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A28944 Certain physiological essays and other tracts written at distant times, and on several occasions by the honourable Robert Boyle ; wherein some of the tracts are enlarged by experiments and the work is increased by the addition of a discourse about the absolute rest in bodies. Boyle, Robert, 1627-1691. 1669 (1669) Wing B3930; ESTC R17579 210,565 356

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of the way of Philosophizing my friends esteem'd I thought I might without a more particular and explicit Enquiry into it say something to illustrate some Notions of it by making choice of such as being of the more simple and obvious did not require skill in the more mysterious points of the Hypothesis they belong'd to And as for the last of the three Discouragements above mention'd I consider'd that the Atomical Cartesian Hypotheses though they differ'd in some material points from one another yet in opposition to the Peripatetick and other vulgar Doctrines they might be look'd upon as one Philosophy For they agree with one another and differ from the Schools in this grand fundamental point that not only they take care to explicate things intelligibly but that whereas those other Philosophers give only a general and superficial account of the Phaenomena of Nature from certain substantial Forms which the most ingenious among themselves confess to be Incomprehensible and certain real Qualities which knowing men of other Perswasions think to be likewise Vnintelligible both the Cartesians and the Atomists explicate the same Phaenomena by little Bodies variously figur'd and mov'd I know that these two Sects of Modern Naturalists disagree about the Notion of Body in general and consequently about the Possibility of a true Vacuum as also about the Origine of Motion the indefinite Divisibleness of Matter and some other points of less Importance than these But in regard that some of them seem to be rather Metaphysical than Physiological Notions and that some others seem rather to be requisite to the Explication of the first Origine of the Vniverse than of the Phaenomena of it in the state wherein we now find it in regard of these I say and some other Considerations and especially for this Reason That both parties agree in deducing all the Phaenomena of Nature from Matter and local Motion I esteem'd that notwithstanding these things wherein the Atomists and the Cartesians differ'd they might be thought to agree in the main and their Hypotheses might by a Person of a reconciling Disposition be look'd on as upon the matter one Philosophy Which because it explicates things by Corpuscles or minute Bodie● may not very unfitly be call'd Corpuscular though I sometimes style it the Phoenician Philosophy because some ancient Writers inform us that not only before Epicurus and Democritus but ev'n before Leucippus taught in Greece a Phoenician Naturalist was wont to give an account of the Phaenomena of Nature by the Motion and other Affections of the minute Particles of Matter Which because they are obvious and very powerful in Mechanical Engines I sometimes also term it the Mechanical Hypothesis or Philosophy By such considerations then and by this occasion I was invited to try whether without pretending to determine the above-mention'd controverted points I could by the help of the Corpuscular Philosophy in the sense newly given of that Appellation associated with Chymical Experiments explicate some particular Subjects more intelligibly than they are wont to be accounted for either by the Schools or the Chymists And how●ver since the vulgar Philosophy is yet so vulgar that it is still in great request with the Generality of Scholars and since the Mechanical Philosophers have brought so few Experiments to verifie their Assertions and the Chymists are thought to have brought so many on the behalf of theirs that of those that have quitted the unsatisfactory Philosophy of the Schools the greater Number dazl'd as it were by the Experiments of Spagyrists have imbrac'd their Doctrines instead of those they deserted For these Reasons I say I hop'd I might at least do no unseasonable piece of service to the Corpuscular Philosophers by illustrating some of their Notions with sensible Experiments and manifesting that the things by me treated of may be at least plausibly explicated without having recourse to inexplicable forms real Qualities the four Peripatetick Elements or so much as the three Chymical Principles Being once resolv'd to write some such Specimina as I formerly judg'd requisite I soon bethought my self of the Experiment hereafter deliver'd concerning Salt-Petre divers of whose Phaenomena I did also as time would permit cast into one of the Essays I was then engag'd to write to a Friend And having dispatch'd that little Treatise it found so favourable a Reception among those Learned Men into whose hands it came that I was much encourag'd to illustrate some more of the Doctrines of the Corpuscular Philsosophy by some of the Experiments wherewith my Furnaces had suppli●d me which also as occasion serv'd I did partly by writing some Physico-Chymical Treatises and partly by making such large Notes on the Essay concerning Salt-Petre as might plentifully contribute to the History of Qualities of which I had sometimes thoughts And this continu'd till in the year before the last the publick Confusions in this then unhappy Kingdom reducing me to quit my former Design together with the place where my Furnaces my Books and my other Accommodations were I fell afterwards upon the making of Pneumatical tryals whereof I lately ventur'd to give the Publick an account in a Book of New Experiments Physo-mechanical about the Air. I should not trouble the Reader with so prolix a Preface to such small Treatises as those whereto this is prefix'd but for these two Reasons The one that I hope the fore-going Narrative will make me be the more favourably judg'd by the Philosophers I desire to serve if sometimes I write less skilfully of their Opinions than perhaps I should have done had I allow'd my self to search into them And the other that I am earnestly sollicited to publish some other Tracts tending to the same purpose that these do to which also should I ever be induc'd by the Reception these may meet with to trouble the World with them the same Preface as it is now penn'd may serve for an Introduction I had almost forgot to take notice That whereas at the end of the Essay concerning Salt-Petre I mention'd a then newly-publish'd Treatise of the laborious Glauber's which I had not then perus'd I found it to contain some Observations concerning the History of Salt-Petre which if they be true are considerable enough I must again recōmend the examination of them to the Readers Curiosity having been hinder'd by divers Avocations from saving him that labour my self And whereas also some years after I was inform'd of another little Book he had put out since the former wherein he teaches us a way of purifying Salt-Petre to make a Conjunction of the spirituous and fixter parts of it and then to suffer the Mixture to evaporate and so crystallize into Nitre This would I confess have made me apprehensive of passing for a Plagiary with those that did not know me but that it was easie for me to clear my self by the Testimony of very Learned Men who had some years before perus'd my Treatise and especially of one person