We may with as little reproach
borrow science as manufactures from our ancestors; and it is as rational
to live in caves till our own hands have erected a palace, as to reject
all knowledge of architecture which our understandings will not supply.
To the strongest and quickest mind it is far easier to learn than to
invent. The principles of arithmetick and geometry may be comprehended
by a close attention in a few days; yet who can flatter himself that the
study of a long life would have enabled him to discover them, when he
sees them yet unknown to so many nations, whom he cannot suppose less
liberally endowed with natural reason, than the Grecians or Egyptians?
Every science was thus far advanced towards perfection, by the emulous
diligence of contemporary students, and the gradual discoveries of one
age improving on another. Sometimes unexpected flashes of instruction
were struck out by the fortuitous collision of happy incidents, or an
involuntary concurrence of ideas, in which the philosopher to whom they
happened had no other merit than that of knowing their value, and
transmitting, unclouded, to posterity, that light which had been kindled
by causes out of his power. The happiness of these casual illuminations
no man can promise to himself, because no endeavours can procure them;
and therefore whatever be our abilities or application, we must submit
to learn from others what perhaps would have lain hid for ever from
human penetration, had not some remote inquiry brought it to view; as
treasures are thrown up by the ploughman and the digger in the rude
exercise of their common occupations.
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