Imagination is not ingovernable.
IV. With regard to imagination, let it be observed, that tho’ it be thought by such as have not taken proper pains to form and improve it, a meer<57> rambler, and utterly incapable of governance; yet ancient philosophers have assured us from their experience, “That if habitual temperance be added to just care to cultivate the imagination, and give it a right turn, such a command may be obtained over it, that its employments even in dreams shall not only be pure and chaste, but very regular as well as highly entertaining.” It is indeed not to be wondered at, considering how egregiously the formation of fancy is neglected in education, that it should be so irregular, desultory and turbulent a faculty, instead of a pleasant, governable and useful one. Philosophers satisfy themselves with railing at it, as a pernicious rather than an advantageous part of our frame; as being instead of an assistant in the pursuit of science, an enemy to truth; a misleader, a sophist, and corrupter: but were it not capable of being not only regulated, but highly refined and improved by due care, mankind had been utter strangers to all the entertaining and embellishing arts of fancy, which give such lustre, beauty and taste to human life; to all the ingenious productions of men of wit and fine imagination: the advances that have been made towards its improvement, to which we owe so many great genius’s, and their delightful productions and compositions, are a sufficient argument, that by timely care duly persevered in, it might be habituated to order regularity and wholesome as well as pleasant exercise. Is it to be wondered, that those whose waking thoughts are so irregular and unprofitable, should have very idle and impertinent visions in their sleep? But so true is the antient maxim about the correspondence or analogy between our dreams and our employments throughout the day, that I believe no temperate man, much given to study,a is not rather entertained<58> than molested by his night reveries, provided he be in a good habit of body. As for the dependence of body and mind, it shall be considered in another place. And the dependence of the imagination upon culture, or our care to improve it, and exercise it rightly, hath been already accounted for, by shewing, that according to the general law of our nature in consequence of which we have dominion, a sphere of activity, and are capable of making acquisitions, and by that means of virtue and merit; the improvement of all our faculties depends on ourselves; and it is the dependence of the improvement of the understanding, reason, imagination, and all our faculties upon our care to improve them, that makes us a species of beings superior to those who have no activity, but only receive sensations from without independently of their own will, choice or foresight.
The other faculty of our minds, that remains to be considered under this article of knowledge, and power, and the laws relative to them, is invention.
Invention what it is and how improveable.
Now with respect to it I would observe,
A history of it, and the phenomena relating to it, is much wanted.
I. That the phenomena of invention appear to us very irregular and whimsical, merely because, for want of a history of them, we cannot reduce them to general laws. Every thing must appear to us casual, anomalous, and as it were detached from nature, while we do not know the general laws on which it depends, or from which it results. And<59> therefore till we be at more pains, than hath yet been taken, to collect a history relating to invention, there can be no other reason to call any of them casual and irregular, than there was to call several other phenomena of nature such, while their laws were not known, which now that they are found out, do no more appear to us to be such. On the contrary, there is good reason to think, that the phenomena of invention may have their general laws; since in whatever case almost we have taken right methods of tracing effects to their general laws, such laws have been discovered; and then the effects which before appeared irregular, immediately changed their face, and assumed, as it were, another mein: they now no more seem uncouth and marvelous, but ordinary and according to rule. It is only in the way of experiment, that either the science of the human mind, or of any material system can be acquired. And by the discoveries made in natural philosophy, we know, that no sooner are facts collected, and laid together in proper order, than the true theory of the phenomenon in question presents itself. And hence, we have reason to think, that knowledge of the qualities and operations of bodies, would quickly make very great and profitable advances, far beyond what it has yet arrived to, by pursuing the same method that has brought it to the present degree of perfection. Now when we consider that moral knowledge can only be carried on in the same way, is it any wonder that the human mind is so little known, since men have not studied it with due care, but have rather been more misled in this philosophy, than in natural, by fictitious hypotheses and romantic, visionary theories? For such are all theories that are not the result of well ranged phenomena.
What discovery of new truths is.
And how they are made.
II. But tho, without all doubt, it is highly reasonable to expect very great assistances for the promotion<60> and improvement of all sciences and arts from an acurate knowledge of our inventive powers, that is, from a full history of their operations and productions; yet, in the mean time, ’tis plain, that invention is nothing else but the habit acquired by practice of assembling ideas or truths, with facility and readiness, in various positions and arrangements, in order to have new views of them. For no truths can be placed in any position or order with respect to one another, but some agreement or disagreement, some relation or quality of these ideas must appear to the mind. And discovery of a new or unknown relation can be nothing else but the result of placing truths, objects or ideas, in some new or unobserved position. But, if this be the case, then the great business with regard to invention and its improvement, must be to accustom ourselves to look round every idea as it were, and to view it in all possible situations and positions; and to let no truth we know pass, till we have compared it with many others in various respects; not only with such, as are like or a kin to it, but with its seeming contraries, opposites, or disparates. Every different juxtaposition of ideas, will give us a new view of them, that is, discover some unknown truth. And the mind by such exercise alone can attain to readiness, quickness and distinctness, in comparing ideas in order to get knowledge.
How it becomes easier to make progress in knowledge by progress.
And by that science which is properly the art of reasoning.
III. Now, this leads me to the last remark I shall make upon our natural furniture for knowledge, which is, that knowledge being progressive and dependent on ourselves; it, by that means, becomes easy to us to make advances in it, in the best and properest way that it can become so, that is, in the way that is qualified to give us the greatest pleasure. For it becomes easier to improve in knowledge, in proportion to the improvements we have made in it. Our inventive, imaginative, comparing and reasoning powers become stronger, more alert, and vigorous<61> by proper exercise. The habit of reasoning well, that is, readily and solidly, is acquired by practice in reasoning. And which is more, in consequence of having inured ourselves to accurate thinking, and of having made several advances in science, we become able to form rules to ourselves for our further progress in knowledge in the best, that is, the clearest, quickest, and surest manner. In other words, knowledge may be made easy to us by ourselves, because after we have made some progress in it, after we have exercised our enquiring, comparing and reasoning powers, for some time, about different objects; we can then make enquiring, comparing, reasoning, inventing, and laying truths together in proper order, to bring out new conclusions, the objects of our consideration; and thus we can form a science concerning science and making progress in it. A science, by the by, which ever since Plato’s time has been very much neglected in education; and very little cultivated, notwithstanding all Lord Verulam has said in his works of its nature and usefulness.a
General conclusion concerning the laws of knowledge, and our natural furniture for it.
Thus then we see how excellently we are furnishedb by nature for the pleasures of knowledge, and for improving in sciences and arts; so that we may conclude, “That with regard to knowledge, (the foundation of intelligent power, dominion and activity) we are very well constituted; or that all the most important circumstances, or