And thus, perhaps, without any other principles, but BARELY CONSIDERING THOSE PERFECT IDEAS, and by COMPARING THEM ONE WITH ANOTHER; finding their agreement and disagreement, and their several relations and habitudes; we shall get more true and clear knowledge by the conduct of this one rule, than by taking up principles, and thereby putting our minds into the disposal of others.
7.

The true Method of advancing Knowledge is by considering our abstract Ideas.
We must, therefore, if we will proceed as reason advises, adapt our methods of inquiry to THE NATURE OF THE IDEAS WE EXAMINE, and the truth we search after.

General and certain truths are only founded in the habitudes and relations of ABSTRACT IDEAS.

A sagacious and methodical application of our thoughts, for the finding out these relations, is the only way to discover all that can be put with truth and certainty concerning them into general propositions.

By what steps we are to proceed in these, is to be learned in the schools of the mathematicians, who, from very plain and easy beginnings, by gentle degrees, and a continued chain of reasonings, proceed to the discovery and demonstration of truths that appear at first sight beyond human capacity.