the Latin word pleases better, SPECIES of things, are nothing else but
these abstract ideas. For the having the essence of any species, being
that which makes anything to be of that species; and the conformity to
the idea to which the name is annexed being that which gives a right to
that name; the having the essence, and the having that conformity, must
needs be the same thing: since to be of any species, and to have a right
to the name of that species, is all one. As, for example, to be a MAN,
or of the SPECIES man, and to have right to the NAME man, is the same
thing. Again, to be a man, or of the species man, and have the ESSENCE
of a man, is the same thing. Now, since nothing can be a man, or have a
right to the name man, but what has a conformity to the abstract idea
the name man stands for, nor anything be a man, or have a right to the
species man, but what has the essence of that species; it follows, that
the abstract idea for which the name stands, and the essence of the
species, is one and the same. From whence it is easy to observe, that
the essences of the sorts of things, and, consequently, the sorting of
things, is the workmanship of the understanding that abstracts and makes
those general ideas.


13. They are the Workmanship of the Understanding, but have their
Foundation in the Similitude of Things.

I would not here be thought to forget, much less to deny, that Nature,
in the production of things, makes several of them alike: there is
nothing more obvious, especially in the races of animals, and all things
propagated by seed. But yet I think we may say, THE SORTING OF THEM
UNDER NAMES IS THE WORKMANSHIP OF THE UNDERSTANDING, TAKING OCCASION,
FROM THE SIMILITUDE IT OBSERVES AMONGST THEM, TO MAKE ABSTRACT GENERAL
IDEAS, and set them up in the mind, with names annexed to them, as