method of analyfis. The greater part of his difcourfes are fo exact a copy of the easiest and most perfect method of investigation, that we imagine we fee, in every step of the process, the very manner in which he himself was led to conceive the fentiments he recommends. To obviate objections, he carefully conceals the result of fome of his inquiries, till his reader be prepared for it, by fuch a happy gradation of previous obfervations and inferences, that he cannot tell how to avoid it; and if, at that time, he fhould wish to refuse his affent, and hesitate about it, as he has, before he was aware, affented to all the premises, he is at a loss where to found his objection. This writer ought, therefore, to be read with very great caution. DR. HARTLEY, propofing a new hypothesis of the principles of the human mind, examines very particularly every thing relating to, or dependent upon the mind of man, viz. fenfations, ideas, muscular motion, the external fenfes, affections, memory, imagination, reasoning, dreams, &c. and endeavours to fhow that none of the phenomena of any of them contradict his hypothefis; that many of them admit a peculiarly eafy and complete illuftration by it; and that the moft difficult cafes are not rendered more difficult, but rather easier by the help of it. And left this hypothefis concerning the principles of the human mind fhould be fufpected to bear an unfavourable afpect afpect upon a plan of human duty, and human expectations, he confiders the whole of both fyftematically; fhowing, whenever he hath opportunity, that the evidences of religion, natural and revealed, with the rule of life drawn from it, receive additional light and evidence from it; and, laftly, that it hath a happy influence both upon our conduct in this life, and upon our expectations after death. This is the general plan of that immense work. The particular method of it is strictly geometrical, and synthetical. The author begins with definitions and axioms, lays down formal propofitions, and advances fuch proof as the nature of the cafe will admit. He deduces formal corollaries from almost every propofition, and in the fcholia he explains the nature of his proofs, and fhows in what manner evidence is reflected from one part to another. Interspersed through the whole of this work is a vast variety of curious and ufeful knowledge. This method may not, at first fight, feem fo well adapted to a theory fo much original as that of Dr. Hartley, and it must certainly have been a work of great labour and difficulty to digeft a fet of fentiments, so intirely new, into fo regular and fyftematical a form; because in a synthetic discourse every thing that is advanced must have one particular place, and no other: whereas in the analytic method there is much greater lati tude. tude. For that method is a copy of the method of investigation, and the fame thought may occur to the mind in a variety of connexions. Nevertheless, fo extenfive a theory could not easily have been delivered without confufion in any other method. Besides, it was enough to recommend this method to Dr. Hartley, that, of all others, it is the faireft, and fhows the greatest impartiality; as a treatise in this form is the moft commodious for examination, and fuggefts the easiest method of fhowing the fallacy of it, if it be falfe. A perfon would be much more at a lofs how to anfwer Mr. Hume, than Dr. Hartley. Mr. HARRIS, propofing in his Hermes to trace the first principles of speech, and to show, by an. analytical procefs, in what manner they may be inveftigated, fiift examines intire fentences, and confiders what differences, in the forms of expreffions, correfpond to the differences in their meaning. Having thus discovered the properties of different fentences; he confiders the particular words that compofe fentences, and thus having, by degrees, arrived at the fimpleft elements of speech, and discovered how many differences there are in words, or the number of general heads to which they may be reduced, he hath completely accomplished his fcheme of analyfis. It may not be unufeful to obferve, in order to illuftrate the variety of method, that another perfon, intending to draw up a fynthetic or fyftematic tematic treatise upon the fame fubject, for the use of learners, would moft naturally take a method the very reverse of Mr. Harris's. For example, he would, in the first place, enumerate the feveral claffes into which words may be diftributed, and show the modifications that each of them admit. After this he would fhow in what manner these words, according to their different fpecies, fentences, and how these sentences are combined into periods. This is the method of the General Grammar of Meffieurs de Port Royal, and others. Divines conduct their inquiries into the sense of the facred writers upon any controverted fubject in a method nearly analytical. For, in order to give their readers intire fatisfaction with regard to their impartiality, they produce all the texts of fcripture relating to the queftion in debate, ranging them under fuch proper heads as the nature of the undertaking requires, and afcertaining the meaning of every paffage they quote with all poffible accuracy; and they deduce the doctrine they contend for as an inference fairly drawn from the texts thus collected and compared. It makes no material difference in the method of these inquiries, if the opinion of the writer be advanced in the entrance of the work, and the texts be afterwards produced as proofs of what he advances. All fuch propofitions require to be proved by an induction of particulars; and it is a capital capital thing, in the conduct of thefe inquiries, that the induction be as complete as poffible. Our beit SERMONS, with respect to the method of their compofition, are of two kinds. Some are intended to be a demonftration of fome doctrine of religion, or a difcourfe upon fome religious duty, with proper inferences, in the regular fynthetic method. Others are usually called textual, because the writers, affuming fome text of fcripture, endeavour to extract from it all the useful information and direction it contains. They accordingly, in this latter method, divide their subject into as many parts as their text contains diftinct articles, and treat of each feparately, according to its nature. The method of this kind of fermons admits of endless variety, but the text cannot be changed. To the former the text ferves only as a motto, and may be changed at pleasure, the method being fuggefted by the fubject, and not at all by the text. It follows, likewife, from the account given in the preceding lectures of the beft method of conducting a demonstration, that there must be a great uniformity in the plan of thefe difcourses, and that each will exhaust the whole fubject. To remedy this inconvenience, it is ufual, and it introduces an agreeable variety into this kind of fermons, to take only fome part fcheme of fynthefis into one difcourfe. of fuch a Some in tire |