d and assented to. Some of the
first sort, because of their general and easy reception, have been
mistaken for innate: but the truth is, ideas and notions are no more
born with us than arts and sciences; though some of them indeed offer
themselves to our faculties more readily than others; and therefore are
more generally received: though that too be according as the organs of
our bodies and powers of our minds happen to be employed; God having
fitted men with faculties and means to discover, receive, and retain
truths, according as they are employed. The great difference that is to
be found in the notions of mankind is, from the different use they put
their faculties to. Whilst some (and those the most) taking things upon
trust, misemploy their power of assent, by lazily enslaving their minds
to the dictates and dominion of others, in doctrines which it is their
duty carefully to examine, and not blindly, with an implicit faith, to
swallow; others, employing their thoughts only about some few things,
grow acquainted sufficiently with them, attain great degrees of
knowledge in them, and are ignorant of all other, having never let their
thoughts loose in the search of other inquiries. Thus, that the three
angles of a triangle are quite equal to two right ones is a truth as
certain as anything can be, and I think more evident than many of those
propositions that go for principles; and yet there are millions, however
expert in other things, who know not this at all, because they never set
their thoughts on work about such angles. And he that certainly knows
this proposition may yet be utterly ignorant of the truth of other
propositions, in mathematics itself, which are as clear and evident as
this; because, in his search of those mathematical truths, he stopped
his thoughts short and went not so far. The same may happen concerning
the notions we have of the being of a Deity. For, though there be no
truth which a man may more evidently make out to himself than the
existence of a God, yet he that shall content himself with things as
he finds them in this world, as they minister to his pleasures and
passions, and not make inquiry a little further into their causes,
ends, and admirable contrivances, and pursue the thoughts thereof with
diligence and attention, may live long without any notion of such a
Being. And if any person hath by talk put such a notion into his head,
he may perhaps believe it; but if he hath never examined