I am apt to think there are far more than at the first mention of them one would imagine And to this kind of Beings the Expressions that Naturists do on divers occasions imploy incline me to think that what is call'd Nature has a great Affinity at least in reference to those Occasions On which Supposition one may conceive that as when 't is said that Health makes a Man Eat well Digest well Sleep well c. Considering Men do not look upon Health as a Distinct and Separate Cause of these Effects but as what we lately call'd a Compounded Accident that is a Complex of all the Real and Genuine Causes of good Appetite Digestion Sleep c. insomuch that Health is not so properly the Cause of these as their Effect or Result So in divers Things that Nature is said to do we need conceive no more than that the Effects are produc'd by Physical Bodies and Qualities or other proper Causes which when we consider as conspiring or rather concurring to produce the same Effect by a Compendious Term we call Nature By these and the like ways of Interpretation I thought fit to try whether I could give an Intelligible and Commodious sense to divers of the Maxims or Sentences and other Forms of Speech that are imploy'd by those that on many Occasions and in differing Expressions say That Nature does this or that and acts thus and thus But I confess that to clear all those ambiguous and unskilfully fram'd Axioms and Phrases I found to be so intricate and difficult a Task that for want of Time and perhaps too of Patience I grew weary before I had prosecuted it to the utmost For which Reason though 't is not improbable that some Light may be given in this dark Subject by what I have been now saying as immature and unfinish'd as it is especially if it be reflected on in Conjunction with what hath been formerly deliver'd in the Fourth Section about Nature General and Particular yet I shall at present make but very little use of the Things that have been now said in expounding the Axioms I am particularly to consider in this Seventh Section hoping that I may by the help of other Mediums dispatch my Work without them And to do it the more easily I shall without tying myself to the Order wherein they are marshall'd after the beginning of the Fourth Section treat of them in the Order wherein I think their Explications may give most Light to one another or in That wherein the Papers that belong'd to them were retriev'd The first of the receiv'd Axioms I shall consider is that which pronounces that Omnis Natura est conservatrix sui where by the Word Nature I suppose they understand a Natural Body for otherwise I know not what they meant Now this Axiom easily admits of a twofold Interpretation For either it may signifie no more than that no one Body does tend to its own Destruction that is to destroy Itself Or else that in every Body there is a Principle call'd Nature upon whose Score the Body is vigilant and industrious to preserve Its Natural State and to defend Itself from the Violence and Attempts of all other Bodies that oppugn It or endeavour to destroy or harm It. In the former of these two Senses the Axiom may be admitted without any prejudice to our Doctrine For since according to our Hypothesis Inanimate Bodies can have neither Appetites nor Hatreds nor Designs which are all of them Affections not of Bruit Matter but of Intelligent Beings I that think Inanimate Bodies have no Appetites at all may easily grant that they have not any to destroy themselves But according to the other Sense of the propos'd Axiom 't will import that every Body has within itself a Principle whereby it does desire and with all its Power endeavour to compass its own Preservation And both to do those things that tend thereunto and oppose all endeavours that outward Agents or internal Distempers may use in order to the Destruction of It. And as this is the most Vulgar Sense of this Axiom so 't is chiefly in this Sense that I am concern'd to Examine It. I conceive then that the most Wise Creator of Things did at first so frame the World and settle such Laws of Motion between the Bodies that as Parts compose It that by the Assistence of his General Concourse the Parts of the Universe especially those that are the Greater and the more Noble are lodg'd in such Places and furnish'd with such Powers that by the help of his general Providence they may have their Beings continued and maintained as long and as far forth as the Course he thought fit to establish amongst Things Corporeal requires Upon this Supposition which is but a reasonable one there will appear no necessity to have any recourse for the Preservation of particular Bodies to such an Internal Appetite and Inbred Knowledg in each of them as our Adversaries presume Since by virtue of the Original Frame of Things and established Laws of Motion Bodies are necessarily determined to act on such Occasions after the Manner they would do if they had really an Aim at Self-preservation As you see that if a blown Bladder be compress'd and thereby the included Air be forc'd out of its wonted Dimensions and Figure it will uncessantly endeavour to throw off and repel that which offers Violence unto It and first displace that Part of the compressing Body that it finds Weakest though in all this there be no Appetite in the Air as I elswhere shew no more than in the Bladder to that particular Figure to maintain itself in which it seems so concern'd Thus 't is all one to a â—lump of Dough whether you make it into a round Loaf or a long Rowl or a flat Cake or give it any other Form For whatever Figure your Hands or your Instruments leave in It that it will retain without having any Appetite to return to that which it last had So 't is all one to a piece of Wax whether your Seal Imprints on It the Figure of a Wolf or that of a Lamb. And for Brevity's sake to pass by the Instances that might be drawn from what happens to Wood and Marble and Metals as they are differently shap'd by the Statuaries Art and Tools I will only observe that the Mariner's Needle before it is excited may have no particular Propensity to have respect to one Part of Heaven more than another but when it has been duly touch'd upon a Load-stone the Flwer-de-Luce will be determin'd to regard the North and the opposite Extream the South So that if the Lilly be drawn aside towards the East or towards the West as soon as the Force that detain'd it is remov'd it will return to its former Position and never rest 'till it regard the North. But in spight of this seeming Affection of the Lilly to that Point of the Horizon yet if the Needle be duly
by a Watchful Being call'd Nature and that she abhors a vacuum and consequently is still in a readiness to do irresistibly whatever is necessary to prevent it Nor must we expect any great Progress in the discovery of the true Causes of natural Effects whilst we are content to sit down with other than the particular and immediate ones 'T is not that I deny that there are divers things as the number and situation of the Stars the shapes and sizes of Animals c. About which even a Philosopher being ask'd can say little but that it pleased the Author of the Universe to make them so but when we give such general Answers we pretend not to give the particular Physical Reasons of the things propos'd but do in effect confess we do not know them To this I add that the veneration wherewith Men are imbued for what they call Nature has been a discouraging impediment to the Empire of Man over the inferior Creatures of God For many have not only look'd upon it as an impossible thing to compass but as something of impious to attempt the removing of those Boundaries which Nature seems to have put and setled among her Productions And whilst they look upon her as such a venerable thing some make a kind of scruple of Conscience to endeavour so to emulate any of her Works as to excel them I have staid so long about removing the first of the two scruples I formerly propos'd against my present attempt that not to tire your Patience I shall in few words dispatch the second which is That I venture to contradict the sense of the generality of Mankind To which I answer That in Philosophical Inquiries it becomes not a Naturalist to be so solicitous what has been or is believ'd as what ought to be so and I have also elsewhere on another occasion shew'd how little the sense of the generality of Men ought to sway us in some Questions But that which I shall at present more directly reply is First That 't is no wonder Men should be generally prepossest with such a Notion of Nature as I call in question since Education especially in the Schools has imbued them with it from their Infancy and even in their maturer years they find it taken for granted and imployed not only by the Most but by the Learnedst Writers and never hear it call'd in question by any and then it exceedingly complies with our Innate Propensity to think that we know more than we do and to appear to do so For to vouch Nature for a Cause is an Expedient that can scarce be wanting to any Man upon any occasion to seem to know what he can indeed render no good reason of And to this first part of my Answer I shall subjoin this second That the general custom of Mankind to talk of a Thing as a real and positive Being and attribute great matters to it does but little weigh with me when I consider that though Fortune be not any Physical thing but a certain loose undetermin'd Notion which a Modern Meta-Physician would refer to the Classis of his non Entia yet not only the Gentiles made it a Goddess Nos te facimus Fortuna Deam Coeloque locamus which many of them seriously Worship'd but eminent Writers in Verse and in Prose Ethnick and Christian Ancient and Modern and all sorts of Men in their common Discourse do seriously talk of It as if it were a kind of Antichrist that usurped a great share in the Government of the World and ascribe little less to It than they do to Nature And not to speak of what Poets Moralists and Divines tell us of the Powers of Ignorance and Vice which are but Moral defects Let us consider what things are not only by these Men but by the generality of Mankind seriously attributed to Death to which so great and fatal a Dominion is assign'd and then if we consider too that this Death which is said to do so many and such wonderful things is neither a Substance nor a Positive Entity but a meer Privation we shall I trust the less believe that the Feats ascribed to Nature do infer that there is really such a Physical Agent as is suppos'd And now having as I presume clear'd our Enquiry as far as 't is yet necessary and 't will be further done hereafter from those Prejudices that might make the Attempt be censur'd before it be examin'd I proceed to the Inquiry it self wherein I shall endeavour but with the brevity my want of leisure exacts to do these six things First To give you a short account of the great Ambiguity of the word Nature arising from its various acceptions Secondly To shew you that the Definition also that Aristotle himself gives of Nature does not afford a clear or satisfactory Notion of it Thirdly To gather from the several things that are wont to be affirmed of or attributed to Nature the received Notion of it which cannot be well gathered from the Name because of its great ambiguity Fourthly I will mention some of those Reasons that dissuade me from admitting this Notion of Nature Fifthly I shall endeavour to answer severally the chief things upon which Men seem to have taken up the Idea of Nature that I disallow And Sixthly I shall propose some of the chief Effata or Axioms that are wont to be made use of concerning Nature in general and shall shew how far and in what sense I may admit them And here it may be opportune to prevent both mistakes and the necessity of interrupting the Series of our Discourse to set down two or three Advertisements 1. When any where in this Tract I speak of the Opinions of Aristotle and the Peripateticks as I would not be thought to impute to him all the sentiments of those that will be thought his followers some of which seem to me to have much mistaken his true meaning so on the other side I did not conceive that my Design oblig'd me to inquire anxiously into his true sentiments whether about the Origine of the Universe as whether or no it were self-existent as well as Eternal or about less important Points Since besides that his expressions are oftentimes dark and ambiguous enough and the things he delivers in several passages do not seem always very consistent it suffic'd for my purpose which was to question Vulgar Notions to examine those Opinions that are by the generality of Scholars taken for the Aristotelian and Peripatetick Doctrines by which if he be mis-represented the blame ought to light upon his Commentators and Followers 2. The Rational Soul or Mind of Man as it is distinct from the sensitive Soul being an immaterial Spirit is a substance of so Heteroclite a kind in reference to things so vastly differing from it as mere Bodies are that since I could neither without injuring it treat of it promiscuously with the Corporeal Works of God nor speak worthily of it
such a Vacuum as to common Air I have try'd that a Load-stone will emit his Effluvia and move Iron or Steel plac'd in It. In short it is not Evident that here below Nature so much strains Herself to hinder or fill up a Vacuum as to manifest an Abhorrence of It. And without much peculiar Solicitude a Vacuum at least a Philosophical One is as much provided against as the Welfare of the Universe requires by Gravity and Confluxibility of the Liquors and other Bodies that are placed here below And as for those that tell us that Nature abhors and prevents a Vacuum as well in the Upper Part of the World as the Lower I think we need not trouble ourselves to answer the Allegation till they have prov'd It. Which I think will be very hard for Them to do not to mention that a Cartesian may tell Them that 't were as needless for Nature to oppose a Vacuum in Heaven as in Earth since the Production of It is every where alike Impossible VI. I come now to the celebrated Saying that Natura est Morborum Medicatrix taken from Hippocrat who expresses it in the plural 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And because this Axiom is generally Receiv'd among Physicians and Philosophers and seems to be one of the principal Things that has made them introduce such a Being as they call Nature I think it may be Time well employ'd to consider somewhat attentively in what Sense and how far this famous Sentence may or should not be admitted First then I conceive it may be taken in a Negative Sense so as to import that Diseases cannot be cur'd in such Persons in whom the Aggregate of the Vital Powers or Faculties of the Body is so far weaken'd or deprav'd as to be utterly unable to perform the Functions necessary to Life or at least to actuate and assist the Remedies employ'd by the Physitian to preserve or recover the Patient This I take to be the Meaning of such usual Phrases as that Physick comes too late and that Nature is quite spent And in this Sense I readily acknowledge the Axiom to be true For where the Engine has some necessary Parts whether Fluid or Solid so far deprav'd or weakn'd as to render it altogether unable to co-operate with the Medicine it cannot be rationally expected that the Administration of that Medicine should be effectual But in this I presume there is no Difficulty worthy to detain us I proceed therefore to the positive Sense whereof our Axiom is capable and wherein it is the most usually imploy'd For Men are wont to believe that there resides in the Body of a sick Person a certain Provident or Watchful Being that still industriously employs itself by its own Endeavours as well as by any occasional Assistence that may be afforded it by the Physitian to rectifie whatever is amiss and restore the distemper'd Body to its Pristine state of Health What I think of this Doctrine I shall leave you to gather from the following Discourse I conceive then in the first Place that the Wise and Beneficent Maker of the World and of Man intending that Men should for the most part live a considerable number of Years in a Condition to act their Parts on the Mundane Stage He was pleas'd to frame those Living Automata Human Bodies that with the ordinary succours of Reason making use of their exquisite Structure fitted for Durableness and of the friendly though undesign'd Assistence of the various Bodies among which they are plac'd they may in many Cases recover a State of Health if they chance to be put out of it by lesser Accidents than those that God in compliance with the great Ends of his General Providence did not think fit to secure them from or enable them to surmount Many things therefore that are commonly ascrib'd to Nature I think may be better ascrib'd to the Mechanisms of the Macrocosm and Microcosm I mean of the Universe and the Human Body And to illustrate a little my Meaning by a gross Example or two I desire you will consider with me a Sea-compass wherein the excited Magnetick Needle and the Box that holds It are duly pois'd by Means of a competent number of opposite Pivats For though if you give this Instrument a somewhat rude Shake you will make the Box totter and encline this way and that way and at the same time drive the Points of the Magnetick Needle many Degrees to the East or to the West yet the Construction of the Instrument and the Magnetism of one main Part of It are such that if the Force that first put it into a disorderly Motion cease from acting on It the Box will after some Reciprocations return to its Horizontal Situation and the Needle that was forc'd to deviate will after a few irregular Motions to this and to that side of the Magnetical Meridian settle itself again in a Position wherein the Flower-de-Luce stedfastly regards the North. And yet this recovery to its former State is effected in a factitious Body by the bare Mechanism of the Instrument itself and of the Earth and other Bodies within whose Sphere of Activity it is plac'd But because Many have not seen a Mariner's Compass I will add a less apposite but more obvious and familiar Example For if when an empty Ballance is duly counterpois'd you shall by your Breath or Hand depress one of the Scales and thereby for the time destroy the Aequilibrium yet when the Force is once remov'd the depress'd Ballance will presently ascend and the Opposite will descend and after a few Motions up and down they will both of them of their own accord settle again in an exact Aequilibrium without the help of any such Provident Internal Principle 〈◊〉 Nature The absence of whose Agency may be confirm'd by This that the depress'd Scale does not at first stop at the Horizontal Line beneath which it was first depress'd as it ought to do if it were rais'd by an Intelligent Being but rises far above It. If it be here objected that these Examples are drawn from Factitious not from merely Physical Bodies I shall return this brief Answer and desire that it be apply'd not only to the Two freshly mention'd Examples but to All of the like Kind that may be met with in this whole Treatise I say then in short that divers of the Instances we are speaking of are intended but for Illustrations and that Others may be useful Instances if they should be no more than Analogous Ones Since Examples drawn from Artificial Bodies and Things may have both the Advantage of being more clearly conceiv'd by ordinary Understandings and That of being less obnoxâ—â—s to be question'd in that Paâ—â—â—â—ar in which the Comparison or Correspondence consists And I the less scruple to employ such Examples because Aristotle himself and some of his more learned Followers make use of divers Comparisons drawn from the Figures and other Accidents of Artificial Things
to give an account of Physical Subjects and even of the Generation Corruption and Forms of Natural Bodies This Advertisement premis'd I persue this Discourse it interrupted by adding Thus in a human Body the Causes that disorder it are oftentimes but Transient whereas the Structure of the Body itself and the Causes that conduce to the Preservation of that Structure are more stable and durable and on that account may enable the Engine to out-last many Things that are Hostile to It. This may be somewhat illustrated by considering that Sleep though it be not properly a Disease easily becomes One when it frequently transgresseth its due Bounds and even whilst it keeps within them it does for the time it lasts hinder the exercise of many Functions of the Body more than several Diseases do and yet according to the common course of Things the Matter that lock't up the Senses being spent the Man of himself recovers that sensible and active State on whose score he is said to be awake But to come somewhat closer to the Point We see that many Persons who get a Praeter natural Thirst with over-much Drinking get rid of it again in a few days by forbearing such Excesses and many that by too plentiful Meals are brought to a want of Appetite Recover as it were of course by a spare Diet in a few days the renewed Ferment or Menstruum of the Stomach being able in that time to concoct by little and little or expell the indigested Aliments or peccant Humours that offended the Stomach and caus'd the want of Appetite And here I desire to have it taken Notice of as a thing that may be considerable to our present Purpose that I look not on a Human Body as on a Watch or a Hand-mill i. e. as a Machine made up only of Solid or at least Consistent Parts but as an Hydraulical or rather Hydraulo-pneumatical Engine that consists not only of Solid and Stable Parts but of Fuids and those in Organical Motion And not only so but I consider that these Fluids the Liquors and Spirits are in a living Man so constituted that in eertain Circumstances the Liquors are dispos'd to be put into a Fermentation or Commotion whereby either some Depuration of Themselves or some Discharge of hurtful Matter by Excretion or both are produc'd so as for the most part to conduce to the Recovery or Welfare of the Body And that even Consistent Parts may be so fram'd and so connected with other Parts as to act as it were pro re nata varying their Motions as differing Circumstances make it convenient they should be varied I purposely shew in another Paper To this I might altogether refer you but in regard the Thing is a Paradox and lays a Foundation for Another not Inferior to itself I shall here borrow thence one Instance not mention'd that I know of by Others to this purpose that may both declare my Meaning and confirm the Thing itself I consider then that what is call'd the Pupil or Apple of the Eye is not as 't is known a substantial Part of the Organ but only a round Hole or Window made in the Vvea at which the Modify'd Beams of Light enter to fall upon the Chrystalline Humour and thence be refracted to the bottom of the Eye or seat of Vision to make there an Impression that is usually a kind of Picture for 't is not always a neat One of the Object Now the Wise and All-foreseeing Author of Things has so admirably contriv'd this Instrument of Sight that as it happens to be employ'd in differing Lights so the Bigness or Area of the Pupil varies For when the Light is vivid and would be too gteat if all the Beams were let in that might enter at an Aperture as large as the usual the Curtain is every way drawn towards the Middle and thereby the round Window made Narrower And on the other side when the Light is but faint and the Object but dimly illustrated there being more Light requisite to make a sufficient Impression at the bottom of the Eye the Curtain is every way drawn open to let in more Light And when the Eye is well constituted this is regularly done according as the Organ has need of more or less Light Of this some late Masters of Opticks have well Treated and I have spoken about it more fully in another place And the truth of the Observation you may easily find if you look upon the Eyes of a Boy or a Girl for in young Persons the change is the most notable when the Eyes are turn'd from looking on dark Objects towards bright or more illuminated Ones And I have found the Variation yet more conspicuous in the Eyes of a young Cat as I elsewhere particularly relate So that referring you to the Writings already pointed at I shall only add in this place that these various Motions in the Eye are produc'd by mere Mechanism without the Direction or so much as Knowledg or Perception of the Rational Soul And upon the like Account it is that other Motions in several Parts belonging to the Eye are produc'd as 't were spontaneously as occasion requires And so as to the Fluid Parts of the Body we find that according to the Institution of the Author of Things when healthy Women are of a fit Age there is a Monthly Fermentation or Commotion made in the Blood which usually produces a kind of Separation and then an Excretion advantagious to the Body And that you may the better make out what I meant by the Disposition or Tendency of the Parts to return to their former Constitution I shall desire you to consider with me a thin and narrow Plate of good Steel or refined Silver for if one End of it be forcibly drawn aside the changed Texture of the Parts becomes such or the Congruity and Incongruity of the Pores in reference to the ambient Aether that endeavours to permeate them is made such that as soon as the Force that bent it is remov'd the Plate does as it were spontaneously return to its former Position And yet here is no internal watchful Principle that is solicitous to make this Restitution for otherwise it is indifferent to the Plate what Figure it settle in for if the Springy Body stand long Bent then as if Nature forgot her Office or were unable to execute it though the Force that held the Spring bent be remov'd it will not endeavour to regain its former streightness And I have tryed in a Silver Plate that if you only heat it red-hot and let it cool if you put it into a crooked Posture it will retain it but barely with two or three stroaks of a Hammer which can only make an invisible change of Texture the Plate will acquire a manifest and considerable Springyness which you may again deprive it of by sufficiently heating it in the Fire without so much as melting it But to return to the Discourse formerly