vations and Definitions, that is to ſay, to underſtand Natural Hiſtory and Metaphyſics, Advantages which the Men of theſe Times could not have enjoyed.
Beſides, general Ideas cannot be conveyed to the Mind without the Aſſiſtance of Words, nor can the Underſtanding ſeize them without the Aſſiſtance of Propoſitions. This is one of the Reaſons, why mere Animals cannot form ſuch Ideas, nor ever acquire the Perfectibility, which depends on ſuch an Operation. When a Monkey leaves without the leaſt Heſitation one Nut for another, are we to think he has any general Idea of that kind of Fruit, and that he compares theſe two individual Bodies with his Archetype Notion of them? No certainly; but the ſight of one of theſe Nuts calls back to his Memory the Senſations which he has received from the other; and his Eyes, modified after ſome certain manner, give
