_Rule_ II. _Cut off all needless Ideas and whatever has not a necessary Connexion to the matter under Consideration_, which serve only to fill up the Capacity of the Mind, and to Divide and Distract the Attention. From the neglect of this comes those causless Digressions, tedious Parentheses and Impertinent Remarques which we meet with in some Authors. For, as when our Sight is diffus’d and extended to many Objects at once we see none of them Distinctly; so when the Mind grasps at every Idea that presents it self, or rambles after such as relate not to its Present Business, it loses its hold and retains a very feeble Apprehension of that which it shou’d Attend. Some have added another Rule (_viz._) _That we Reason only on those things of which we have Clear Ideas_; but I take it to be a Consequence of the first, and therefore do not make it a distinct one: For we can by no means Understand our Subject, or be well acquainted with the State of the Question, unless we have a Clear Idea of all its Terms. _Rule_ III. Our Business being stated, the next Rule is _To conduct our Thoughts by Order, beginning with the most Simple and Easie Objects, And ascending as by Degrees to the Knowlege of the more Compos’d_. I need not tell you, that Order makes every thing, Easie, Strong and Beautiful, and that the Superstructure is neither like to Last or Please unless the Foundation be duly laid, for this is obvious to the most Superficial Reader. Nor are they likely to solve the Difficult, who have neglected or slightly pass’d over the Easie Questions. Our Knowledge is gradual, and by passing Regularly thro Plain things, we arrive in due time at the more Abstruse. _Rule_ IV. In this Method we are to practise the Fourth Rule which is, _Not to leave any part of our Subject unexamin’d_, it being as necessary to Consider All that can let in Light, as to shut out what’s Foreign to it. We may stop short of Truth as well as over-run it; and tho we look never so attentively on our proper Object, if we view but half of it, we may be as much mistaken, as if we extended our Sight beyond it. Some Objects agree very well when observ’d on one side, which upon turning the other shew a great disparity. Thus the Right Angle of a Triangle may be like to one part of a Square, but compare the Whole, and you’l find ’em very different Figures. And a Moral Action may in some Circumstance be not only Fit but Necessary, which in others, where Time, Place, and the like have made an alteration, wou’d be most Improper; so that if we venture to Act on the former Judgment, we may easily do amiss, if we wou’d Act as we ought, we must view its New Face, and see with what Aspect that looks on us.