But the method of the Schools having allowed and encouraged men to oppose and resist evident truth till they are baffled, i.e.till they are reduced to contradict themselves, or some established principles: it is no wonder that they should not in civil conversation be ashamed of that which in the Schools is counted a virtue and a glory, viz.

obstinately to maintain that side of the question they have chosen, whether true or false, to the last extremity; even after conviction.

A strange way to attain truth and knowledge: and that which I think the rational part of mankind, not corrupted by education, could scare believe should ever be admitted amongst the lovers of truth, and students of religion or nature, or introduced into the seminaries of those who are to propegate the truths of religion or philosophy amongst the ignorant and unconvinced.

How much such a way of learning is like to turn young men's minds from the sincere search and love of truth; nay, and to make them doubt whether there is any such thing, or, at least, worth the adhering to, I shall not now inquire.

This I think, that, bating those places, which brought the Peripatetic Philosophy into their schools, where it continued many ages, without teaching the world anything but the art of wrangling, these maxims were nowhere thought the foundations on which the sciences were built, nor the great helps to the advancement of knowledge.] {Of great use to stop wranglers in disputes, but of little use to the discovery of truths.} As to these general maxims, therefore, they are, as I have said, of great use in disputes, to stop the mouths of wranglers; but not of much use to the discovery of unknown truths, or to help the mind forwards in its search after knowledge.