CHAPTER IV, 447 to ask wisdom of him who giveth liberally to them that ask it, ànd upbraideth us not with our own follies. Such a devout practice will be an excellent preparative for the best improvement of all the directions and rules proposed in the two following chapters. CHAP. IV. General Directions to assist us in judging aright. THE chief design of the art of Logic is to assist us in forming a true judgment of things ; a few proper observations for this end have been dropt occasionally in some of the foregoing' chapters : yet it is necessary to mention them again in this place, that we may have a more complete and simultaneous view of the general directions, which are necessary in order to judge aright. A multitude of advices may be framed for this purpose ; the chief of them may, for order sake, be reduced to the following heads. I. Direction. When we Consider ourselves as philosophers, or searchers after truth, we should examine all our old opinions _afresh, and enquire what was the ground of them, and whether our assent were built on just evidence; and then we should cast of all those judgments which were formed heretofore without due examination. A man in pursuit of knowledge, should throw off all those prejudices which he had imbibed in times past, and guard against all the springs of error, mentioned in the preced- ing chapter, with the utmost watchfulness for time to come. Observe here. That this rule of casting away all our for. mer prejudicate opinions and sentiments, is not proposed to any òf us to be practised at once, considered as men of business or religion, as friends or neighbours, as fathers or sons, as magis- trates, subjects, or christians, but merely as philosophers and searc/t&rs after truth; and though it may be well presumed that many of our judgments, both true and false, together with the practices built thereon in the natural, the civil and the religious life, were formed without sufficient evidence ; yet an universal rejection of all these might destroy at once our present sense and practice of duty with regard to God, ourselves, and our fellow - creatures. Mankind would be hereby thrown into such a state of doubting and indifference, that it would be too long ere they re- covered any principles of virtue or religion by a train of rea- sonings. Besides, the common affairs of human life often demand a much speedier determination, and we must many times act upon present probabilities: the bulk of mankind have not time and leisure, and advantages sufficient to begin all their knowledge anew, and to build up every single opinion and practice afresh& upon the justest grounds of evidence
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