2. That every particular thing should have a name for itself is impossible.
First, It is impossible that every
particular thing should have a distinct peculiar name. For, the signification and use of words depending on that
connexion which the mind makes between its ideas and the sounds it uses as signs of them, it is necessary, in the
application of names to things, that the mind should have distinct ideas of the things, and retain also the particular
name that belongs to every one, with its peculiar appropriation to that idea. But it is beyond the power of human
capacity to frame and retain distinct ideas of all the particular things we meet with: every bird and beast men saw;
every tree and plant that affected the senses, could not find a place in the most capacious understanding. If it be
looked on as an instance of a prodigious memory, that some generals have been able to call every soldier in their
army by his proper name, we may easily find a reason why men have never attempted to give names to each sheep
in their flock, or crow that flies over their heads; much less to call every leaf of plants, or grain of sand that came
in their way, by a peculiar name.
