12. And why.
The reason whereof seems to me to be this: That the abstract ideas of mixed modes, being men's
voluntary combinations of such a precise collection of simple ideas, and so the essence of each species being
made by men alone, whereof we have no other sensible standard existing anywhere but the name itself, or the
definition of that name; we having nothing else to refer these our ideas of mixed modes to, as a standard to which
we would conform them, but the ideas of those who are thought to use those names in their most proper
significations; and, so as our ideas conform or differ from them, they pass for true or false. And thus much
concerning the truth and falsehood of our ideas, in reference to their names.