23. Difference of men's discoveries depends upon the different application of their faculties.
To conclude: some
ideas forwardly offer themselves to all men's understanding; and some sorts of truths result from any ideas, as
soon as the mind puts them into propositions: other truths require a train of ideas placed in order, a due comparing
of them, and deductions made with attention, before they can be discovered and assented to. Some of the first sort,
because of their general and easy reception, have been mistaken for innate: but the truth is, ideas and notions are
no more born with us than arts and sciences; though some of them indeed offer themselves to our faculties more
readily than others; and therefore are more generally received: though that too be according as the organs of our
bodies and powers of our minds happen to be employed; God having fitted men with faculties and means to
discover, receive, and retain truths, according as they are employed. The great difference that is to be found in the
notions of mankind is, from the different use they put their faculties to. Whilst some (and those the most) taking
things upon trust, misemploy their power of assent, by lazily enslaving their minds to the dictates and dominion of
others, in doctrines which it is their duty carefully to examine, and not blindly, with an implicit faith, to swallow;
others, employing their thoughts only about some few things, grow acquainted sufficiently with them, attain great
degrees of knowledge in them, and are ignorant of all other, having never let their thoughts loose in the search of
other inquiries. Thus, that the three angles of a triangle are quite equal to two right ones is a truth as certain as
anything can be, and I think more evident than many of those propositions that go for principles; and yet there are
millions, however expert in other things, who know not this at all, because they never set their thoughts on work
about such angles. And he that certainly knows this proposition may yet be utterly ignorant of the truth of other
propositions, in mathematics itself, which are as clear and evident as this; because, in his search of those
mathematical truths, he stopped his thoughts short and went not so far. The same may happen concerning the
notions we have of the being of a Deity. For, though there be no truth which a man may more evidently make out
to himself than the existence of a God, yet he that shall content himself with things as he finds them in this world,
as they minister to his pleasures and passions, and not make inquiry a little further into their causes, ends, and
admirable contrivances, and pursue the thoughts thereof with diligence and attention, may live long without any
notion of such a Being. And if any person hath by talk put such a notion into his head, he may perhaps believe it;
but if he hath never examined it, his knowledge of it will be no perfecter than his, who having been told, that the
three angles of a triangle are equal to two right ones, takes it upon trust, without examining the demonstration;
and may yield his assent as a probable opinion, but hath no knowledge of the truth of it; which yet his faculties, if
carefully employed, were able to make clear and evident to him. But this only, by the by, to show how much our
knowledge depends upon the right use of those powers nature hath bestowed upon us, and how little upon such
innate principles as are in vain supposed to be in all mankind for their direction; which all men could not but
know if they were there, or else they would be there to no purpose. And which since all men do not know, nor can
distinguish from other adventitious truths, we may well conclude there are no such.
