It would possibly be thought
a bold paradox, if not a very dangerous falsehood, if I should say
that some changelings, who have lived forty years together, without
any appearance of reason, are something between a man and a beast:
which prejudice is founded upon nothing else but a false
supposition, that these two names, man and beast, stand for distinct
species so set out by real essences, that there can come no other
species between them: whereas if we will abstract from those names,
and the supposition of such specific essences made by nature,
wherein all things of the same denominations did exactly and equally
partake; if we would not fancy that there were a certain number of
these essences, wherein all things, as in moulds, were cast and
formed; we should find that the idea of the shape, motion, and life of
a man without reason, is as much a distinct idea, and makes as much
a distinct sort of things from man and beast, as the idea of the shape
of an ass with reason would be different from either that of man or
beast, and be a species of an animal between, or distinct from both.
14. Objection against a changeling being something between a man and
beast, answered. Here everybody will be ready to ask, If changelings
may be supposed something between man and beast, pray what are they? I
answer, changelings; which is as good a word to signify something
different from the signification of man or beast, as the names man and
beast are to have significations different one from the other.
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