==================       Principle Ten

If the mind is to become skillful, it must seek out (and enjoy seeking out, be eager to seek out) what others have already discovered. It must also systematically survey even the most minute results of human art, but primarily those results that presuppose a certain order. I confess that I was born with a mind that has always found its greatest pleasure in research not by listening to others' explanations, but by discovering these truths through my own diligent efforts. This alone led me to study science when I was still young, so whenever the title of a book suggested new revelations, I would, without delving deeply into it, immediately try to see if, by virtue of some natural ingenuity given to me, I could perhaps achieve a similar result. I was careful not to rush through it, lest I spoil my innocent pleasure. This approach often succeeded, so much so that I eventually discovered that, by relying on confused and blind inquiry, as others often do, preferring luck over skill, I could not discover the truth of things any more than others. At the same time, I also found that it was only through long experience that I became aware of certain definite principles that helped me greatly, and by applying them, I eventually conceived of several other principles. My entire method was thus carefully cultivated, and I have always believed that from the very beginning, I followed the most useful of all research methods. However, not everyone's mind is naturally inclined to use its own tools to investigate things. Therefore, this proposition teaches that one should not immediately examine very difficult and arduous matters, but should instead begin by understanding all the most minute and simplest arts, especially those that are most orderly. For example, the skills of artisans who weave canvas and carpets, the skills of embroiderers, or the skills of women who weave warp and weft to create endless patterns, as well as all numerical calculations and everything related to arithmetic. It is truly astonishing how much all of this can train the mind, provided we do not borrow others' inventions but invent and create ourselves! In this way, nothing will be hidden from us, everything can adapt to the human capacity for knowledge, and we can clearly see an infinite number of orders of things, which, though different from each other, are very regular. The ingenuity of the human mind lies almost entirely in strictly adhering to these orders. Therefore, as already indicated, these problems must be studied systematically. System, in less important matters, usually refers only to consistently following a certain order: either an order inherent in the things themselves, or an order skillfully constructed by our thought.