guage, to express every thing with plainness and precision; and especially never attempt to prejudice the cause of truth, and snatch a surreptitious victory by the use of an equivocal phraseology. No man of an enlarged and cultivated mind can be ignorant, that multitudes of words in every language admit of diversities of signification. There are found also in all languages many words, which sometimes agree with each other, and sometimes differ in signification, according to the connection in which they appear, and their particular application. There is, therefore, undoubtedly an opportunity, if any should be disposed to embrace it, of employing equivocal terms, equivocal phrases, and perplexed and mysterious combinations of speech, and thus hiding themselves from the penetrating light of truth, under cover of a mist of their own raising.

No man, whose sole object, is truth and justice, will resort to such a discreditable subterfuge. If in reasoning he finds himself inadvertently employing words of an equivocal signification, it will be a first care with him to guard against the misapprehensions, likely to result from that source. will explain so precisely the sense in which he uses the doubtful terms as to leave no probability of cavilling and mistake.

He

And besides the invaluable reputation of a man of honor and justice, he will in this way realize results in respect to his own intellectual character of the most beneficial nature. The practice of verbal criticism, as it has been called, (that is, of discriminating readily and accurately the meaning of words,) will result in a HABIT, giving to the dialectician a vast power over his opponent, who has not been trained to the making of such nice discriminations. There will be a keenness of intellectual perception, which, while it helps to untie the perplexities of language, at the same time resolves the perplexities of thought; separating meaning from meaning and dividing truth from falsehood in those cases, where at first sight it appeared to be impossible. But it is a power, which cannot be possessed without a laborious acquaintance with the purest writers and the ablest reasoners in a language; together with a systematic and philosophic study of its origin, idioms, and general forms. And while it may be

employed to the most beneficial purposes, it is far too formidable to be entrusted in the management of any one, who is not under the influence of that moral rectitude and that love of the truth, which have been so repeatedly insisted on.

§. 301. On the sophism of estimating actions and character from the circumstance of success merely.

VI.- -The foregoing are some of the fallacies in reasoning, which have found a place in writers on Logic. To these might be added the fallacy or sophism, to which men are obviously so prone, of judging favorably of the characters and the deeds of others, from the mere circumstance of success. Those actions, which have a decidedly successful termination, are almost always applauded, and are looked upon as the result of great intellectual forecast; while not less frequently actions, that have an unsuccessful issue, are not only stigmatized as evil in themselves, but as indicating in their projector a flighty and ill-balanced mind. The fallacy, however, does not consist in taking the issues or results into consideration, which are undoubtedly entitled to their due place in estimating the actions and characters of men, but in too, much limiting our view of things, and forming a favorable or unfavorable judgment from the mere circumstance of good or ill success alone.

While there is no SOPHISM, more calculated to lead astray and perplex, there is none more common than this; so much so, that it has almost passed into a proverb, that a hero must not only be brave, but fortunate. Hence it is that Alexander is called Great, because he gained victories, and overran kingdoms; while Charles XII of Sweden, who the most nearly resembles him in the characteristics of bravery, perseverence, and chimerical ambition, but had his projects cut short at the fatal battle of Pultowa, is called a madman.

"Machiavel has justly animadverted, (says Dr. Johnson,) on the different notice taken by all succeeding times, of the two great projectors, Cataline and Cæsar. Both formed the same project and intended to raise themselves to power by subverting the commonwealth. They pursued their design perhaps with equal abilities and equal virtue; but Cataline perished in the field, and Cæsar returned from Pharsalia with

unlimited authority; and from that time, every monarch of the earth has thought himself honored by a comparison with Cæsar; and Cataline has never been mentioned, but that his name might be applied to traitors and incendiaries."

In the same Essay* he happily illustrates this subject by a reference to the discovery of America, in the following terms.-"When Columbus had engaged king Ferdinand, in the discovery of the other hemisphere, the sailors, with whom he embarked in the expedition, had so little confidence in their commander, that after having been long at sea looking for coasts, which they never expected to find, they raised a general mutiny, and demanded to return. He found means to sooth them into a permission to continue in the same course three days longer, and on the evening of the third day descried land. Had the impatience of his crew denied him a few hours of the time requested, what had been his fate but to have come back with the infamy of a vain projector, who had betrayed the king's credulity to useless expenses, and risked his life in seeking countries that had no existence? how would those, that had rejected his proposals, have triumphed in their acuteness; and when would his name have been mentioned, but with the makers of potable gold and malleable glass?"

§. 302. Of adherence to our opinions.

Whenever the rules laid down have been followed, and conclusions have been formed with a careful and candid regard to the evidence presented, those opinions are to be asserted and maintained with a due degree of confidence. It would evince an unjustifiable weakness to be driven from our honest convictions by the effrontery, or even by the upright, though misguided zeal of an opponent. Not that a person is to set himself up for infallible, and to suppose that new ac'cessions of evidence are impossible, or that it is an impossibility for him to have new views of the evidence already examined. But a suitable degree of stability is necessary in order to be respected and useful; and, in the case supposed, such stability can be exhibited without incurring the charge, which is sometimes thrown out, of doggedness and intoler

ance.

* See the Adventurer, No. 99.

It is further to be observed that we are not always to relinquish judgments, which have been formed in the way pointed out, when objections are afterwards raised, which we cannot immediately answer. The person thus attacked can, with good reason, argue in this way; I have once examined the subject carefully and candidly; the evidence, both in its particulars and in its multitude of bearings, has had its weight; many minute and evanescent circumstances were taken into view by the mind, which have now vanished from my recollection; I, therefore, do not feel at liberty to alter an opinion thus formed, in consequence of an objection now brought up, which I am unable to answer, but choose to adhere to my present judgment, until the whole subject, including this objection, can be re-examined.This reasoning would in most cases be correct, and would be entirely consistent with that love of truth and openness to conviction, which ought ever to be maintained.

§. 303. Effects on the mind of debating for victory instead of truth.

By way of supporting the remarks under the first rule, we here introduce the subject of contending for victory merely. He, who contends with this object, takes every advantage of his opponent, which can subserve his own purpose. For instance, he will demand a species of proof or a degree of proof, which the subject in dispute does not admit; he gives, if possible, a false sense to the words and statements, employed by the other side; he questions facts, which he himself fully believes and every body else, in the expectation that the opposite party is not furnished with direct and posi tive evidence of them. In a word, wherever an opening presents, he takes the utmost advantage of his opponent, however much against his own internal convictions of right and justice.

Such a course, to say nothing of its moral turpitude, effectually unsettles that part of our mental economy, which concerns the grounds and laws of belief. The practice of inventing cunningly devised objections against arguments, known to be sound, necessarily impairs the influence, which such arguments ought ever to exert over us. Hence the remark has been made with justice, that persons, who addict

themselves to this practice, frequently end in becoming sceptics. They have so often perplexed, and apparently overthrown what they felt to be true, they at last question the existence of any fixed grounds of belief in the human constitution, and begin to doubt of every thing.

This effect, even when there is an undoubted regard for the truth, will be found to follow from habits of ardent disputation, unless there be a frequent recurrence to the original principles of the mind, which relate to the nature and laws of belief. The learned Chillingworth is an instance. The consequences, to which the training up of his vast powers to the sole art of disputation finally led, are stated by Clarendon. "Mr. Chillingworth had spent all his younger time in disputations and had arrived at so great a mastery, that he was inferior to no man in those skirmishes; but he had, with his notable perfection in this exercise, contracted such an irresolution and habit of doubting, that by degrees he grew confident of nothing. Neither the books of his adversaries nor any of their persons, though he was acquainted with the best of both, had ever made great impression on him. All his doubts grew out of himself, when he assisted his scruples with all the strength of his own reason, and was then too hard for himself.”