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A28982
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A free enquiry into the vulgarly receiv'd notion of nature made in an essay address'd to a friend / by R.B., Fellow of the Royal Society.
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Boyle, Robert, 1627-1691.
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1686
(1686)
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Wing B3979; ESTC R11778
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140,528
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442
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account as they think of Religion against the care I take to decline the frequent use of that Word Nature in the Vulgar Notion of it Reserving to another and fitter place some other things that may relate to the Theological scruples if any occur to me that our Free Inquiry may occasion The Philosophical Reason that inclines me to forbear as much as conveniently I can the frequent use of the Word Nature and the Forms of Speech that are deriv'd from it is That 't is a Term of great Ambiguity On which score I have observ'd that being frequently and unwarily imploy'd it has occasion'd much darkness and confusion in many Mens Writings and Discourses And I little doubt but that others would make the like Observations if early Prejudices and universal Custom did not keep them from taking notice of it Nor do I think my self oblig'd by the just Veneration I owe and pay Religion to make use of a Term so inconvenient to Philosophy For I do not find that for many Ages the Israelites that then were the only People and Church of God made use of the Word Nature in the Vulgar Notion of it Moses in the whole History of the Creation where it had been so proper to bring in this first of second Causes has not a word of Nature And whereas Philosophers presume that she by her Plastick Power and Skill forms Plants and Animals out of the Universal Matter the Divine Historian ascribes the Formation of them to Gods immediate Fiat Gen. i. 11. And God said let the Earth bring forth Grass and the Herb yielding Seed and the Fruit tree yielding Fruit after his kind c. And again Vers. 24 God said Let the Earth bring forth the living Creature after its kind c. Vers. 25 And God without any mention of Nature made the Beast of the Earth after his kind And I do not remember that in the Old Testament I have met with any one Hebrew word that properly signifies Nature in the sense we take it in And it seems that our English Translators of the Bible were not more fortunate in that than I for having purposely consulted a late Concordance I found not that Word Nature in any Text of the Old Testament So likewise though Iob David and Solomon and other Israelitish Writers do on divers occasions many times mention the Corporeal Works of God yet they do not take notice of Nature which our Philosophers would have his great Vicegerent in what relates to them To which perhaps it may not be impertinent to add that though the late famous Rabbi Menasseh Ben Israel has purposely written a Book of numerous Problems touching the Creation yet I do not remember that he imploys the Word Nature in the receiv'd Notion of it to give an account of any of Gods Mundane Creatures And when St. Paul himself who was no stranger to the Heathen Learning writing to the Corinthians who were Greeks speaks of the Production of Corn out of Seed sown he does not attribute the produc'd Body to Nature but when he had spoken of a grain of Wheat or some other seed put into the ground he adds that God gives it such a Body as he pleaseth and to every seed it s own Body i. e. the Body belonging to its kind And a greater than St. Paul speaking of the gaudiness of the Lillies or as some will have it Tulips uses this Expression If God so cloath the grass of the Field c. Matt. vi 28 29 30. The Celebrations that David Iob and other Holy Hebrews mention'd in the Old Testament make an occasion of the admirable Works they contemplated in the Universe are address'd directly to God himself without taking notice of Nature Of this I could multiply Instances but shall here for brevity's sake be contented to name a few taken from the Book of Psalms alone In the hundredth of those Hymns the Penman of it makes this That God has made us the ground of an Exhortation To enter into his Gates with Thanksgiving and into his Courts with Praise Psal. lxxix 34. And in another Let the Heaven and Earth praise God that is give Men ground and occasion to Praise Him congruously to what David elsewhere says to the Great Creator of the Universe All thy work 's shall praise thee O Lord and thy Saints shall bless thee Psal. cxlv 10. And in another of the Sacred Hymns the same Royal Poet says to his Maker Thou hast cover'd me in my Mothers womb I will praise thee for I am fearfully and wonderfully made marvellous are thy works and that my soul knoweth right well Psal. cxxxix 13 14. I have sometimes doubted whether one may not on this occasion add that if Men will need takes in a Being subordinate to God for the management of the World it seems more consonant to the Holy Scripture to depute Angels to that charge than Nature For I consider that as to the Coelestial Part of the Universe in comparison of which the Sublunary is not perhaps the ten-thousandth part both the Heathen Aristotelian's and the School Philosophers among the Christians teach the Coelestial Orbs to be moved or guided by Intelligences or Angels And as to the lower or sublunary World besides that the Holy Writings teach us that Angels have been often imploy'd by God for the Government of Kingdoms as is evident out of the Book of Daniel and the Welfare and Punishment of particular Persons one of those Glorious Spirits is in the Apocalypse expresly styl'd the Angel of the Waters Which Title divers Learned Interpreters think to be given him because of his Charge or Office to oversee and preserve the Waters And I remember that in the same Book there is mention made of an Angel that had Power Authority or Iurisdiction 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 over the Fire And though the Excellent Grotius gives another conjecture of the Title given the Angel of the Waters yet in his Notes upon the next Verse save one he teaches That there was an Angel appointed to preserve the Souls that were kept under the Altar there-mention'd And if we take the Angel of the Waters to be the Guardian or Conserver of them perhaps as the Romans in whose Empire St. Iohn wrote had special Officers to look to their Aqueducts and other Waters it may not be amiss to observe upon the by that he is introduc'd Praising his and his fellow-Spirits Great Creator Which is an Act of Religion that for ought I know none of the Naturists whether Pagan or even Christians ever mention'd their Nature to have perform'd I know it may on this occasion be alledg'd that subordinata non pugnant and Nature being God's Vicegerent her Works are indeed his But that he has such a Vicegerent it is one of the main businesses of this Discourse to call in Question and till the Affirmative be solidly prov'd nay and tho' it were so I hope I shall be excus'd if with
Lustres ago and that not long after the Youth to whom I dictated it having been inveigled to steal away unknown to me or his Parents into the Indies whence we never heard of him since left the loose Sheets wherein and not in a Book my thoughts had been committed to Paper very incoherent by the Omission of divers necessary Passages Upon which Account and my Unwillingness to take the Pains to supply what was wanting those Papers lay by me many Years together neglected and almost forgotten 'till the Curiosity of some Philosophical Heads that were pleas'd to think they deserv'd another Fate oblig'd me to tack them together and make up the Gaps that remain'd between their Parts by retrieving as well as after so many Years my bad Memory was able to do the Thoughts I sometimes had pertinent to those purposes And indeed when I consider'd of how vast importance it is in Philosophy and the Practice of Physick too to have a right Notion of Nature and how little the Authority of the generality of Men ought in so nice and intricate a Subject to sway a free and impartial Spirit as I at first thought myself oblig'd since others had not sav'd me the labour to make a Free Enquiry into this Noble and Difficult Subject so I was afterwards the more easily prevail'd with by those that press'd the Publication of it With what Success I have made this Attempt I must leave others to judg But if I be not much flatter'd whatever becomes of the main Attempt there will be found suggested here and there in the following Discourse some Reflections and Explications that will at least oblige the zealous Assertors of the Vulgar Notion of Nature to clear up the Doctrine and speak more distinctly and correctly about Things that relate to it than hitherto has been usual And that will be Fruit enough to recompense the Labour and justifie the Title of a Free Enquiry In Prosecution of which since I have been oblig'd to travel in an untrodden Way without a Guide 't will be thought I hope more pardonable than strange if in attempting to discover divers general Mistakes I be not so happy as to escape falling into some particular Ones myself And if among These I have been so unhappy as to make any that is injurious to Religion as I did not at all intend it so as soon as ever I shall discover it I shall freely disown it Myself and pray that it may never mislead Others What my Performance has been I have already acknowledg'd that I may be unfit to judg but for my Intentions I may make bold to say they were to keep the Glory of the Divine Author of Things from being usurp'd or intrench'd upon by His Creatures and to make His Works more throughly and solidly understood by the Philosophical Studiers of Them I do not pretend and I need not that every one of the Arguments I employ in the following Tract is cogent especially if consider'd as single For Demonstrative Arguments would be unsuitable to the very Title of my Attempt since if about the Receiv'd Notion of Nature I were furnish'd with unanswerable Reasons my Discourse ought to be styl'd not a Free Enquiry into the Vulgar Notion of Nature I consider but a Confutation of It. And a heap of bare Probabilities may suffice to justifie a Doubt of the Truth of an Opinion which they cannot clearly evince to be False And therefore if any Man shall think fit to Criticize upon the less Principal or less necessary Parts of this Treatise perhaps I shall not think my self oblig'd to be concern'd at It. And even if the main Body of the Discourse itself shall be attack'd from the Press I who am neither Young nor Healthy nor ever made Divinity Philosophy or Physick my Profession am not like to oppose him in the same Way Since as I ought not to wish that any Errors of mine if this Essay teach any Such should prevail so if the Things I have deliver'd be True for the Main I need not despair but that in such a Free and Inquisitive Age as Ours there will be found Generous Spirits that will not suffer weighty Truths to be oppress'd tho' the Proposers of them should by averseness from Contention or by want of Time or Health be themselves kept from defending them Which I have thought fit to take Notice of in this Place that the Truth if I have been so happy as to have found and taught It may not suffer by my Silence nor any Reader surmize that if I shall leave a Book Unanswered I thereby acknowledg it to be Unanswerable But This regards only the main Substance of our Essay not the Order or Disposition of the Parts Since if any shall censure That I shall not quarrel with him about It. For indeed considering in how preposterous an Order the Papers I have here tack'd together came to Hand and how many Things are upon that score unduly plac'd I shall not only be content but must desire to have this Rhapsody of my own loose Papers look'd upon but as an Apparatus or Collection of Materials in order to what I well know this maim'd and confus'd Essay is not a compleat and regular Discourse Yet to conclude I thought that the affording even of a little Light in a Subject so Dark and so very Important might keep an Essay from being useless and that to fall short of Demonstration would prove a pardonable Fault in a Discourse that pretends not to Dogmatize but only to make an Enquiry Sept. 29 1682. A Free Enquiry Into the Received NOTION OF NATURE SECT I. I Know not Whether or no it be a Prerogative in the human Soul that as 't is itself a True and Positive Being so 't is apt to conceive all other things as True and Positive Beings also But Whether or no this Propensity to frame such kind of Idea's suppose an excellency I fear it occasions mistakes and makes us think and speak after the manner of True and Positive Beings of such things as are but Chimerical and some of them Negations or Privations themselves as Death Ignorance Blindness and the like It concerns us therefore to stand very carefully upon our Guard that we be not insensibly misled by such an innate and unheeded Temptation to error as we bring into the World with us And consequently I may be allowed to consider whether among other Particulars in which this deluding Propensity of our minds has too great though unsuspected an Influence upon us it may not have impos'd on us in the Notion we are wont to frame concerning Nature For this being the fruitful Parent of other Notions as Nature herself is said to be of the Creatures of the Universe the Notion is so general in its Applications and so important in its Influence that we had need be jealously careful of not over-easily admitting a Notion than which there can scarce be any that more deserves to be warily