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Words are the signes of things

It being to signifie that they were instituted at first

Nor can they be as such directed to any other end

Whether they be articulate or inarticulate

All things are either real or rational

And the real either natural or artificial

There ought to be a proportion betwixt

The signe and thing signified

Therefore should all things whether real or rational

Have their proper words assigned unto them

Man is called a Microcosme

Because he may by his conceptions and words

Containe within him the representatives

Of what in the whole world is comprehended

Seeing there is in nature such affinity

Twixt words and things as there ought to be

In whatever is ordained for one another

Arts Sciences Mechanick Trades notional Faculties

And whatever is excogita∣ble by man have their own method

By vertue whereof the Learned of these latter times

Have orderly digested them yet hath none hitherto

Considered of a mark whereby words of the same

Faculty Art Trade or Science should be dignosced

From those of another by the very sound of the word at the first hearing

A Tree will be known by its leaves

A Stone by its grit

Musick by the ear

Colours by the eye

The several Natures of things

With their properties and essential qualities

By the Intellect and accordingly

As the things are in themselves diversified

The Judicious and Learned man after he hath conceived them alright

Sequestreth them in the several cells of his Understanding

Each in their definite and respective places

But in matter of the words whereby those things are expressed

No Language ever hitherto framed hath observed

Any order relating to the thing signified by them

For if the words be ranked in their Alphabetical series

The things represented by them will fall to be in several predicaments

And if the things themselves be categorically classed

The word whereby they are made known

Will not be tyed to any Alphabetical rule

This is an imperfection incident to all the Languages