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great philofopher has proved in the event the greatest tyrant in the univerfe. He not only fubverted all the fyftems of the philofophers who went before him with a bold and licentious hand, not fparing that of his master Plato, as his pupil Alexander did all the empires of the east; but, by that Instrument, he has manacled the philofophy of all future times and, though the dominion of that great prince and conqueror has vanished for many ages, and is now as though it never had existed, the chain of the philofopher is felt at this day by learned bodies and focieties through some of the most distant and enlightened parts of Europe. His LOGIC rendered

malo medicina; nec ipsa mali expers: Siquidem dialectica quæ recepta eft, licet ad civilia et artes, quæ in fermone et opinione potitæ funt, rectiffime adhibeatur; naturæ tamen fubtilitatem longo intervallo non attingit; et prenfando quod non capit, ad errores potius ftabilidendos et quafi figendos, quam ad viam veritati aperiendam valuit. Ibid. Præf,

• Cæterum de viro tam eximio certe, et ob acumen ingenii mirabili, Ariftotele, crediderim facile hanc ambitionem eum a difcipulo fuo accepiffe, quem fortaffe æmultatus eft; ut fi ille omnes nationes, hic omnes opiniones fubigeret, et monarchiam quandam in contemplationibus fibi conderet. Ibid. De Augm. Sc. lib, iii. cap. 4.

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more imperfect than he had left it, held out extérie as completely equipped to attend Reason in the fearch and communication of all truth, infallible as a guide, and incapable of improvement, fuperfeded every other, ? and deprived it for many ages of its most useful and faithful attendant; keeping learning and science in a dark and gloomy prifon, and drawing a cloud over the disk of the literary fun, by which it was for centuries eclipsed, and of which more than a single limb is now obfcured.

Whilft commentators, particularly the Latin and Arabian, were darkening this dark system by their illuftrations, and the schoolmen were contending with great fubtlety and little fenfe, and growing warm in Difputation, Truth and Learning were left to starve, cramped in their growth, and blafted in their profpects, in confequence of being deprived of their natu

• Primus mortalium Ariftoteles certum Logicæ finem conftituit, precepta in ordinem redegit, fingulari artificio integræ artis Methodum contexuit. Quam invenit Logicam: tum feliciter perfecit, ut in hunc ufque diem, per annos circiter bis mille, perpetuis clariffimorum virorum ftudiis exculta, nihil prorfus acceperit incrementi. Aldrich.

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ral support and fuccour.' Instead of extracting the pure and genuine ore by an experimental and inductive process, these champions of fyllogifm were employed in raking together heaps of sophisticated trafh, which they valued as the purest gold, Instead of pursuing Nature through her hidden stores, and connecting truth with truth, by a gradual operation, into an ufeful and wellcompacted chain, they fabricated their boafted fyftems of bafe materials, with all the fubtlety of their art, into useless and factitious geer, instead of connecting science with fcience, according to their natural order and relation, and erecting them into a great edifice of truth, they filled the Schools with heaps of indigefted rubbish, which, however worthlefs and deservedly defpifed by fome, adds to its inutility this difgrace, that it remains in a great measure unremoved

f The flow progress of useful knowledge, during the many ages in which the fylogistic art was moft highly cultivated as the only guide to science, and its quick progrefs fince that art was disused, suggest a prefumption against it; and the prefumption is ftrengthened by the purility of the examples which have been always brought to illuftrate its rules. Dr. Read in the Appendix to vol. iii. Lord Kaim's Sketches.

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How that fublimes and moff important part of Truth, the CHRISTIAN RELIGION, was enabled to emerge out of the midst of thofe errors and fuperftitions, by which it was furrounded and involved for many ages, whilst they were disguised and patronized by the evasive artifice and the fallacious fubtleties of fuch a Logic, is a profound and

• What is more facred among Sciences than Divinity? You have prophaned it by bringing in of that which you term Scholaftic, gathered out of Lombard, Master of the fentences, which has engendered unto us the race of the Thomifts, Scotifts, Albertifts, Ocamifts, Realifts, Nomi- C nalifts, and fuch others, whofe foundation is laid upon the fubtleties of Aristotle. Let any man remark the themes of your Sermons, the difputations of your Schools, together with those great and huge volumes of Commentaries upon the four books of the Sentences. Oracles are received every were from the Tripus of this Philofopher, and the Universities that ought to be inftituted after a Chriftian manner, are changed into the Academies of that heathenish Athens. You spend more time in clearing that which feemeth ambiguous and doubtful in the doctrine of that ingrate difciple toward Plato, than in teaching your flocks the law of the Gofpel. The oaths which the Universities do exact of their initiates and Batchelors, that they fhall not controll him, are witneffes of the truth of what I fpeak. De Croy's Firft Conformity, chap. 3.

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explorin folemn wonder, which can only be difpelled by referring the emancipation of this pure offspring of heaven to the special interpofition of its Author, who became, in his good time, the vindicator of his own honour, and the affertor of its awful and ftupendous truths.

CHAP.

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