afterwards without distinct meanings.

Others there be who extend this abuse yet further, who take so little
care to lay by words, which, in their primary notation have scarce
any clear and distinct ideas which they are annexed to, that, by an
unpardonable negligence, they familiarly use words which the propriety
of language HAS affixed to very important ideas, without any distinct
meaning at all. WISDOM, GLORY, GRACE, &c., are words frequent enough in
every man's mouth; but if a great many of those who use them should be
asked what they mean by them, they would be at a stand, and not know
what to answer: a plain proof, that, though they have learned those
sounds, and have them ready at their tongues ends, yet there are no
determined ideas laid up in their minds, which are to be expressed to
others by them.


4. This occasioned by men learning Names before they have the Ideas the
names belong to.

Men having been accustomed from their cradles to learn words which are
easily got and retained, before they knew or had framed the complex
ideas to which they were annexed, or which were to be found in the
things they were thought to stand for, they usually continue to do so
all their lives; and without taking the pains necessary to settle in
their minds determined ideas, they use their words for such unsteady and
confused notions as they have, contenting themselves with the same words
other people use; as if their very sound necessarily carried with it
constantly the same meaning. This, though men make a shift with in
the ordinary occurrences of life, where they find it necessary to be
understood, and therefore they make signs till they are so; yet this