e was black. Whereby they
had the advantage to destroy the instruments and means of discourse,
conversation, instruction, and society; whilst, with great art and
subtlety, they did no more but perplex and confound the signification of
words, and thereby render language less useful than the real defects of
it had made it; a gift which the illiterate had not attained to.

11. As useful as to confound the sound that the Letters of the Alphabet
stand for.

These learned men did equally instruct men's understandings, and
profit their lives, as he who should alter the signification of known
characters, and, by a subtle device of learning, far surpassing the
capacity of the illiterate, dull, and vulgar, should in his writing show
that he could put A for B, and D for E, &c., to the no small admiration
and benefit of for his reader. It being as senseless to put BLACK,
which is a word agreed on to stand for one sensible idea, to put it, I
say, for another, or the contrary idea; i.e. to call SNOW BLACK, as
to put this mark A, which is a character agreed on to stand for one
modification of sound, made by a certain motion of the organs of speech,
for B, which is agreed on to stand for another modification of sound,
made by another certain mode of the organs of speech.

12. This Art has perplexed Religion and Justice.

Nor hath this mischief stopped in logical niceties, or curious empty
speculations; it hath invaded the great concernments of human life and
society; obscured and perplexed the material truths of law and divinity;
brought confusion, disorder, and uncertainty into the affairs of
mankind; and if not destroyed, yet in a great measure rendered useless,
these two great rules, religion and justice. What have the greatest part
of the comments and disputes upon the laws of God and man served for,
but to make the meaning more doubtful, and perplex the sense? What have
been the effect of those multiplied curious distinctions, and acute
niceties, but obscurity and uncertainty, leaving the words more
unintelligible, and the reader more at a loss? How else comes it to pass
that princes, speaking or writing to their servants, in their ordinary
commands are easily understood; speaking to their people, in their laws,
are not so? And, as I remarked before, doth it not often happen that a
man of an ordinary capacity very well understands a text, or a law, that
he reads, till he consults an expositor, or goes to counsel; who, by
t