excluding from the head of ideas the visible idea of the character of a word, and the audible one of its sound, and also all ideas which are either extremely faint or extremely variable: words may be distinguished into the four following classes: 1. Such as have ideas only; 2. Such as have both ideas and definitions; 3. Such as have definitions only; 4. Such as have neither ideas nor definitions.

It is difficult to fix precise limits to these four classes, so as to determine accurately where each ends and the next begins; and if we consider these things in the most general way, there is perhaps no word which has not both an idea and a definition; that is, which is not occasion ally attended with some one or more internal feelings, and which may not be explained, in some perfect manner, at least, by other words. However, the following are some instances of words which have the fairest right to each class. The names of simple sensible objects are of the first class. Thus, white, sweet, &c. excite ideas, but cannot be defined. Words of this class stand only for the stable parts of the respective ideas, not for the several variable particularities, circumstances, and adjuncts which here intermix themselves.

The names of natural bodies, animal, vegetable, or mineral, are of the second class; for they excite aggregates of sensible ideas, and at the same time may be defined by an enumeration of their properties and characteristics. Thus likewise geometrical figures have both ideas and definitions. The definitions, in both cases, are so contrived as to leave out all the variable particularities of the ideas, and also to be more full and precise than the ideas generally are in the parts which are of a permanent nature.

Algebraic quantities, such as roots, powers, surds, &c. belong to the third class; and have definitions only. The same may be said of scientifical terms of art, and of most abstract general terms, moral, metaphysical, and vulgar. However, mental emotions are apt to attend some of these, even in passing slightly over the ear, and these emotions may be considered as ideas belonging to the respective terms. Thus, the very words, gratitude, mercy, cruelty, treachery, &c. separately taken, affect the mind; and yet, since all reasoning upon them is to be founded on their definitions, it seems best to refer them to this third class.

Lastly, the particles, the, of, to, for, but, &c. have neither definition nor ideas, as we have limited those terms.

2. It will easily appear, from the observations here made upon words, and the associations which adhere to them, that the languages of different ages and nations must bear a great general resemblance to each other, and yet have considerable particular differences; whence any one may be translated into any other, so as to convey the same ideas in general, and yet not with perfect precision and exactness. They must resemble one another, because the phenomena of nature, which they are all intended to express, and the uses and exigencies of human life to which they minister, have a general resemblance. But then, as the bodily make and genius of each people, the air, soil, and climate, commerce, arts, sciences, religion, &c. make considerable differences in different ages and nations, it is natural to expect that the languages should have proportionable differences in respect of each other.

In learning a new language, the words of it are at first substitutes for those of our native language; that is, they are associated by means of these, with the proper objects and ideas. When this association is sufficiently strong, the middle bond is dropped, and the words of the new language become substitutes for, and suggest directly and immediately objects and ideas; also clusters of other words in the same language.

In learning a new language, it is much easier to translate from it into the native one, than back again; just as young children are much better able to understand the expressions of others, than to express their own conceptions. And the reason is the same in both cases. Young children learn at first to go from the words of others, and those who learn a new language from the words of that language to the things signified. And the reverse of this, viz. to go from the things signified to the words, must be difficult for a time, from the nature of successive associations. It is to be added here, that the nature and connections of the things signified often determine the import of sentences, though their grammatical analysis is not understood; and that we suppose the person, who attempts to translate from a new language, is sufficiently expert in passing from the things signified to the corresponding words of his own language. The power of association is every where conspicuous in these remarks.

3. It follows also, from the foregoing reasoning, that persons who speak the same language cannot always mean the same things by the same words, but must

sometimes mistake each other's meaning. This confusion and uncertainty arise from the different associations transferred upon the same words by the difference in the accidents and events of our lives. It is, however, much more common in discourses concerning abstract matters, where the terms stand for collections of other terms, sometimes at the pleasure of the speaker or writer, than in the common and necessary affairs of life; for here frequent use, and the constancy of the phenomena of nature, intended to be expressed by words, have rendered their sense determinate and certain. However, it seems possible, and even not very difficult, for two truly candid and intelligent persons to understand each other upon any subject.

That we may enter more particularly into the causes of this confusion, and consequently be the better enabled to prevent it, let us consider words according to the four classes above mentioned.

Now, mistakes will happen in words of the first class. viz. such as have ideas only, where the persons have associated these words with different impressions. And the method to rectify any mistake of this kind is, for each person to show with what actual impressions he has associated the word in question. But mistakes here are not common.

In words of the second class, viz. such as have both ideas and definitions, it of ten happens that one person's knowledge is much more full than another's, and consequently his idea and definition much more extensive This must cause a misapprehension on one side, which yet may be easily rectified by recurring to the definition. It happens also sometimes in words of this class, that a man's ideas are not always suitable to his definition; that is, are not the same with those which the words of the definition would excite. If then this person should pretend, or even design, to reason from his definition, and yet reason from his idea, misapprehension will arise in the hearer, who supposes him to reason from his definition merely.

In words of the third class, which have definitions only, and no immediate ideas, mistakes generally arise through want of fixed definitions being mutually acknow ledged and kept to. However, as imperfect fluctuating ideas that have little relation to the definitions are often apt to adhere to the words of this class, mistakes must arise from this cause also.

As to the words of the fourth class, or

those which have neither ideas nor defi nitions, it is easy to ascertain their use, by inserting them in sentences whose import is known and acknowledged, this being the method in which children learn to decipher them; so that mistakes could not arise in the words of this class, did we use moderate care and candour. And, indeed, since children learn the uses of words most evidently without having any data, any fixed point at all, it is to be hoped that philosophers and candid persons may learn at least to understand one another with facility and certainty, and get to the very bottom of the connection between words and ideas.

4. When words have acquired any considerable power of exciting pleasant or painful feelings, by being often associated with such things as do this, they may transfer a part of their pleasures and pains upon different things, by being at other times often associated with such. This is one of the principal sources of the several factitious pleasures and pains of human life. Thus, to give an instance from childhood, the words sweet, good, pretty, fine, &c. on the one hand; and the words bad, ugly, frightful, &c. on the other; being applied by the nurse and attendants in the child's hearing, almost promiscuously, and without those restrictions that are observed in correct speaking, the one set to all the pleasures, the other to all the pains, of the several senses, must by association raise up general pleasant and painful feelings, in which no one part can be distinguished above the rest; and when applied by further associations to objects of a neutral kind, they must transfer a general pleasure or pain upon them.

5. Since words thus collect ideas from various quarters, unite them together, and transfer them, both upon other words and upon foreign objects, it is evident that the use of words adds much to the number and complexity of our ideas, and is the principal means by which we make mental and moral improvement. This is verified abundantly by the observations which are made upon persons born deaf, and continuing so. It is probable, however, that these persons make use of some symbols to assist the memory, and fix the imagination; and they must have a great variety of pleasures and pains transferred upon visible objects, from their associations with one another, and with sensible pleasures of all kinds; but they are very deficient in this, upon the whole, through the want of the associa

tions of visible objects and states of mind, &c. with words. Learning to read must add greatly to their mental improvement; yet still their intellectual capacities cannot but remain very narrow.

Persons blind from birth must proceed in a manner different from that before described, in the first ideas which they affix to words. As the visible ones are wanting, the others, particularly the tangible and audible ones, must compose the aggregates which are annexed to words. However, as they are capable of learning and retaining as great a variety of words as others, and can associate with them pleasures and pains from the four remain ing senses, they fall little or nothing short of others in intellectual accomplishments, and may arrive even at a greater degree of spirituality and abstraction in their complex ideas.

6. Hence it follows, that when children or others, first learn to read, the view of the words excites ideas only by the mediation of their sounds, with which alone their ideas have hitherto been associated. And thus it is that children and illiterate persons best understand what they read by reading aloud. By degrees, the intermediate links being left out, the written or printed characters suggest the ideas directly and instantaneously; so that persons who are much in the habit of reading understand more readily by passing over the words with the eye only; since this method, by being more expeditious, brings the ideas closer together. How. ever, all are peculiarly affected by words pronounced in a manner suitable to their sense and design; which is still an associated influence.

WORKING, in harvest. A person may go abroad to work in harvest, carrying with him a certificate from the minister, and one churchwarden or overseer, that he hath a dwelling-house, or place in which he inhabits, and hath left wife and children, or some of them there, (or otherwise as his condition shall require,) and declaring him an inhabitant there.

WORMS. See VERMES.

WORM, in gunnery, a screw of iron, to be fixed on the end of a rammer, to pull out the wad of a firelock, carbine, or pistol, being the same with the wad-hook, only the one is more proper for small arms, and the other for cannon.

WORM, in chemistry, is a long, winding, pewter pipe, placed in a tub of water, to cool and condense the vapours in the distillation of spirits.

WORM a cable or hawser, in the sea
VOL. XII.

language, is to strengthen it by winding a small line, or rope, all along between the strands.

WORSTED, a kind of woollen thread, which, in the spinning, is twisted harder than ordinary. It is chiefly used, either wove or knit, into stockings, caps, gloves, er the like.

WREATH, in heraldry, a roll of fine linen or silk (like that of a Turkish turban) consisting of the colours borne in the escutcheon, placed in an achievement between the helmet and the crest, and immediately supporting the crest.

WRECK, such goods as, after a shipwreck, are cast upon the land by the sea, and left there within some county; for they are not wrecks so long as they remain at sea, being within the jurisdiction of the Admiralty.

Various statutes have been made relative to wreck, which was formerly a perquisite belonging to the King, or by special grant to the lord of the manor. It is now, however, held, that if proof can be made of the property of any of the goods or lading which come to shore, they shall not be forfeited as wreck.

By the 3 Edward, c. 4. the sheriff of the county shall be bound to keep the goods a year and a day; that if any man can prove a property in them, either in his own right, or by right of representation, they shall be restored to him without delay.

By statute 26 George II. c. 19, plundering any vessel, either in distress or wrecked, and whether any living creature be on board or not, or preventing the escape of any person that endeavours to save his life, or putting out false lights to bring any vessel into danger, are all declared to be capital felonies; and by this statute, pilfering any goods cast ashore is declared to be petty larceny. See INSURANCE salvage.

WREN, (Sir CHRISTOPHER,) in biography, a great philosopher and mathematician, and one of the most learned and eminent architects of his age, was the son of the Rev. Christopher Wren, Dean of Windsor, and was born at Knoyle, in Wiltshire, in 1632. He studied a Wadham College, Oxford, where he took the degree of Master of Arts, in 1653, and was chosen fellow of All Souls College there. Soon after he became one of that ingenious and learned society, who then met at Oxford for the improvement of natural and experimental philosophy, and which at length produced the Royal Society.

M m

When very young, he discovered a surprising genius for the mathematics, in which science he made great advances before he was sixteen years of age. In 1657 he was made professor of astronomy in Gresham College, London; and his lectures, which were much frequented, tended greatly to the promotion of real knowledge. He proposed several me. thods, by which to account for the shadows returning backward ten degrees on the dial of King Ahaz, by the laws of nature. One subject of his lectures was upon telescopes, to the improvement of which he had greatly contributed: another was on certain properties of the air and the barometer. In the year 1658 he read a description of the body and different phases of the planet Saturn; which subject he proposed to investigate, while his colleague, Mr. Rook, then professor of geometry, was carrying on his observations upon the satellites of Jupiter. The same year he communicated some demonstrations concerning cycloids to Dr. Wallis, which were afterwards published by the Doctor at the end of his treatise upon that subject. About that time also he resolved the problem proposed by Pascal, under the feigned name of John de Montford, to all the English mathematicians; and returned another to the mathematicians in France, formerly proposed by Kepler, and then resolved likewise by himself, to which they never gave any solution. In 1660, he invented a method for the construction of solar eclipses; and in the latter part of the same year, he, with ten other gentlemen, formed themselves into a society, to meet weekly, for the improvement of natural and experimental philosophy; being the foundation of the Royal Society. In the beginning of 1661, he was chosen Savilian professor of astronomy at Oxford, in the room of Dr. Seth Ward; where he was the same year created Doctor of Laws.

Among his other accomplishments, Dr. Wren had gained so considerable a skill in architecture, that he was sent for the same year from Oxford, by order of King Charles the Second, to assist Sir John Denham, surveyor-general of the works. In 1663 he was chosen fellow of the Royal Society, being one of those who were first appointed by the council after the grant of their charter. Not long after, it being expected that the King would make the Society a visit, the Lord Brounker, then president, by a letter, requested the advice of Dr. Wren, concerning the experiments which might be most proper

on that occasion: to whom the Doctor recommended principally the Torricellian experiment, and the weather needle, as being not mere amusements, but useful, and also neat in their operation.

In 1665 he travelled into France, to examine the most beautiful edifices and curious mechanical works there, when he made many useful observations. Upon his return home he was appointed architect, and one of the commissioners for repairing St. Paul's cathedral. Within a few days after the fire of London, 1666, he drew a plan for a new city, and presented it to the King; but it was not approved by the Parliament. In this model the chief streets were to cross each other at right angles, with lesser streets between them; the churches, public buildings, &c. so disposed, as not to interfere with the streets, and four piazzas, placed at proper distances. Upon the death of Sir John Denham, in 1668, he succeeded him in the office of surveyor-general of the King's works, and from this time he had the direction of a great many public edifices, by which he acquired the highest reputation. He built the magnificent theatre at Oxford, St. Paul's cathedral, the monument, the modern part of Hampton Court, Chelsea College, one of the wings of Greenwich Hospital, the churches of St. Stephen Walbrook, and St. Mary-le-Bow, with upwards of sixty other churches and public works, which that dreadful fire made necessary; in the management of which business he was assisted in the measurements, and laying out of private property, by the ingenious Dr. Robert Hook. The variety of business in which he was by this means engaged requiring his constant attendance and concern, he resigned his Savilian professorship at Oxford in 1673, and the year following he received from the King the honour of knighthood. He was one of the commissioners, who, on the motion of Sir Jonas Moore, surveyor-general of the ordnance, had been appointed to find out a proper place for erecting an observatory, and he proposed Greenwich, which was approved of; the foundation-stone of which was laid the tenth of August, 1675, and the building was presently finished, under the direction of Sir Jonas, with the advice and assistance of Sir Christopher.

In 1680 he was chosen president of the Royal Society; afterwards appointed architect and commissioner of Chelsea College; and in 1684, principal officer or comptroller of the works in Windsor castle. Sir Christopher sat twice in Par

liament, as a representative for two dif ferent boroughs. While he continued surveyor-general, his residence was in Scotland-yard; but after his removal from that office, in 1718, he lived in St. James's street, Westminster. He died the twenty-fifth of February, 1723, at ninety-one years of age; and he was interred with great solemnity in St. Paul's Cathedral, in the vault under the south wing of the choir, near the east end.

WRIGHT, (EDWARD,) in biography, a noted English mathematician, who flourished in the latter part of the sixteenth century, and beginning of the seventeenth. He was contemporary with Mr. Briggs, and much concerned with him in the business of the logarithms, the short time they were published before his death. He also contributed greatly to the improvement of navigation and astronomy. He was the first undertaker of that difficult but useful work, by which a little river is brought from the town of Ware in a new canal, to supply the city of London with water; but by the manœuvres of others he was hindered from completing the work he had begun. For the improvement of the art of navigation he was appointed mathematical lecturer by the East India Company, and read lectures in the house of that worthy knight, Sir Thomas Smith, for which he had a yearly salary of fifty pounds. This office he discharged with great reputation, and much to the satisfaction of his hearers. He published in English a book on the Doctrine of the Sphere, which is very scarce and dear, and another concerning the construction of sun-dials. He also prefixed an ingenious preface to the learned Gilbert's book on the load-stone. He published other works, and died in the year 1615.

WRIT, is the King's precept, whereby any thing is commanded touching a suit or action; as the defendant or tenant to be summoned, a distress to be taken, a disseisin to be redressed, &c. And these writs are diversely divided; some, in respect of their order or manner of granting, are termed original, and some judicial.

Original writs are those that are sent out for the summoning of the defendant in a personal, or the tenant in a real action, before the suit begins, or rather to begin the suit.

The judicial writs are those which are sent out, by order of the court where the cause depends, upon occasion, after the suit begins.

Original writs are issued out of the

Court of Chancery, for the summoning a defendant to appear, and are granted before the suit is begun, to begin the same: and judicial writs issue out of the court where the original is returned, after the suit is begun. The originals bear date in the name of the King, but the judicial writs bear teste in the name of the chief justice.

WRIT of inquiry of damages, a judicial writ that issues out to the sheriff, upon a judgment by default, in action of the case, covenant, trespass, trover, &c. commanding him to summon a jury to inquire what damages the plaintiff has sustained occasione præmissorum: and when this is returned with the inquisition, the rule for judgment is given upon it, and if nothing be said to the contrary, judgment is thereupon entered.

A writ of inquiry of damages is a mere inquest of office, to inform the conscience of the court; who, if they please, may themselves assess the damages. And it is accordingly the practice in actions upon promissory notes and bills of exchange, instead of executing a writ of inquiry, to apply to the court for a rule to show cause why it should not be referred to the master, to see what is due for principal and interest, and why final judgment should not be signed for that sum, without executing a writ of inquiry: which rule is made absolute on an affidavit of service, unless good cause be shown to the contrary.

WRITER of the tallies, an officer of the Exchequer, being clerk to the auditor of the receipt, who writes upon the tallies the whole letters of the teller's bill. See the articles TALLY, EXCHEQUER, &C.

WRITING, origin of alphabetical. The history of the origin and progress of writ ten languages is, in most of its stages, less enveloped in obscurity than that of oral language. Difficulties attend it in common with every inquiry into antiquity; but the data are more numerous and progressive than the fleeting nature of audible signs would admit. The rudiments of the art of writing are very simple; its advances towards the present state of improvement slow and gradual. Visible language first used marks as the signs of things; and we can trace it through all its stages, from the simple picture, to the arbitrary mark for the elements of sound.

The rudest species of visible communication was, the variously coloured knotted cords of the Peruvians, called the quipos. They have been represented by