I am yours, &c. MERCATOR.
No. 107. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1753
----Sub judice lis est. HOR. De Ar. Poet. 78.
And of their vain disputings find no end. FRANCIS.
IT has been sometimes asked by those who find
the appearance of wisdom more easily attained by
questions than solutions, how it comes to pass, that
the world is divided by such difference of opinion?
and why men, equally reasonable, and equally lovers
of truth, do not always think in the same manner?
With regard to simple propositions, where the
terms are understood, and the whole subject is
comprehended at once, there is such an uniformity of
sentiment among all human beings, that, for many
ages, a very numerous set of notions were supposed
to be innate, or necessarily co-existent with the
faculty of reason: it being imagined, that universal
agreement could proceed only from the invariable
dictates of the universal parent.
In questions diffuse and compounded, this
similarity of determination is no longer to be expected.
At our first sally into the intellectual world, we all
march together along one straight and open road;
but as we proceed further, and wider prospects open
to our view, every eye fixes upon a different scene;
we divide into various paths, and, as we move forward,
are still at a greater distance from each other.
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