major proposition signifies the public view of the world; in the minor it signifies the brightness of flame and fire, and therefore the syllogism has four terms, or rather it has no middle term, and proves nothing. But where such gross equivocations and ambiguities appear in argument, there is little danger of imposing upon ourselves or others. The greatest danger, and which we are perpetually exposed to in reasoning, is, where the two senses or significations of one term are near a kin, and not plainly distinguished, and yet they are really sufficiently different in their sense to lead us into great mistakes, if we are not watchful. And indeed the greatest part of controversies in the sacred or civil life arise from the different senses that are put upon words, and the different ideas which are included in them; as hath been shewn at large in the first part of Logic, chap. IV. which treats of words and terms. There is, after all these, another sort of sophism which is wont to be called an imperfect Enumeration, or a false Induction; when from a few experiments or observations, men infer general theorems and universal propositions. But this is sufficiently noticed in the foregoing chapter, where we treated of that sort of syllogism which is called Induction. SECT. II.-Two general Tests of true Syllogisms, and Methods of solving all Syllogisms. Besides the special description of true syllogisms and sophisms already given, and the rules by which |