Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	world_n	write_n	write_v	503	4	5.1932	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A25846	Logic, or, The art of thinking in which, besides the common, are contain'd many excellent new rules, very profitable for directing of reason and acquiring of judgment in things as well relating to the instruction of for the excellency of the matter printed many times in French and Latin, and now for publick good translated into English by several hands.; Logique. English. 1685	Arnauld, Antoine, 1612-1694.; Nicole, Pierre, 1625-1695.	1685 (1685)	Wing A3723; ESTC R7858	106,112	258

LOGIC OR THE ART OF THINKING IN WHICH Besides the Common are contain'd many excellent New Rules very profitable for directing of Reason and acquiring of Judgment in things as well relating to the Instruction of a Mans self as of others In Four Parts The First Consisting of Reflections upon Ideas or upon the first Operation of the Mind which is called Apprehension c. The Second of Considerations of Men about Proper Judgments c. The Third of the Nature and various kinds of Reasoning c. The Fourth Treats of the most profitable Method for demonstrating or illustrating any Truth c. TO WHICH Is added an INDEX to the whole BOOK For the Excellency of the Matter Printed many times in French and Latin and now for Publick Good translated into English by SEVERAL HANDS LONDON Printed by T. B. for H. Sawbridge at the Bible on Ludgate-hill 1685. AN ADVERTISEMENT OF THE AUTHOR THIS Small Treatise is altogether more beholding for its Birth to Fortune or rather to an Accident of Divertisement then to any serious Design For it happen'd That a Person of Quality entertaining a Young Nobleman who made appear a Solidity of Judgment and a Penetration of Wit much above his years among other Discourse told him that when he himself was a Young Man he had met with a Person from whom in fifteen days time he had learnt the greatest and most material Part of Logic. This Discourse gave occasion to another Person then present and one who was no great Admirer of that Science to answer with a Smile of Contempt That if Monsieur would give himself the trouble he would undertake to teach him all that was of any use in the so much cry'd up Art of Logic in four or five Days Which Proposal made in the Air having for some time serv'd us for Pastime I resolv'd to make an Essay And because I did not think the vulgar Logic's either Compendiously or Politely written I design'd an Abridgment for the particular use of the Young Gentleman himself This was the only Aim I had when I first began the Work nor did I think to have spent above a day about it But so soon as I had set my self to work so many new Reflections crowded into my Thoughts that I was constrain'd to write 'em down for the discharge of my Memory So that instead of one day I spent four or five during which time this Body of Logic was form'd to which afterwards several other things were added Now tho it swell'd to a greater Bulk of Matter then was at first intended yet had the Essay the same success which I at first expected For the young Nobleman having reduc'd the whole into four Tables he learnt with ease one a day without any assistance of a Teacher Tho true it is we cannot expect that others should be so nimble as he who had a Wit altogether extraordinary and prompt to attain whatever depended upon the Understanding And this was the accidental occasion that produc'd this Treatise But now whatever censure it may undergo in the World I cannot be justly blam'd for committing it to the Press since it was rather a forc'd then voluntary Act. For several Persons having obtain'd Copies of it in Writing which cannot well be done without several Errors of the Pen and understanding withal That several Booksellers were about to Print it I thought it better to send it into the World corrected and entire than to let it be Printed from defective Manuscripts But then again I thought my self oblig'd to make divers Additions which swell'd it above a Third Part believing the Limits of the First Essay too short for a Public View And to that purpose we have made it the Subject of the following Discourse to explain the End which we propose to our selves and the reason why we have included so much variety of Matter THE TRANSLATORS TO THE READER THE Common Treatises of LOGIC are almost without number and while every Author strives to add something of his own sometimes little to the purpose sometimes altogether from the matter the Art is become not only Obscure and Tedious but in a great measure Impertinent and Vseless Thus the Schoolmen may be said to have clogg'd and fetter'd Reason which ought to be free as Air and plain as Demonstration it self with vain misapplications of this Art to Notion and Nicety while they make use of it only to maintain litigious Cavils and wrangling Disputes So that indeed the common LOGICS are but as so many Counterscarps to shelter the obstinate and vain-glorious that disdain Submission and Convincement and therefore retire within their Fortifications of difficult Terms wrap themselves up in Quirk and Suttlety and so escape from Reason in the Clouds and Mists of their own Raising For remedy of which we are beholden to this Famous Author who has at length recover'd this Art then a noble Science when not Pedantic from Night and Confusion clear'd away the Rubbish that oppress'd it and prun'd off those Vnderwoods and superfluous Boughs that overshaded and ecclipsed the light of true Reason so that now LOGIC may be said to appear like Truth it self naked and delightful as being freed from the Pedantic Dust of the Schools It has had this Influence upon the World already that several Books have been already Written from the Rules of this LOGIC not only by the Author himself no less Celebrated for his Writings then for many other worthy Actions that recommend him to the Commonwealth of Learning Nor is his diligence in this particular less to be applauded for having cleans'd the Augean Stables of so many Systems from studied Barbarism and Delirium For which reason this LOGIC was thrice Reprinted in France so great was the satisfaction in those Parts and likewise Translated into Latin for Vniversal Benefit and now is rendered into English as being a Small Treatise no less Vseful for the Conduct of Human Life than to instruct and guide us wandring in the Labyrinths of Unsettl'd Reason Let not the Reader slightly pass these Pages over but seriously digest This Art of Thinking and being digested let him disperse the Applications into all the Judgments which he makes of Things and into all the Actions of his Life if Knowledg and Understanding be his Aim THE FIRST DISCOURSE Shewing the DESIGN Of this New Logic. THERE is nothing more worthy of Esteem than soundness of Judgment and an exact measure of Wit to discern between truth and falshood All the other faculties of the Mind are of singular use but exactness of Reason is universally profitable upon all occasions and in all the employments of Life For it is not only in the Sciences that it is a difficult thing to discern truth from error but also in all those affairs and actions both of the Body and Mind which are the subjects of human discourse There is in every one a signal difference while some are true and some are false and therefore it

believe me to believe otherwise and I should do ill to suspect others where I did not however see the same marks or Falshood not to be false since they might be as well Counterfeited as the other We may apply all this to several matters that cause frequent disputes among the Learned We demand if such a Book were written by such an Author whose Name was always to it And whether the Acts of a Council are True or Counterfeit Certain it is that we ought to give Sentence for the Author whose name has been long acknoledg'd and affix'd to the Work and for the Acts of a Council which we read every day nor are we to believe the contrary but upon very strong Reasons Therefore a most learned Person of this Age being to prove that the Epistle of Cyprian to Pope Steven about Martian Bishop of Arles was none of the Holy Martyrs he could not convince the Learned his Conjectures not seeming sufficient to deprive St. Cyprian of a Peice that had always carry'd his Name and which has a perfect resemblance of Style with the rest of his Works In vain also it is that Blondel and Salmasius not able to answer the Argument drawn from the Epistles of Ignatius for the superiority of Bishops above Priests in the Infancy of the Church pretend those Epistles to be Counterfeit though as they were Printed by Vossius and Vsher from the Antient Manuscript in the Florentine Library Insomuch that they have been refut'd by those of their own party For that confessing as they do that we have the same Epistles which were cited by Eusebius St. Jerom Theodoret and Origen himself there is no likelihood that the Epistles of Ignatius being collected by Polycarp that the true Epistles should have disappear'd and others be counterfeited in the time between Polycarp and Origen or Eusebius Besides that those Epistles of Ignatius which we have now wear such a Character of the holiness and simplicity so proper to the Apostolic Times that they justifie themselves against the vain accusations of being false and counterfeit Lastly all the difficulties that Cardinal Perron proposes against the Epistles of the Council of Afric to Pope Celestin touching Appeals to the See cannot prevail with us to beleive otherwise now then before but that those Epistles were really written by the Council But it happens sometimes that particular Circumstances carry more weight in Perswasion then long Possession So that altho' the Epistle of St. Clement to St. James Bishop of Jerusalem be translated by Ruffinus near upon thirteen hundred Years ago and that it is cited and own'd for St. Clement by a Council of France above twelve Hundred years ago yet we can hardly believe it otherwise then Counterfeit In regard that St. James being Martyr'd before St. Peter it is impossible that St. Clement should write after the Death of St. Peter as the Epistle supposes Thus tho the Commentaries upon St. Paul are attributed to St. Ambrose and cited under his Name by a great number of Authors together with that imperfect Work upon St. Mathem under the name of Chrysostome All Men however at this day agree that they belong to neither but to other antient Authors full of many Errors Lastly the Acts of the two Sinuessan Councils under Marcellin and two or three at Rome under Silvester and another at Rome under Sixtus III. might be sufficient to perswade us of the verity of those Councils if they contain'd nothing but what were congruous to reason and which might be proper for the times wherein they are said to be Celebrated but they contain so many absurdities so disagreeable from those times that there is great likelihood of their being false and counterfeit And these are the Remarks which may serve for these sorts of judgments But we must not imagin 'em to be of such great use as always to free us from the danger of being deceiv'd All that they can do at most is to guard us from the more gross and apparent Absurdities and to enure us not to be carry'd astray by common Places which containing something of general Truth cease not however to be false upon many particular occasions which is one of the chiefest sources of human Error CHAP. XVI Of the Judgments we ought to make of Future Accidents THese Rules that serve us to judge of Things past may be apply'd to things to come For as we probably judge a Thing to have come to pass when the certain Circumstances which we know to be usually joyn'd to the Fact we may as probably believe that such a thing will happen when the present Circumstances are such as are usually attended by such an Effect Thus the Physitians judge of the good or bad success of Diseases Captain of the future Events of War and that we judge in the world of the most part of contingent Affairs But as to these Accidents of which we are some part our selves and which we may either promote or prevent by our care and foresight in avoiding or exposing our selves to harm or danger it happens that most persons fall into many errors so much the more greivous by how much they seem to be guarded by reason because they only set before their Eyes the Grandeur and consequence of the advantage which they wish for or the mischiefs that they fear not considering the likelihood and probability that this advantage or inconvenience may happen or not happen In like manner when it is any great misfortune which they fear as loss of Life or Estate they think it prudence not to take any care to prevent it Or if it be any great advantage which they expect as the gain of a Hundred Thousand Crowns they think they act wisely to endeavour the gaining of it if the Venter cost but little let the probability of success be never so small By such a Ratiocination as this it was that a Princess hearing that some Persons had been overwhelm'd by the fall of a Roof would never go into a House 'till she had all the Roofs first view'd and she was so fully perswaded that she had a reason for so doing that she accounted all other imprudent that did not as she did 'T is also this appearance of Reason that engages several Persons into inconvenient and excessive cautions for the preservation of their Health This is that which renders others distrustful even in little Things for that having been sometimes deceiv'd they believe they shall be deceiv'd in all their other Business This is that which enveagles so many People to Lotteries to gain cry they Twenty Thousand Crowns for one Crown is not that a very great advantage And every one believes himself shall be that happy Person upon whom this great Fortune shall showr it self Never considering that though the Lots promise Twenty Thousand for One 't is Thirty times more probable to every particular person that he shall be a looser then a winner And this is the Defect of