We herewith annex a fuller example of the cipher of writing " omnia per omnia," viz., an interior letter once sent by the Ephores of Sparta in a scytale or round ciphered staff:

"Perditæ res. Minidarus cecidit. Milites esuriunt, neque hinc nos extricare, neque hic diutius manere possumus.' The exterior letter in which the above is involved is taken from the first epistle of Cicero. We adjoin it:— Ego omni officio ac potius pietate erga te, cæteris satisfacio omnibus; mihi ipse numquam satisfacio. Tanta est enim magnitudo tuorum erga me meritorum, ut quoniam tu nisi perfecta re, de me non conquiesti. Ego quia non idem tu tua causa efficio, vitam mihi esse acerbam putem. In causa hæc sunt; Ammonius regis legatus aperte pecunia non oppugnat. Res agitur per eosdem creditores per quos, cum tu aderas, agebatur regis causa, si qui sunt, qui velint qui pauci sunt, omnes ad Pompeium rem deferri volunt. Senatus religionis calumniam, non religione, sed malevolentia, et illius regiæ largitionis invidia, comprobat, &c."

The doctrine of ciphers has introduced another, relative to it, viz., the art of deciphering without the alphabet of the cipher, or knowing the rules whereby it was formed. This indeed is a work of labour and ingenuity, devoted, as well as the former, to the secret service of princes. Yet by a liligent precaution it may be rendered useless, though, as matters now stand, it is highly serviceable: for if the ciphers in use were good and trusty, several of them would absolutely elude the labour of the decipherer, and yet remain commodious enough, so as to be readily written and read. But through the ignorance and unskilfulness of secretaries and clerks in the courts of princes, the most important affairs are generally committed to weak and treacherous ciphers.—And thus much for the organ of speech.

Key." The trustiness of this cipher depends upon a dexterous use of two hands, or two different kinds of letters, in the same writing, which the skilful decipherer, being thus advertised of, will be quicksighted enough to discern, and consequently be able to decipher, though a foundation seems here laid for several other ciphers, that perhaps could neither be suspected nor deciphered. Shaw.

The art of ciphering is doubtless capable of great improvement. It is said that King Charles I. had a cipher consisting only of a straight line differently inclined; and there are ways of ciphering by the more

CHAPTER II.

Method of Speech includes a wide Part of Tradition. Styled the Wisdom of Delivery. Various kinds of Methods enumerated. Their respective Merits.

THE doctrine concerning the method of speech has been usually treated as a part of logic; it has also found a place in rhetoric, under the name of disposition; but the placing of it in the train of other arts has introduced a neglect of many useful things relating to it. We, therefore, think proper to advance a substantial and capital doctrine of method, under the general name of traditive prudence. But as the kinds of method are various, we shall rather enumerate than divide them; but for one only method, and perpetually splitting and subdividing, it scarce need be mentioned, as being no more than a light cloud of doctrine that soon blows over, though it also proves destructive to the sciences, because the observers thereof, when they wrest things by the laws of their method, and either omit all that do not justly fall under their divisions, or bend them contrary to their own nature, squeeze, as it were, the grain out of the sciences, and grasp nothing but the chaff,-whence this kind of method produces empty compendiums, and loses the solid substance of the sciences, a

punctuation of a letter, whilst the words of the letter shall be non-significants, or sense, that leave no room for suspicion. It may also be worth considering, whether the art of deciphering could not be applied to languages, so as to translate, for instance, a Hebrew book without understanding Hebrew. See Morhof, De variis Scripturæ Modis, "Polyhist." tom. i. lib. iv. cap. 2. and Mr. Falconer's " Cryptomenysis Patefacta.' Shaw.

• The design of Ramus, whose method of Dichotomies is here censured, was to reduce all divisions and subdivisions to two members, with a view to obtain a basis for the construction of dilemmas and disjunctive syllogisms, We are never certain that these species of reasoning are legitimate, except when the divisions out of which they rise are exact; and the only test of this accuracy is to be sought in a dichotomous contradictory division, where the supposition of one member necessarily leads to the exclusion of the other. This method of exhausting a subject by an analytic exhaustion of its parts, which he mainly derived from Plato, has its proper sphere in logic; and though condemned in the text, was employed by Bacon in many of his prerogative instances. The error of Ramus consisted in taking only a part for the whole of logic, and applying what is strictly pplicable to subjects of a peculiar nature, to the whole range of inference.

Let the first difference of method be, therefore, betwixt the doctrinal and initiative. By this we do not mean that the initiative method should treat only of the entrance into the sciences, and the other their entire doctrine; but borrowing the word from religion, we call that method initiative which opens and reveals the mysteries of the sciences; so that as the doctrinal method teaches, the initiative method should intimate, the doctrinal method requiring a belief of what is delivered, but the initiative rather that it should be examined. The one deals out the sciences to vulgar learners, the other as to the children of wisdom,—the one having for its end the use of the sciences as they now stand, and the other their progress and farther advancement. But this latter method seems deserted; for the sciences have hitherto been delivered as if both the teacher and the learner desired to receive errors by consent, the teacher pursuing that method which procures the greatest belief to his doctrine, not that which most commodiously submits it to examination, whilst the learner desires present satisfaction without waiting for a just inquiry, as if more concerned not to doubt than not to mistake. Hence the master, through desire of glory, never exposes the weakness of his own science, and the scholar, through his aversion to labour, tries not his own strength; whereas knowledge, which is delivered to others as a web to be further wove, should if possible be introduced into the mind of another in the manner it was first procured; and this may be done in knowledge acquired by

It is evident, however, that the dichotomous process can only be employed in the investigation of subjects which admit of a twofold contradictory division, and that where the primitive elements are composed of four or tive distinct members, the method is totally inapplicable. Its use, therefore, ought to be attended with the greatest caution, as the Ramist can hardly be certain that the twofold division, in many cases, is not more apparent than real, and that a further analysis would not necessitate a multiform classification. For want of this foresight, Ramus, with all his subtilty, falls into inconceivable errors, and a great many of Bacon's exemplifications of his method in the crucial instance are direct paralogisms. Milton framed a logic on the model of Ramus's method, seduced rather by the bold antagonism of the latter against Aristotle, than by its philosophic justness. Both the original and the copy are now forgotten, and Ramus is committed to the judgment of posterity rather on his absurdities than his merits. See Hooker, i. 6, with Keble's note. Ed.

induction; but for that anticipated and hasty knowledge we have at present it is not easy for the possessor to say by what road he came at it. Yet in a greater or less degree any one might review his knowledge, trace back the steps of his own thoughts, consent afresh, and thus transplant his knowledge into the mind of another as it grew up in his own. For it is in arts as in trees,-if a tree were to be used, no matter for the root, but if it were to be transplanted, it is a surer way to take the root than the slips. So the transplantation now practised of the sciences makes a great show, as it were, of branches, that without the roots may be fit indeed for the builder, but not for the planter. He who would promote the growth of the sciences should be less solicitous about the trunk or body of them, and bend his care to preserve the roots, and draw them out with some little earth about them. Of this kind of transplantation there is some resemblance in the method of mathematicians; but in general we do not see that it is either used or inquired after; we therefore place it among the deficiencies, under the name of the traditive lamp, or a method for posterity.c

There is another difference of method, bearing some relation to the former intention, though in reality almost opposite to it; both of them have this in common, that they separate the vulgar audience from the select; but herein they are opposite, that the former introduces a more open and the other a more secret way of instruction than the common; hence let them be distinguished, by terming the former plain or open, and the latter the learned or concealed method, thus transferring to the manner of delivery the difference made use of by the ancients, especially in publishing their books This concealed or enigmatical method was itself also employed by the ancients with prudence and judgment, but is of late dishonoured by many, who use it as a false light to set off their counterfeit wares. The design of it seems to

To this purpose see Wolfius's "Brevis Commentatio de Methodo Mathematica," prefixed to his "Elementa Matheseos Universæ ;" as also his "Logics and Metaphysics." Shaw.

Perhaps M. Tschirnhaus's "Medicina Mentis, sive Tentamen genuinæ Logicæ, in qua disseritur de Methodo detegendi incognitas Veritates," may pave the way for supplying this desideratum; proceeding as it does upon a mathematical and algebraical foundation, to raise a method of discovering unknown truths.

Shaw.

have been, by the veil of tradition to keep the vulgar from the secrets of sciences, and to admit only such as had, by the help of a master, attained to the interpretation of dark sayings, or were able, by the strength of their own genius, to enter within the veil.

The next difference of method is of great moment with regard to the sciences, as these are delivered either in the way of aphorism or methodically. It highly deserves to be noted, that the general custom is, for men to raise as it were a formal and solemn art from a few axioms and observations upon any subject, swelling it out with their own witty inventions, illustrating it by examples, and binding the whole up into method. But that other way of delivery by aphorisms has numerous advantages over the methodical. And first, it gives us a proof of the author's abilities, and shows whether he hath entered deep into his subject or not. Aphorisms are ridiculous things, unless wrought from the central parts of the sciences; and here all illustration, excursion, variety of examples, deduction, connection, and particular description, is cut off, so that nothing besides an ample stock of observations is left for the matter of aphorisms. And, therefore, no person is equal to the forming of aphorisms, nor would ever think of them, if he did not find himself copiously and solidly instructed for writing upon a subject. But in methods so great a power have order, connection, and choice,

"d

"Tantum series juncturaque pollet; Tantum de medio sumptis accedit honoris," that methodical productions sometimes make a show of I know not what specious art, which, if they were taken to pieces, separated, and undressed, would fall back again almost to nothing. Secondly, a methodical delivery has the power of enforcing belief and consent, but directs not much to practical indications, as carrying with it a kind of demonstration in circle, where the parts mutually enlighten each other, and so gratifies the imagination the more; but as actions lie scattered in common life, scattered instructions suit them the best. Lastly, as aphorisms exhibit only certain scraps and fragments of the sciences, they carry with them an invitation

Hor. Art. Poet. 242