SINCE

INCE our minds are narrow in their capacity, and cannot furvey the feveral parts of any complex being, with one fingle view, as God fees all things at once; therefore we muft, as it were, take it to pieces, and confider of the parts feparately, that we may have a more complete conception of the whole. So that, if I would learn the nature of a watch, the workman takes it to pieces and fhews me the fpring, the wheels, the axles, the pinions, the balance, the dial-plate, the pointer, the cafe, &c. and def cribes each of these things to me apart, together with their figures and their uses. If I would know what an animal is, the anatomift confiders the head, the trunk, the limbs, the bowels, apart from each other, and gives me diftinct lectures upon each of them. So a kingdom is divided into its feveral provinces; a book into its several chapters ; and any science is divided according to the several subjects of which it treats.

This is what we properly call the divifion of an idea, which is an explication of the whole by its feveral parts, or an enumeration of the feveral parts that go to compofe any whole idea, and to render it complete. And I think when man is divided into body and foul, it properly comes under this part of the doctrine of integral divifion, as well as when the mere body is divided into head, trunk, and limbs : This divifion is fometimes called partition.

When any of the parts of any idea are yet farther divid ed, in order to a clear explication of the whole, this is called a fubdivifion; as when a year is divided into months,, each month into days, and each day into hours, which may also be farther fubdivided into minutes and jeconds.

It is neceffary, in order to a full explication of any being, to confider each part, and the properties of it, diftinct by itself, as well as in its relation to the whole: For there are many properties that belong to the feveral parts of a being which cannot properly be afcribed to the whole,

though these properties may fit each part for its proper station, and as it ftands in that relation to the whole complex being: As in a house, the doors are moveable, the rooms fquare, the ceilings white, the windows tranfparent, yet the boufe is neither moveable, nor fquare, nor white, nor transparent.

The Special Rules of a good Divifion are these.

I Rule....Each part fingly taken must contain less than the whole, but all the parts taken collectively, (or together,) muft contain neither more nor less than the whole. Therefore, if in difcourfing of a tree you divide it into the trunk and leaver, it is an imperfect divifion, because the root and the branches are needful to make up the whole. So logic would be ill divided into apprehenfion, judgment, and reafoning; for method is a confiderable part of the art which teaches us to use our reafon right, and fhould by no means be omitted. Upon this account, in every divifion wherein we defign a perfect exactnefs, it is neceffary to examine the whole idea with diligence, left we omit any parts of it through want of care; though in fome cafes it is not poffible, and in others it is not neceffary, that we fhould defcend to the minutest parts.

II Rule.... In all divifions we should first confider the larger and more immediate parts of the subject, and not divide it at once into the more minute and remote parts. It would by no means be proper to divide a kingdom first into streets, and lanes, and fields; but it must be firft divided into provinces or counties, then thofe counties may be divided into towns, villages, fields, &c. and towns into streets and lanes.

III Rule... The feveral parts of a divifion ought to be oppofite, that is, one part ought not to contain another. It would be a ridiculous divifion of an animal into head, limbs, body, and brain, for the brains are contained in the head.

Yet here it must be noted, that fometimes the fubjects of any treatise, or the objects of any particular science, may be properly and neceffarily fo divided, that the fecond may include the firft, and the third may include the first and second, without offending against this rule, because in the second or following parts of the science or I

difcourse these objects are not confidered in the fame manner as in the first; as for inftance, geometry divides its objects into lines, furfaces, and folids: Now, though a line be contained in a furface, or a folid, yet it is not considered in a furface, separate and alone, or as a mere line, as it is in the first part of geometry, which treats of lines. So logic is rightly divided into conception, judgment, reafoning, and method. For, though ideas or conceptions are contained in the following parts of logic, yet they are not there treated of as feparate ideas, which are the proper fubject of the first

part.

IV Rule.....Let not subdivisions be too numerous without neefity: For it is better many times to distinguish more parts at once, if the subject will bear it, than to mince the difcourfe by exceffive dividing and fubdividing. It is preferable therefore, in a treatife of geography, to fay, that in a city we will confider its walls, its gates, its buildings, its Streets, and lanes, than to divide it formerly first into the encompaffing and the encompassed parts; the encompaffing parts are the walls and gates, the encompaffed parts include the ways and the buildings; the ways are the Streets and the lanes; buildings confilt of the foundations and the fuperftructure, &c.

Too great a number of fubdivifions has been affected by fome perfons in fermons, treatifes, inftructions, &c. under pretence of greater accuracy: But this fort of fubtilities hath often caufed great confufion to the understanding, and fometimes more difficulty to the memory. In these cafes it is only a good judgment can determine what fubdivifions are useful.

V Rule.... Divide every fubject according to the special defign you have in view. One and the fame idea or fubject may be divided in very different manners, according to the different purposes we have in difcourfing of it. So, if a printer were to confider the feveral parts of a book, he must divide it into sheets, the fheets into pages, the pages into lines, and the lines into letters. But a grammarian divides a book into periods, fentences, and words, or parts of fpeech, as noun, pronoun, verb, &c. A logician confiders a book as divided into chapters, fections, arguments, propofitions, ideas; and, with the help of ontology, he divides the propofitions into

subject, object, property, relation, action, passion,cause, effect, &c. But it would be very ridiculous for a logician to divide a book into fheets, pages, and lines; or for a printer to divide it into nouns and pronouns, or into propofitions, ideas, properties, or causes.

VI Rule..... In all your divifions obferve with greateft exactnefs the nature of things. And here I am conftrained to make a fubdivifion of this rule into two very neceffary particulars.

(1.) Let the parts of your divifion be fuch as are properly diftinguished in nature. Do not divide afunder thofe parts of the idea which are intimately united in nature, nor unite those things into one part which nature has evidently disjoined: Thus it would be very improper, in treating of an animal body, to divide it into the fuperior and inferior halves; for it would be hard to fay how much be longs by nature to the inferior half, and how much to the fuperior. Much more improper would it be ftill to divide the animal into the right hand parts and left hand parts, which would bring greater confufion. This would be as unnatural as if a man fhould cleave a hafel nut in halves through the husk, the shell, and the kernal, at once, and say, a nut is divided into these two parts; whereas nature leads plainly to the threefold distinction of husk, shell, and kernel.

(2.). Do not affect duplicities, nor triplicities, nor any certain number of parts in your divifion of things; for we know of no fuch certain number of parts which God the Creator has obferved in forming all the varieties of his creatures; nor is there any uniform determined number of parts in the various fubjects of human art or science; yet fome perfons have disturbed the order of nature, and abused their readers, by an affectation of dichotomies, trichotomies, fevens, twelves, &c. Let the nature of the subject, confidered together with the defign, which you have in view, always de termine the number of parts into which you divide it.

After all, it must be confeffed, that an intimate knowl edge of things, and a judicious obfervation, will affist in the bufinefs of divifion, as well as of definition, better than too nice and curious an attention to the mere formalities of logical writers, without a real acquaintance with things.

604906 A

SECT. IX.

OF A COMPREHENSIVE CONCEPTION OF THINGS, AND OF ABSTRÁC="

TION.

THE

HE third rule to direct our conceptions requires us to conceive of things comprehenfively. As we must furvey an object in all its parts to obtain a complete idea of it, fo we mult confider it in all its modes, attributes, properties, and relations, in order to obtain a comprehenfive conception of it.

The comprehenfion of an idea, as it was explained under the doctrine of univerfals, includes only the effential modes or attributes of that idea; but in this place the word is taken in a larger fenfe, and implies also the various occafional properties, accidental modes, and relations.

The neceffity of this rule is founded upon the fame reafon as the former, namely, That our minds are narrow and scanty in their capacities, and as they are not able to confider all the parts of a complex idea at once, fo neither can they at once contemplate all the different attributes and circumftances of it: We must therefore confider things fucceffively and gradually in their various appearances and circumstances: As our natural eye cannot at once behold the fix fides of a die or cube, nor take cognizance of all the points that are marked on them, and therefore we turn up the fides fucceffively, and thus furvey and number the points that are marked on each fide, that we may know the whole.

In order to a comprehenfive view of any idea, we muft first confider, whether the object of it has an existence as well as an effence; whether it be a fimple or complex idea; whether it be a fubftance or a mode. If it be a fubftance, then we must inquire what are the effential modes of it which are necessary to its nature, and what are thofe properties or accidents of it which belong to it occafionally, or as it is placed in fome particular circumstances: We must view it in its internal and abfolute modes, and obferve it in those various external relations in which it ftands to other beings :