CHAPTER VI. 375 fine these things learnedly, have wrapt up their ideas in greater darkness, and exposed themselves to ridicule and contempt ; as when they define heat, they say, it is qualitas congregans homo- g enea & segregans heterogenea, that is, a quality gathering toge- ther things of the same kind, and separating things of a different kind. So they define white, a colour arising from the prevalency of brightness; but every child knows hot and white better with- out these definitions. There are many other definitions given by the peripatetic philosophers, which are very faulty by reason of their obscurity ; as motion is defined by them " the act of a being in power, so far forth as it is in power. Time is the measure or number of motion according to past, present and future." The soul is the act of an organscal natural body, having life in power ; and seve- ral others of the same stamp. 1V. l t is also commonly prescribed amongst the rules of de- finition, that it should be short, so that it must have no tautology in it, nor any words superfluous. I confess definitions ought to be expressed in as few words as is consistent with a clear and just explication of the nature of the thing defined, and a distinc- tion of it from all other things beside ; but it is of much more importance, and far better, that a definition should explain clearly the subject we treat of, though the words be many, than to leave obscurities in the sentence, by confining it within too narrow limits. So in the definition which we have given of Logic, that it is the art of using reason well in the search after truth, and the communication of it to others, it has indeed many words in it, but it could not well be shorter. Art is the genus wherein it agrees with rhetoric, poesy, arithmetic, wrestling, sailing, build- ing, &c. for all these are arts also ; but the difference or special nature of it is drawn from its object, reason ; from the act, using it well, and from its two great ends or designs, namely, the search after truth, and the communication of it; nor can it be justly described and explained in fewer ideas. V. If we add a fifthh rule, it must be, that neither the thing defined nor a mere synonymous name, should make a part of the definition, for this would be no explication of the nature of the thing ; and a synonymous word at best could only be a definition of the name. SECT. VL Observations concerning the Definition of Things. BEFORE I part with this subject, I must propose several observations which relate to the definition of things. 1st. There is no need that in definitions we should be confi- ned to one single attribute or property, in order to express the difference of the thing designed, for sometimes the essential dif- ference consists in two or three ideas or attributes. So a grocer
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