219 fore cannot choose but have different ideas of the fame fubftance, and therefore make the fignification of its common name very various and uncertain; for the complex ideas of fubftances being made up of fuch fimple ones as are fuppofed to co-exift in nature, every one has a right to put into his complex idea thofe quali ties he has found to be united together. For though in the substance gold, one fatisfies himself with colour and weight, yet another thinks folubility in aqua regia as neceffary to be joined with that colour in his idea of gold, as any one docs its fufibility; folubility in aqua regia be ing a quality as conftantly joined with its colour and weight, as fufibility, or any other: Others put in its ductility, or fixedness, &c. as they have been taught by tradition or experience. Who of all thefe has established the right fignification of the word gold? or who shall be the judge to determine? Each has his standard in nature, which he appeals to, and with reafon thinks he has the fame right to put into his complex idea fignified by the word gold, thofe qualities which upon trial he has found united, as another, who has not fo well examined, has to leave them out, or a third, who has made other trials, has to put in others; for the union in nature of these qualities being the true ground of their union in one complex idea, who can fay one of them has more reafon to be put in or left out than another? From whence it will always unavoidably follow, that the complex ideas of fubftances, in men ufing the name for them, will be very various, and fo the fignifications of those names very uncertain.

§14. To co-exifting Qualities, which are known but im

perfectly.

BESIDES, there is fcarce any particular thing: exifting, which, in fome of its fimple ideas, does not communicate with a greater, and in others with a lefs number of par- ticular beings: who fhall determine in this cafe which are thofe that are to make up the precife collection that is to be fignified by the fpecific name, or can with any juft authority prefcribe, which obvious or common qua lities are to be left out, or which more fecret, or more

particular, are to be put into the fignification of the name of any fubftance? All which together feldom or never fail to produce that various and doubtful signification in the names of fubflancos, which caufis fuch uncertainty, difputes, or mistakes, when we come to a philofophical (ufe of them, at youdt an -ga5. With this: Imperfection they may ferve for civil, but, not swell for philofophical Ufe. la IT is true, as to civil and common converfation, the general names of fubftances, regulated in their ordinary fignification by fome obvious qualities (as by the fhape and figure in things of known feminal propagation, and in other fubftances, for the most part by colour, joined with fome ⚫other fenfible qualities), do well enough to defign the things men would be underfood to fpeak of; and fo they ufually conceive well enough the fubftances meant by the word gold, or apple, to diftinguith the one from the other. But in philofophical inquiries and debates, where general truths are to be established, and confequences drawn from pofitions laid down, there the precife fignification of the names of substances will be found, not only not to be well established, but also very hard to be fo, For example, he that fhall make malleablenefs, or a certain degree of fixednefs, a part of his complex idea of gold, may make propofitions concerning gold, and draw confequences from them, that will truly and clearly follow from gold taken in fuch a fignification, but yet fuch as another man can never be forced to admit, nor be convinced of their truth, who makes not malleableness, or the fame degree of fixednefs, part of that complex idea that the name gold, in his ufe of it, ftands for.

§ 16. Inftance-Liquor.

THIS is a natural, and almoft unavoidable imperfection in almost all the names of fubftances, in all languages whatsoever, which men will easily find, when once paffing from confufed or loofe notions, they come to more strict and clofe inquiries; for then they will be convinced how doubtful and obscure those words are in their fignification, which in ordinary use appeared very clear and determined. I was once in a meeting of very

learned and ingenious phyficians, where by chance there arofe a question, whether any liquor paffed through the filaments of the nerves. The debate having been managed a good while by variety of arguments on both Eides, I (who had been ufed to fufpect that the greatest part of difputes were more about the fignification of words, than a real difference in the conception of things) defired, that before they went any farther on in this difpute, they would firft examine, and establish among them, what the word liquor fignified. They at first were a little furprifed at the propofal; and had they been perfons lefs ingenious, they might perhaps have taken it for a very frivolous or extravagant one, fince there was no one there that thought not himself to understand very perfectly what the word liquor ftood for, which I think too none of the most perplexed names of fubftanccs. However, they were pleafed to comply with my motion, and upon examination, found, that the fignification of that word was not fo fettled and certain as they 'had all imagined, but that each of them made it a fign of a different complex idea. This made them perceive that the main of their difpute was about the fignification of that term, and that they differed very little in their opinions concerning fome fluid and fubtile matter, pasfing through the conduits of the nerves, though it was not fo eafy to agree whether it was to be called liquor or "no, a thing which, when confidered, they thought it not worth the contending about.

t

$17. Inflance-Gold.

How much this is the cafe, in the greatest part of dif putes that men are engaged fo hotly in, I fhall perhaps have an occafion in another place to take notice. Let us only here confider a little more exactly the forementioned inftance of the word gold, and we fhall fee how hard it is precifely to determine its fignification. - I think all agree to make it stand for a body of a certain yellow fhining colour; which being the idea to which children have annexed that name, the fhining yellow part of a peacock's tail is properly to them gold: Others, finding fusibility joined with that yellow colour in cer

tain parcels of matter, make of that combination a com plex idea, to which they give the name gold to denote a fort of fubftances, and fo exclude from being gold all fuch yellow fhining bodies as by fire will be reduced to athes, and admit to be of that fpecies, or to be comprehended under that name gold, only fuch fubftances as having that fhining yellow colour will by fire be reduced to fufion, and not to afhes: Another, by the fame reafon, adds the weight, which, being a quality as ftraitly joined with that colour as its fufibility, he thinks has the fame reafon to be joined in its idea, aud to be fignified by its name, and therefore the other made up of body, of fuch a colour and fufibility, to be imperfect; and fo on of all the reft: wherein no one can fhow a reason why fome of the infeparable qualities, that are always united in nature, fhould be put into the nominal effence, and others left out; or why the word gold, fignifying that fort of body the ring on his finger is made of, fhould determine that fort rather by its colour, weight, and fufibility, than by its colour, weight, and folubility in aqua regia; fince the diffolving it by that liquor is as infeparable from it as the fufion by fire, and they are both of them nothing but the relation which that fubftance has to two other bodies, which have a power to operate differently upon it. For by what right is it that fufibility comes to be a part of the cffence fignified by the word gold, and folubility but a property of it? or why is its colour part of the effence, and its malleablenefs but a property? That which I mean is this, that thefe being all but properties depending on its real conftitution, and nothing but powers, either active or paflive, in reference to other bodies, no one has authority to determine the fignification of the word gold (as referred to fuch a body exifting in nature) more to one collection of ideas to be found in that body than to another; whereby the fignification of that name muft unavoidably be very uncertain, fince, as has been faid, feveral people obferve feveral properties in the fame fubftance, and, I think, I may fay no body all; and therefore have but very imper

fect defcriptions of things, and words have very uncertain fignifications.

18. The Names of fimple Ideas the leaft Doubtful. FROM what has been faid, it is eafy to obferve what has been before remarked, viz. That the names of fimple ideas are, of all others, the leaft liable to miflakes, and that for thefe reafons: First, Because the ideas they ftand for, being each but one fingle perception, are much easier got, and more clearly retained, than the more complex ones, and therefore are not liable to the uncertainty which ufually attends thofe compounded ones of fubftances and mixed modes, in which the precife number of fimple ideas that make them up are not eafily agreed, and fo readily kept in the mind; and, Secondly, Because they are never referred to any other effence, but barely that perception they immediately fignify: which reference is that which renders the fignification of the names of fubftances naturally fo perplexed, and gives occafion to fo many dif putes. Men, that do not perverfely use these words, or on purpose fet themselves to cavil, feldom mistake, in any language which they are acquainted with, the ufe and fignification of the names of fimple ideas; white and fweet, yellow and bitter, carry a very obvious meaning with them, which every one precifely comprehends, or eafily perceives he is ignorant of, and feeks to be informed; but what precife collection of fimple ideas, modefty or frugality ftand for in another's ufe, is not fo certainly known. And, however we are apt to think we well enough know what is meant by gold or iron, yet the precife complex idea others make them the figns of, is not fo certain; and I believe it is very feldom that in fpeaker and hearer they ftand for exactly the fame collection; which muft needs produce mistakes and difputes, when they are made ufe of in difcourfes, wherein men have to do with univerfal propofitions, and would fettle in their minds univerfal truths, and confider the confequences that follow from them.

$21 And next to them Simple Modes. By the fame rule, the names of fimple modes are, next to thofe of fimple ideas, leaft liable to doubt and uncertainty, elpe