ON THE USE OF DEFINITIONS. Ihere appears to be a persuasion pretty widely preva- lent, that definitions of terms may be of great use in getting at truth, even in cases of seeming doubt and difficulty. When two eager disputants begin to argue systematically, the attempt generally leads very soon to a demand for a definition on one side or the other ; a demand, however, which does not in most cases materially shorten or elucidate the debate. And it has been much the habit for systematical writers on the conduct of the understanding to assure us that a large proportion of the disputes which are carried on among men, are merel}^ quarrels about words, which would vanish if men would only define the terms they use. Some of these writers indeed have complained of the ingratitude with which controversialists usually receive the proposal to terminate their contest by proving that it turns on the ambiguity of words ; and they inform us that the persons concerned often take such a sug- gestion as an affront, and forthwith bestow^ upon the mediator even more ill-will than they feel towards their opponents^. If both litigants conceive that the judge who thus volun- teers his services, proves, by his summing up, that he has taken a very incomplete view of the matter in dispute, and feel that they are contending to establish views and systems substantially different in their consequences and effects, even though they may not have shewn the most exact knowledge of forms in the selection of the issue on which they have put the question, it is perhaps very natural that they should still listen with some impatience and peevishness to a person who assures them they are fighting about nothing. Whether in such cases, the promulgation, by any bene- volent philosopher, of definitions of the terms mainly em- ployed in the discussion, tends much to bring the parties, or even the majority of impartial and intelligent l>ystanders, to
- Whately's Bamptoii Lectures, p. 19<>.
Vol. II. No. 5. L l
