Page:Reflections upon ancient and modern learning (IA b3032449x).pdf/286

 ledges to be anciently unknown (b); which is more, indeed, than what some do (c), who, at the same Time, make our Fore-fathers to have been extreamly stupid, that could suffer such a Discovery to be ever lost. So that all that can be said of the Advances which, by the Uses of the Load-stone, have been made in several Parts of Learning, do not in the least affect Sir William Temple. However, I shall mention some of the greatest, because he charges the Moderns with not making all the Uses of so noble an Invention; which he supposes the Ancient Greeks and Romans would have made, had it fallen into their Hands: Which makes him assert, that the Discoveries hereby made in remote Countries have been rather pursued to accumulate Wealth (d), than to increase Knowledge. Now, if both these can be done at once, there is no Harm done: And since there is no Dispute of the one, I think it will be an easie Matter to prove the other. I shall name but a few Particulars, most of them rather belonging to another Head.

Geography therefore was anciently a very imperfect Study, for want of this