140. To which I answer, we can no more argue a visible and tangible
square to be of the same species from their being called by the same
name, than we can that a tangible square and the monosyllable consisting
of six letters whereby it is marked are of the same species because they
are both called by the same name. It is customary to call written words
and the things they signify by the same name: for words not being
regarded in their own nature, or otherwise than as they are marks of
things, it had been superfluous, and beside the design of language, to
have given them names distinct from those of the things marked by them.
The same reason holds here also. Visible figures are the marks of
tangible figures, and from sect. 59 it is plain that in themselves they
are little regarded, or upon any other score than for their connexion
with tangible figures, which by nature they are ordained to signify. And
because this language of nature doth not vary in different ages or
nations, hence it is that in all times and places visible figures are
called by the same names as the respective tangible figures suggested by
them, and not because they are alike or of the same sort with them.
141. But, say you, surely a tangible square is liker to a visible square
than to a visible circle: it has four angles and as many sides: so also
has the visible square: but the visible circle has no such thing, being
bounded by one uniform curve without right lines or angles, which makes
it unfit to represent the tangible square but very fit to represent the
tangible circle.
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