tween a flight connection and one that is more intimate, is equally affected by each: fuch a perfon must neceffarily have a great flow of ideas, because they are introduced by any relation indifferently; and the flighter relations, being without number, furnish ideas without end. This doctrine is, in a lively manner, illustrated by Shakespear.

Falstaff. What is the grofs fum that I owe thee?

Hoftefs. Marry, if thou wert an honest man, thyself and thy money too. Thou didst swear to me on a parcel-gilt-goblet, fitting in my Dolphin-chamber, at the round table, by a fea-coal fire, on Wednesday in Whitfun-week, when the Prince broke thy head for likening him to a finging man of Windfor, thou didft fwear to me then, as I was washing thy wound, to marry me, and make me my Lady thy wife. Canft thou deny it? Did not Goodwife Keech, the butcher's wife, come in then, and call me Goffip Quickly? coming in to borrow a mefs of vinegar; telling us fhe had a good dish of prawns; whereby thou didst desire to eat fome; whereby I told thee they were ill for a green wound. And didft not thou, when fhe was gone down ftairs, defire me to be no more fo familiarity with fuch poor people, faying, that ere long they fhould call me Madam? And didst thou not kifs me, and bid me fetch thee thirty fhillings? I put thee now to thy book-oath, deny it if thou canst ? Second Part, Henry IV. act 2. fc. 2.

On the other hand, a man of accurate judg-` ment cannot have a great flow of ideas; because

the

Wit

Ement

the flighter relations, making no figure in his mind, have no power to introduce ideas. And hence it is, that accurate judgment is not friendly to declamation or copious eloquence. This reafoning is confirmed by experience; for it is a noted obfervation, That a great or comprehenfive memory is feldom connected with a good judgment.

As an additional confirmation, I appeal to another noted obfervation, That wit and judg ment are feldom united. Wit confifts chiefly in joining things by distant and fanciful relations, which furprise because they are unexpected: fuch relations, being of the flightest kind, readily occur to thofe only who make every relation equally welcome. Wit, upon that account, is in a good meafure incompatible with folid judgment; which, neglecting trivial relations, adheres to what are fubftantial and permanent. Thus memory and wit are often conjoined: folid judgment seldom with either.

Every man who attends to his own ideas, will difcover order as well as connection in their fucceffion. There is implanted in the breast of every man a principle of order, which governs the arrangement of his perceptions, of his ideas, and of his actions. With regard to perceptions, I obferve that, in things of equal rank, fuch as fheep in a fold, or trees in a wood, it must be indifferent in what order they be furveyed.. But, in things of unequal rank, our tendency is, to

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view the principal fubject before we defcend to its acceffories or ornaments, and the fuperior before the inferior or dependent; we are equally averse to enter into a minute confideration of conftituent parts, till the thing be firft furveyed as a whole. It need scarce be added, that our ideas are governed by the fame principle; and that, in thinking or reflecting upon a number of objects, we naturally follow the fame order as when we actually furvey them.

The principle of order is confpicuous with respect to natural operations; for it always directs our ideas in the order of nature: thinking upon a body in motion, we follow its natural courfe; the mind falls with a heavy body, defcends with a river, and afcends with flame and fmoke: in tracing out a family, we incline to begin at the founder, and to defcend gradually to his latest pofterity; on the contrary, mufing on a lofty oak, we begin at the trunk, and mount from it to the branches as to historical facts, we love to proceed in the order of time; or, which comes to the fame, to proceed along the chain of caufes and effects.

But tho', in following out an hiftorical chain, our bent is to proceed orderly from caufes to their effects, we find not the fame bent in matters of fcience: there we feem rather difpofed to proceed from effects to their caufes, and from particular propofitions to thofe which are more general. Why this difference in matters that appear fo nearly

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nearly related? I anfwer, The cases are fimilar in appearance only, not in reality. In an historical chain, every event is particular, the effect of fome former event, and the cause of others that follow in fuch a chain, there is nothing to bias the mind from the order of nature. Widely different is science, when we endeavour to trace out causes and their effects: many experiments are commonly reduced under one caufe; and again, many of thefe caufes under one still more general and comprehenfive: in our progress from particular effects to general causes, and from particular propofitions to the more comprehensive, we feel a gradual dilatation or expanfion of mind, like what is felt in an afcending feries, which is extremely pleafing: the pleasure here exceeds what arifes from following the course of nature; and it is that pleasure which regulates our train of thought in the cafe now mentioned, and in others that are fimilar. Thefe obfervations, by the way, furnish materials for inftituting a comparison between the fynthetic and analytic methods of reafoning: the fynthetic method, defcending regularly from principles to their confequences, is more agreeable to the ftrictness of order; but in following the oppofite courfe in the analytic method, we have a fenfible pleafure, like mounting upward, which is not felt in the other: the analytic method is more agreeable to the imagination; the other method will be preferred by thofe only who with rigidity ad

here

here to order, and give no indulgence to natural emotions *.

It now appears that we are framed by nature to relish order and connection. When an object is introduced by a proper connection, we are confcious of a certain pleasure arifing from that circumstance. Among objects of equal rank, the pleasure is proportioned to the degree of connection: but among unequal objects, where we require a certain order, the pleasure arifes chiefly from an orderly arrangement; of which one is sensible, in tracing objects contrary to the course of nature, or contrary to our fenfe of order the mind proceeds with alacrity down a flowing river, and with the fame alacrity from a whole to its parts, or from a principal to its acceffories; but in the contrary direction, it is fenfible of a fort of retrograde motion, which is unpleafant. And here may be remarked the great influence of order upon the mind of man: grandeur, which makes a deep impreffion, inclines us, in running over any feries, to proceed from fmall to great, rather than from great to fmall; but order prevails over that tendency, and affords pleasure as well as facility in paffing from a whole to its parts, and from a fubject to its ornaments, which are not felt in the oppofite courfe. Elevation touches the mind no lefs

A train of perceptions or ideas, with refpe to its u piformity and variety, is handled afterwards, chap. 9.

than