f beating the stones, which
hurt them: In poets, by their readiness to personify every thing: And in
the antient philosophers, by these fictions of sympathy and antipathy.
We must pardon children, because of their age; poets, because they
profess to follow implicitly the suggestions of their fancy: But
what excuse shall we find to justify our philosophers in so signal a
weakness?

SECT. IV. OF THE MODERN PHILOSOPHY.

But here it may be objected, that the imagination, according to my own
confession, being the ultimate judge of all systems of philosophy, I
am unjust in blaming the antient philosophers for making use of that
faculty, and allowing themselves to be entirely guided by it in their
reasonings. In order to justify myself, I must distinguish in the
imagination betwixt the principles which are permanent, irresistible,
and universal; such as the customary transition from causes to effects,
and from effects to causes: And the principles, which are changeable,
weak, and irregular; such as those I have just now taken notice of. The
former are the foundation of all our thoughts and actions, so that upon
their removal human nature must immediately perish and go to ruin. The
latter are neither unavoidable to mankind, nor necessary, or so much as
useful in the conduct of life; but on the contrary are observed only to
take place in weak minds, and being opposite to the other principles
of custom and reasoning, may easily be subverted by a due contrast and
opposition. For this reason the former are received by philosophy, and
the latter rejected. One who concludes somebody to be near him, when
he hears an articulate voice in the dark, reasons justly and naturally;
though that conclusion be derived from nothing but custom, which infixes
and inlivens the idea of a human creature, on account of his usual
conjunction with the present impression. But one, who is tormented
he knows not why, with the apprehension of spectres in the dark, may,
perhaps, be said to reason, and to reason naturally too: But then it
must be in the same sense, that a malady is said to be natural; as
arising from natural causes, though it be contrary to health, the most
agreeable and most natural situation of man.

The opinions of the antient philosophers, their fictions of substance
and accident, and their reasonings concerning substantial forms and
occult qualities, are like the spectres in the dark, and are derived
from principles, which, ho