CHAPTEII IV. 453 IV. Direct. "Search for evidence of truth with diligence and honesty, and be heartily ready to receive evidence, whether for the agreement or disagreement of ideas." Search with diligence ; spare no labour in searching for the truth in due proportion to the importance of the proposition: Read the best authors who have writ ou that subject ; consult your wise and learned friends in conversation ; and be not un- willing to borrow hints toward your improvement from the meanest person, nor to receive any glimpse of light from the in'ost unlearned. Diligence and humility is the way to thrive in the riches of the understanding, as well as in gold or silver. Search carefully for the evidence of truth, and dig for wisdom Os for hid treasure. Search with a steady honesty of soul, and a sincere im- partiality to find the truth. Watch against every temptation that might bribe your judgment, or warp it aside from truth. Do not indulge yourself to wish any unexamined proposition were true or false. A wish often perverts the judgment, and tempts the mind strangely to believe upon slight evidence whatsoever we wish to be true or false. V. Direct. Since the evidence of the agreement or dis- agreement of two ideas is the ground of our assent to any propo- sition, or the great criterion Of truth' ; therefore " we should suspend our judgment, and neither affirm nor deny till this evidence appear." This direction is different from the second; for though the evidence of the agreement or disagreement of two ideas most tunes depends on the clearness and distinctness of the ideas themselves, yet it does not always arise thence. Testimony may be a sufficient evidence of the agreement or disagreement of two obscure ideas, as we have seen just before in the excep- tion under the second direction. Therefore, though we are not universally and in all cases bound to suspend our judgment, till our ideas of the objects themselves are clear and distinct, yet we must always suspend our judgment, and withhold our assent to, or denial of any proposition, till some just evidence appear of its truth or falsehood. It is an imrtience of doubt and suspence, a rashness and precipitance of judgment and nas- tiness to believe something on one side or the other, that plunges us into many errors. This direction to delay and suspend our assent is more par. ticularly necessary to be observed when such propositions offer themselves to us as are supported by-education, authority, custom, inclination, interest, or other powerful prejudices; for our judg- tuentis led away insensibly to believe all that they dictate; and where prejudices and dangers of error are multiplied, we should set the stricter guard upon our assent. F f 3
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