Authors' Advertisements to the First and Fifth Editions
THIS small work had quite an accidental origin, and is due rather to a kind of sport than to any serious intention. A person of quality, entertaining a young nobleman, who, at an early age, displayed much depth and penetration of mind, happened to mention to him that he had, when himself young, met with a person who in fifteen days made him acquainted with the greater part of logic. The mention of this led another person who was present, and who held that science in no great esteem, to reply, sportively, that if Mr would take the trouble he could confidently engage to make him acquainted, in four or five days, with all that was of any use in logic. This proposal, made at random, having afforded entertainment for a while, it was resolved to make the attempt; but as it was thought that the common logics were not sufficiently concise, or exact, it was determined that a brief abstract should be made from them for this purpose.
This is all that was contemplated in undertaking the work, and it was thought that it would not occupy more than a day. On engaging in it, however, so many new reflections presented themselves to the mind that it became necessary to write them down, in order to proceed. Thus, instead of a single day, four or five days were occupied in forming the body of this Logic, to which several additions have since been made. But although it thus embraced many more topics than it was at first designed to include, the attempt, nevertheless, succeeded as had been promised, for the young nobleman having reduced the work to four tables, easily learnt them one a-day, without even having need of any one as instructor. It is certainly true, however, that we ought not to expect that others will learn it with the same ease, his mind being quite extraordinary in every thing that depends on intelligence. Such is the accident that gave rise to this work. But whatever opinion may be held respecting it, the printing of it cannot, at least with justice, be condemned, since it was compulsory rather than voluntary. For since many persons had obtained manuscript copies, which, it is well known, cannot be made without many mistakes creeping in, and since it was understood that the printers were about to publish it, it was judged better to give it forth to the public in a correct and perfect form than to allow it to be printed from imperfect copies. In consequence of this, it became necessary to make various additions, which have increased its size about a third, it being thought that the views it contained ought to be extended further than they had been in the first essay. It is the design of the following Discourse to explain the end which the work proposes, and the reason of those subjects which are treated of in it.
VARIOUS important additions have been made to this New Edition of the Logic. These were occasioned by the objections made by the Ministers to certain observations which it contained; it thus became necessary to explain and defend the parts which they had endeavoured to attack. It will be seen, by these explanations, that reason and faith perfectly harmonise, as being streams from the same source, and that we cannot go far from the one without departing also from the other. But although theological disputes have thus given rise to these additions, they are not less appropriate or less natural to logic; and they might have been made, even though there had never been any ministers in the world, who had attempted to obscure the truths of our faith with false subtileties.