created Beings that by the powerful and soveraign Institution of Almighty God have an immediate Principle of Motion in and from themselves is beyond Dispute A Brute Beast possibly may be put immediately into Motion by his Appetite and that Appetite excited by the presence of an Object and here the Object hath as I may call it a Moral Principle of Motion exciting the Appetite moving the Brute to a nearer approach to the Object But then in the Gressus Brutalis it is somewhat within him that gives the Local Motion it self namely the Brutalis Anima And the same is evident in the Motions of Augmentation and Conformation of Vegetables the motions of Ascent and Calefaction in Fire the Motions of Attraction and Aversation in Magnetical Bodies and the very Motion of Descent in heavy Bodies and infinite more instances of Physical Bodies which have an intrinsick principle of exciting and communicating Motion to the Subjects of their inexistence and to other things Now touching this internal immediate principle of Motion is this Enquiry upon which I am CHAP. II. A farther Disquisition touching the immediate Cause of Motion IN the former Chapter I have supposed these two things 1. That there are some things that have an active self-moving Principle lodged within them 2. That Matter simply considered is not that immediate self-moving Principle It remaines therefore to be enquired what that Principle is The ancient Bi-partition of created Beings was into Substance and Accident But this seems to me to be too narrow I am still speaking of created material Existences and I shall not be ashamed to own Helmont for my Instructer herein because he speaks with great evidence of Reason There seems therefore to be a third kind of Existence or Entity participating in some respect of the nature of both and yet differing in other respects from both for indeed it is an Entity among created Beings belonging to Matter far more noble than either of the two former and is that which giveth Life Vigor Activity and Motion immediately next under the Lord of Nature to every self-moving Being And this Entity I call Vis or Virtus activa superadded to Matter and giving immediately those Motions to it that are specifically appropriate to that Vis or Virtus Activa and without which Matter would be stupid dull unactive and alwayes at rest in it self unless accidentally moved ab extrinseco And although those Vires or Virtutes activae the immediate Principles of Motion in such things as are Automata are various and infinitely diversified yet I shall instance but in few which nevertheless will be sufficient to render my self intelligible in what I say And those are principally of two sorts the first of those the noblest below the humane Soul are those Vires or Virtutes Essentiales that are the principal Constituents of vital or substantial Forms The second are those which are usually called active qualities which seem to be of a lower nature and allay than the former Under the first of these Ranks there are different Classes not only gradually but essentially more or less perfect than others viz. first the Vis sentiens animalis of Animals 2. The Vis vegetans vitalis of Vegetables and possibly of many Minerals 3. The Vis combustiva calefactiva of Fire 4. The Vis attractiva directiva communicativa of Magnetical Bodies These Virtutes or Vires Essentiales even of the noblest sort I mean below the humane nature have this preheminence above the Matter or Substance whereunto they are united that they are the immediate vital movent principle that gives a kind of Life or Motion to the Subject wherein they exist which would otherwise be destitute of Life or Motion from it self Whether these Vires or Virtutes Essentiales are in themselves defectible or not may be questioned some have thought that they have certain Termini Temporales of their Existence and Operations in themselves simply and abstractively considered and in process of time languish and finally expire and cease as the energy of the Spring of a Watch in its evolution grows languid and at last utterly ceaseth from any farther evolution or motion Others have thought and with great evidence of Reason that there is no decay or natural termination of the Vis or Energia Essentialis it self but only by the decay or defectibility or dissolution of the material Hypostasis to which it is united or of the Organs which it useth in its operations which being compounded Bodies are subject to decay and dissolution And therefore the Philosopher tells us that if an old man had a young mans eye he would see as well as in his Youth for the decay is not in the Visive Faculty or Vis or Virtus Essentialis sentiens but in the Organ or Subject or Substratum of its Operation or Inexistence But in some respects it is inferiour to Matter and seems to participate of the nature of Accidents as for instance It necessarily according to the common Laws of Nature requires a material Hypostasis or Subject in which it may inexist and to which it may be united thus the Vis Sentiens Animalis is immediately united to the Animal Spirits or the most refined parts of the Animal Nature The Vis Vegetans Vitalis of Vegetables is immediately united to the Vital Spirits and Succus Vitalis of Vegetables As to Fire whether the Vis Ignea have a proper Hypostasis of its own to which it is united as the Vis Sentiens hath or whether it hath no other Substratum but the Body in which it is as the Cole or Iron or as the common Body of the Air it self through which it is universally diffused may I confess be questionable yet certainly it hath some Hypostasis to which it is united and primitively inexists and without which it seems it cannot be 2. Whereas no portion of Matter is lost in Nature or annihilable but by Omnipotence those Vires Essentiales are in their individuals extinguished and lost and no where in Nature upon the destruction dissipation or dissolution of the necessary Hypostasis or Subject of their inexistence When the Animal Spirits are wholly dissipated or dissolved the Vis Sentiens of that Animal is lost and no where When water is thrown upon the Cole of Fire the Vis Ignea that was in it is extinct and nullibi and as it seems doth not facessere in elementum commune Ignis at least if it have not a special Hypostasis of its own to which it is united and when the Magnet is burnt in the Fire the Vis Magnetica in it is extinct And the same is to be said of that other more ignoble Principle of Motion hereafter mentioned viz. Active Qualities And this as I think gives us a true notion of the Souls of Brutes the Forms of Vegetables of Fire and other substantial Forms below the humane Soul If any should ask me what I take the Soul of a
brute animal to be I should say it consisted of two essential parts the one this active Vis or Virtus Sentiens Animalis the Root and Fountain of all its motions of Sensation Perception Phantasie Appetition and Local Motion And the other is the immediate Hypostasis or Substratum in which this Vis Vitalis Sentiens primitively inexists and to which it is primitively united and by which it communicates it self to the whole Compositum and these are some select Crasis or Portion of the Animal Spirits For the Animal Nature being a more curious piece than inferiour Subsistences and fuller of variety therefore there is a more elaborate and curious method of the union of its Essentials than in others And next to Animals there is a more curious method of union and colligation of the Virtus Vitalis of Vegetables to the more pure and subtil vital Spirits or Latex Vitalis of Vegetables But the Vis Ignea and the Vis Magnetica seem to be immediately united to the whole Fiery or Magnetical Mass But yet still the activity of both is owing not to the bare Hypostasis or Substratum wherein it is lodged but to that incorporeal force virtue or energy which acts in it upon it and by it And upon this accompt Aristotle is to be understood when in 1. De Anima he stiles the Souls of Brutes to be incorporeal and yet in other places calls them substantial viz. they are immaterial and incorporeal with relation to the Vis or Virtus Essentialis activa which is the regnant and noblest part of them but they are substantial and not only so but material in relation to the prima Hypostasis or Primum Substratum the Animal Spirits whereunto this Vis Activa is united or rather some Nodus or concrement of a refined Substance which is as it were the root or Focus of these Spirits that like so many Branches are derived from it through the Nerves and by them communicated to the whole Compositum And although I do here industriously omit the Examination of the Nature of the Humane or Reasonable Soul yet I cannot omit this special observation of the discrimination of the Humane Soul from the Souls of Brutes viz. that although the appropriate faculties of the Sentient or Animal Soul be admitted indefectible in themselves yet their prima Hypostasis or immediate subject of their inexistence is corruptible and subject to dissipation but the appropriate powers or faculties of the reasonable Soul namely Intellect and Will are not only indefectible powers but also the prima Hypostasis or primum Substratum of their inexistence is by the Divine Ordination an indefectible Substratum namely a pure immaterial and incorruptible Substance and the union thereunto indissoluble whereby it comes to pass that the Humane Soul is immortal and preserved both in its Essence Existence Personality and in duration after the dissolution of the Body 1. It s Virtus or Vis is indefectible 2. The Prima Hypostasis incorruptible 3. The Union of both indissoluble by natural power And thus far concerning the first sort of Active Principles in self-moving Automata 2. The second sort of motive Principles are Active Qualities as they are commonly called which though possibly some of them may be the same with the former essentiating Active Forms yet some may be such as are of a second and more inferiour allay as proceeding from the primitive forms themselves I shall instance in two only 1. In that of Heat 2. In that of Gravity As to the former it is evident that Heat not only that which is so to the touch but is such virtually as in Vegetables and Minerals hath a power of exciting Motion both in the Subject of its inexistence and in other Subjects as appears in the Fermentation of Liquors and other things which are put into motion by that virtual heat that resides in its particles though not hot to the touch Whether Cold be of any positive nature and so have a positive activity of its own or whether it be an absence only of heat either totally as in summè frigidis if any such be or partially according to the degrees of heat abated or removed I shall not here dispute for I only propound some Instances to render what I write intelligible 2. As to Gravity or that Principle in heavy bodies that inclines them ab intrinseco to descend this seems to be a quality of most tangible bodies that we converse with if not of all for some contend that there is no such thing in nature as simple Levity at least in any thing but Fire but only some bodies are minus gravia than others and urged to ascend by the pressure or circumpulsion of other bodies more heavy this is not my business at this time to examine This Gravity I take to be a quality intrinsick to heavy bodies at least in our inferiour System of the world Gravitation which is a kind of second act may not altogether improperly be applied to motions of different terminations because it seems to be only nisus or conatus ad motum which may have different terminations viz. upward or downward or laterally and arise from different causes but Gravity it self as it imports a disposition propension or inclination in heavy bodies to descend is not unfitly stiled a quality and an intrinsick quality For we may observe in the motions of natural bodies some are from an extrinsecal cause or accidental sometimes arising from the pressure of other bodies sometimes from the position of the bodies themselves as Water will be driven up perpendicularly by a forcer as in Water-Engines it will move collaterally or per declive by reason of its own fluid nature or by its position upon a declining Plain But when all Obstacles of that nature are removed a heavy body as such will move by a right Line to the Center from that inherent quality of gravity which is intrinsick to it and puts it into motion so that I am unjustly blamed for saying Gravity is a quality inclining bodies to descend to the Center and yet at the same time saying that it is not improper to say that things may gravitate upward or laterally as well as downward for when heavy bodies have another termination than downward it is by reason of some other intervention of some external cause or from some other property in bodies accompanying their Gravity as Fluidity in Water or Air which gives them a Nisus ad motum which is gravitation of a differing termination from that of bodies purely considered as heavy But when the motion proceeds simply and solely from that active quality of gravity its nisus ad motum which is its gravitation is simply in linea recta ad centrum which I often call a central motion or direction This any fair Remarker might have easily seen without charging the Second Chapter of the Essay with a contradiction where indeed there is none And therefore in this place I cannot chuse
and mix it self with the included rarefied Air as well as if a little Air were let into it through a Pin-hole 4. In the Instance last given and many other of like nature that might be given where the filaments of the Air in their relaxation from heat have a motion of contraction in themselves per viam restitutionis and a consequential attraction on the Vessel including them per modum nexus it is impossible this can be salved by the Supposition of the Cartesians and Lucretians which suppose the Air to consist of minute particles only joyned together by contiguity for where there is only contiguity without continuity of parts that body can never draw another body per modum tractionis it will be really less tenacious than a Rope of Sand so that such an intromission of particles thus solute as they state most bodies to be by a bare contiguity of Atoms could never explicate this visible Phaenomenon that ensues upon tension of the Air or after the avolation or extinguishment of Heat that first expanded it 5. And as this Supposition by no means salves the Phaenomena of Rarefaction of the Air and what ensues thereupon so it as little salves that of Condensation or Constipation of Air by compression as we see in Wind-Guns and other Engines which upon a Discharge or a Motion of that compression do with a force explode or discharge themselves and press very hard upon bodies that are in their way so that a Wind-Gun will drive a Bullet through a pretty thick piece of Wood which could never be if this Solution of Rarefaction and Condensation were true 1. If the Air it self and also this subsidiary Materia subtilissima were but a collection of minute bodies joyned only in contiguity one to another all the compression in the world would give it no more elasticity or that explosive motion than if a portion of Calice-Sand were forced into a Gun or other Vessel with all the compression imaginable 2. But again in that elastical explosion by the Air compressed into a narrower room what is it that actually exerciseth that explosive Elasticity Is it the subtil matter that was mingled with the included compressed Air Surely no for according to this Supposition that is squeezed out and permeated through the Barrel or Trunk of the Wind-gun Or is it the grosser Particles of the Air that is yet left in the Gun and cannot get out till the Obturaculum be removed But there is no reason for that to have any Elasticity for by the avolation of the subtil Matter there is room enough left for it and under that narrow dimension that now it hath yet hath it as much room as before for the avolation of the Materia subtilis hath made a perfect room for it and left it a space exactly commensurate to its corporeal Moles But it may be that the Materia subtilis that was driven out by the compression now upon the aperture of the Obturaculum pervades the substance of the Gun with that force that it gives the explosion But it is apparent that neither this can help it for it doth appear that the Motion of the Subtil Matter into the Orifice of the Wind-gun upon the removal of the Obturaculum must needs run counter to the explosion of the Air and obstruct it Again it is apparent that the subtil Matter is driven out gradually and with iterated force and it cannot pervade the Iron sides of the Gun but gradually and with great straining and to imagine that in a moment the moment of a Motion of the Obturaculum the whole body of that removed Matter should pervade the strong and close Metal in an instant to give that strong and forcible explosion exceeds all reason sense and credibility And therefore it was but necessary for those that will maintain this Assertion to substitute a Spirit of Nature or an Hylarchical Principle which for the preservation of Bodies in their due natural state and position should act little less than miraculously to supply all these Difficulties which yet notwithstanding must be supposed according to this Supposition to act in contradiction to it self and Nature also For when in Rarefaction of Bodies this Spiritus Naturae sends supplies of subtil Matter to fill the Interstitia it must necessarily rob other parts of the Air of some of that subtil Matter that properly belonged to its texture and natural constitution and so when one portion of Matter is gratified another is impoverished of what belongs to it which seems wholly unsutable to the office which this vicarious Spirit of Nature according to this new Supposition is substituted to exercise CHAP. IX Touching the Third Supposition of the Method of Rarefaction and Condensation according to the Ancient Philosophy and seems to be the truest HAving examined the two former Suppositions and as near as I can discovered their insufficiency I now come to the Third which I think to be true viz. as to that kind of Rarefaction and Condensation which before in the 4 th Chapter is stated to be the true Matter of the Question for in Rarefaction of a Body suppose Air either by Heat or Tension there is a real expansion or dilatation of the same Moles of Matter of the Air and all its parts to a larger space extent or dimension than it had before and in Condensation by Cold but more evidently by compression the same Moles of Matter and all its parts have a narrower or less space or expansion than before I suppose therefore that although Rarefaction and Condensation of any Body from its natural size and dimension belonging to it is for the most part if not alwayes by the agency or efficiency of some external cause yet under such circumstances Rarity and Density are but natural affections or rather Passions Qualities or Modes of such Bodies arising from their very texture and make and are as naturally belonging to them as Heat or Cold Humidity or Driness Smoothness or Roughness or other tangible Qualities to other Bodies that are more gross and corporeal 2. I do suppose that whatever men have talkt or wrote concerning Spatia imaginaria without relation to any Bodies to fill it yet as time or successive duration is a kind of Attendant upon successive Motion so space is a kind of Entity relative to Bodies and dependent upon them 3. To make way to what I have to say herein It seems to me no kind of repugnancy in Nature but altogether consonant thereunto and that it is equally possible and reasonable that a Body that is much more rare than another and having in it less of solid corporeity and consequently of weight than another yet may as entirely fill the whole space within the compass of its external Superficies as a body of a denser consistence so that although Gold be 18000 times bulk for bulk heavier than Air and near 20 times heavier than Water and although Water be near 14 times lighter than Mercury
than once answered which I think is done in my Observations upon Remark 17 c. Then he proceeds to the Argument touching Rarefaction and the inconvenience of the penetration of dimensions and so endeavours to prove repugnancies in what is said by a Problem that deserves more discussion than the Argument in hand as hath been shewed in the beginning of this Book wherein I have nevertheless expressed my thoughts touching it I cannot tell what the Remarker imagines or conceives against the cohesion of grosser Bodies by the tension of lighter bodies but I can tell what is evident to my sense and so may any that will give his Senses leave freely to determin without stifling them by Notions namely that there is as plain a cohesion in the Magdeburgh Hemispheres yea and in the Torricellian Engin as there is between things fastned each to other by a string And therefore I cannot so over-readily change the conviction of my Senses for a Notion or Conception asserted and magnified but not proved But to infer that because Water which is above 900 times crasser than Air is not compressible to a sensible smaller room by a great weight therefore a portion of subtil Matter cannot be extracted out of it or Mercury with so small a weight as the Mercurial Cylinder or that the effluvia of Water or Mercury which are as subtil as Air cannot be expanded by a less weight than Water compressed into a sensible narrower room seem hard illations and very inconsequential for we see the heat of a mans hand will expand Air in Weather-Glasses to near a double extension REMARK XXXIV I Do prove the attraction of tensed Bodies by the plain evidence of Sense and I assign the preservation of the continuity of the Universe as the end thereof and the supream efficient cause thereof to be the most wise and powerful Creator of all things and the immediate effective cause that instituted Law that he hath placed in things natural the immediate instrumental cause in many motions that are not primitive in their Subjects to be from the singular disposition of the part of the Universe their admirable mechanical adaptation each to other And as to the vicarious Spirit of Nature as a distinct incorporeal subsistence when the Author hath given us better proofs thereof than the suspending of Mercury in the Torricellian Experiment the driving up a Rundle of light wood by the Water and potentia attractiva of the Embolus of the Air-Pump and such like petty Instances together with his bare Notion touching it It may possibly obtain a better entertainment than yet I find it doth at least with me REMARK XXXV THis Instance in the Bladder and Cupping-Glasses is passed over in this Remark very lightly and it was necessary so to be dealt with because too troublesome to be explicated otherwise than by Tension and Attraction and it would require an admirable process in the Hylarchical Principle to effect this and some proof besides single Notions and Conceptions of such explication by such a principle REMARK XXXVI THe Instance here given hath put the Remarker to a great deal of pains to find a solution for it and the consequences of it for the Hypothesis of Attraction is confidently said to be fully confuted though it be only so said but not so done But yet the Hylarchical Principle is at length furnished with an Hylostatical Libration and Hylostatical power of union of the several parts of Water Air and Glass And at this rate I confess there will never want a ready solution to any difficulty for it is but asserting that the Spirit of Nature is furnished with that effectual power and the knot is untied or cut though there be not a Syllable of proof offered for it but it is only graffed on to the Hypothesis of the Spirit of Nature by the wit of the Assertor to accommodate the Hypothesis REMARK XXXVII I Refer my self to what is said before in the first Chapter of this Book and upon the same Remark there need not be said more The Laws of Nature were the Laws of God imprinted upon the nature of Physical Beings by his Almighty Fiat and though as to particular Beings he hath substituted particular active principles usually called Essential and Vital Forms yet as to the Universe it self it seems to be too great an Empire to be put into the vicariat hands of that which is here called the Spirit of Nature The great God that gave the Laws of Nature is sufficient without such a Substitute and is only sufficient for the regiment of so great an Empire and this may serve also to Remark 38. We are not disputing whether such a Spirit of Nature be possible to be but whether de facto it be or not or that it is necessary that it should be at least as to those motions which have so evident explication from other principles REMARK XXXIX HErein we differ not as to the rejecting of the great Elasticity of the Air. REMARK XL. I Confess when I read the beginning of this Remark I hoped to meet with such a Solution to the Instance remarked upon as would be close and clear because this Instance bears so hard against most of what the Remarker hath before affirmed but I was deceived herein In this Instance of the Magdeburg Hemispheres these things are most evident to any mans Sense 1. That the included Air is certainly expanded and rarefied by the heat beyond its natural size 2. That while they are so hot and the Air so expanded and lax they do not at all cohere 3. That as they grow cold they do most evidently cohere so that they will not be divulsed without a considerable strength 4. That most necessarily as the included Air grows cold and the heat which was the cause of its expansion decayes so the Air must needs endeavour its restitution to its natural dimension by contracting it self inward to its natural size 5. And yet if it have such a degree of heat as again gives a more lax state to the included Air the cohesion will cease and the Hemispheres fall asunder 6. And as the Remarker confesseth and the most clear evidence of Sense evinceth those Phaenomena are not wrought nor indeed possible to be wrought either by the weight pressure or elasticity of the external Air as the Elaterists would have it The Consequence of all which is that certainly as far as Sense can lead us the Air is rarefied by the Heat and as the Heat decayes the Air endeavours its own contraction and there necessarily follows even to our Sense an attraction upon the sides of the Hemispheres whereby they cohere and that cohesion will continue till relaxed by another accession of Heat or admission of more Air. But now what doth the Remark propound in this Instance Marry an Hylostatical Spirit which pro re nata works these various Phaenomena which is only a conjecture and hath no evidence to prove it
Expressions that are not polished according to Grammatical or Scholastick Niceties or Modes that I may be excused herein and that the Reader will look to the Scope and Drift and mark at what I aim and not cavil at bare Terms and Expressions so long as the thing they design be laid open This is an unhappiness that too often befals men that are inquisitive after Truth that their Readers or Opponents miss the scope of the Writer and fall upon Criticismes about Words and Forms of Expressions Words are but Signs of Conceptions and Thoughts and as I have elsewhere said they perform their Office well enough when they render our Thoughts intelligible 3. That he will be content to suspend his Censure upon Clauses or Sentences apart till he hath perused all It is not possible especially in Discourses of this Nature to speak or write all at once Some things that are but shortly or obscurely delivered or perchance omitted in one Sentence Page or Paragraph may be supplied or explained in another The CONTENTS CHap. 1. Concerning Motion and its Original Pag. 1 Chap. 2. A farther Disquisition touching the immediate Cause of Motion Pag. 7 Chap. 3. Concerning some other more universal or common Causes assigned to Motions viz. Anima Mundi Spiritus Naturae Principia Hylarchica Pag. 25 Chap. 4. Touching Rarefaction and Condensation and their Kinds Pag. 36 Chap. 5. Concerning the Phaenomena of Rarefaction and Condensation apparent to Sense Pag. 49 Chap. 6. Concerning the various Solutions of Condensation and Rarefaction and first of that which is by supposed interspersed Vacuities Pag. 55 Chap. 7. Concerning the Second Solution of Rarefaction and Condensation and its insufficiency Pag. 67 Chap. 8. Further Considerations concerning the Deficiency of the Second Solution in relation to Rarefaction and Condensation and the Supplements that have been devised to enforce or supply it Pag. 77 Chap. 9. Touching the Third Supposition of the Method of Rarefaction and Condensation according to the Ancient Philosophy which seems to be the truest Pag. 87 Chap. 10. A further Consideration of Rarefaction and Condensation and of the Supposition of the Penetrability or Impenetrability of Bodies Material Substances Quantity Extension c. Pag. 108 ERRATA PAg. 39. l. 4. dele appearing p. 43. l. 10. r. it it makes spaces p. 63. l. 25. abstracted r. obstructed p. 64. l. 18. r. and with great ease if the supposition be true p. 65. l. 15. more r. mere p. 89. l. 20. Tube r. Cube p. 94. l. 23. dele actual p. 95. l. 13. cancelled r. cantelled p. 106. l. 7. r. passion or quality of p. 131. l. 21. r. in Condensation p. 189. l. 6. r. preponderation p. 192. l. 25. Ballance r. Bottom p. 204. l. 20. some r. sense p. 239. l. 24. r. preponderated p. 276. l. 17. r. foreign OBSERVATIONS Touching the Principles of Natural Motions and especially touching RAREFACTION and CONDENSATION CHAP. I. Concerning Motion and its Original AS an Introduction to what follows I shall briefly set down some Observations touching Motion of Created Material Beings for I shall not in this place meddle with those more Noble Beings of Angelical or Spiritual Natures nor the Humane Soul which is a Subject of another and higher nature and not to be measured by those ordinary Rules or Reasons that concern Bodies Matter and Material Natures We may generally find in all Material Beings the thing called Motion in some of one kind in some of another some more simple some more complexed and various some more conspicuous to sense as Local Motion some less conspicuous as Generation and Alteration some things are moved by others some things seem to have the Principle or Original of motion in themselves which communicates motion to the Subject wherein that Principle resides and also to other things by contact of their corporeity or virtue And therefore Aristotle somewhere as I remember calls motion or endeavours of it to be quasi vita quaedam quae omnibus inest quae Natura constant The primitive Principle or Cause of all Motion is the first Mover the great and glorious Lord of Nature from whom as being so all Motion is derived into created Beings 1. By way of causality those created Beings that seem to have the immediate Principle of Motions in themselves have that Principle from his Fiat and Institution And 2. By way of Concurrence and Concomitance There is a perpetual flux from that Fountain of Being that preserves and sustains those Principles of Motion which he at first lodged in created Beings according to their several ranks kinds and natures and instituted Durations and if this Concourse should withdraw it self but one moment all the Motion of created Beings would cease and expire Matter it self simply considered as such though it be susceptive of Motion as we daily see is not the immediate principle of Motion in those subjects that seem to be self-moving or primitive Movents of other things according to that Law of Nature instituted by the Soveraign Lord thereof And this seems apparent among other Reasons by these that follow 1. Because Matter in it self and simply considered seems to be meerly passive and receptive of active impressions from something else It is true one portion of Matter once set in Motion will by contact put another portion of Matter into Motion But we are not now upon the search of intermediate Instrumentals of Motion but upon the search of the Principles of such Motions which seem primitively and immediately to be elicited in any Physical Subject 2. Because Matter simply considered seems to be one kind of uniform Entity but diversified by its Forms Qualities and Modifications as Weight Colour Hardness Softness c. The Matter of a piece of Gold and of a piece of Wood abstractively considered seems to be the Materia prima of the Ancients and of the same nature and consequently if Matter simply considered were the immediate active principle of Motion the Motions of all things would be as simple and uniform as the Matter it self But we see by daily experience that there are Motions of several Subjects which have the immediate principle of their Motion in and from themselves or somewhat within them that obtains vicem Moventis and are various differing differently exerted and differently terminated from the Motions of other Bodies Therefore if there be any things in Nature that have their Principle of Motion in themselves we must find out if we can somewhat besides Matter that is the immediate root or spring of it It is true the great Master in Natural Philosophy Aristotle tells us that whatsoever is moved is moved by another which would make one suppose that he thought there were no immediate self-moving principle in those Beings we call Automata but only the first Mover and truly with respect to the Soveraign Cause of all things that every thing is moved by him that is unmoveable as I have before shewed cannot be questioned But that there are
but take notice of two extreams in the modern Philosophy Some are so wholly intent upon vital and plastick Principles that they contend even almost against all Mechanical motions of Bodies which I shall have occasion hereafter to meet with Again Others are so greatly taken up with the thoughts of Matter and Mechanical Motions that they wholly exterminate any intrinsick Principles of motion and resolve them wholly into Matter and its modifications and Mechanism and Mechanical motions and therefore 1. They suppose that there are no such things as I call Active Forms at least excepting the Humane Soul though some venture hard at that also but that all Active Forms and their Originals are only various modifications of Matter as Size Figure Position Texture c. This I think is impossible to be true for though the Modifications of Matter may give variety of accidental or external Forms naturally arising from the texture of Matter as Figure Colour c. And those various modifications may in relation not only to the powers of the Sentient Faculty but to other Bodies make various impressions as we see is done in some tangible effects as by smoothness roughness hardness softness sharpness bluntness and the like whereby sometimes other bodies are affected yet they can never arrive to those greater activities which we see in Physical Bodies as Sense Life Primitive Motions of several kinds nor can be productive of the principles thereof for the modifications of Matter can never raise it to such an activity as of it self it is not capable of but requires the union of some nobler active entity to quicken and actuate it 2. They suppose that all the most noble motions as well of Sense as Life in Animals and Vegetables are nothing else but Mechanism and not from any intrinsick active principle which we usually call the sentient and vegetable Soul nay some by a vain petulancy have gone so far as to resolve the noble faculties and motions of the rational Soul as Intellection Ratiocination and Memory into a bare Mechanism and Modification and Motion of Particles of Matter such extravagancies as these need no other confutation but our very Senses in the observation of the curious properties instincts operations and motions of the animal and vegetable souls and faculties and the unevident and unintelligible explications that these men offer for the support of their Suppositions which is not my business here at large to examine Now touching the production of these active self-moving Principles which I call Vires or Virtutes activae 1. As to their primitive institution and production there cannot possibly as I think be assigned any other than that constitution institution and communication which they received from the great Creator of all things and that Law which he annexed and gave them in their first formation 2. But as to the subsequent and physical production of these active principles in the common and ordinary track of Nature they are various according to the methods setled by the same Divine Law such as are Generation the Irradiation of the Heavens and Heavenly Bodies especially the Sun the various mixtures of simple and compounded bodies and therewith of their essential Forms and active Qualities whereby there arise many times such Forms and Qualities as are sometimes called equivocal anomalous or of various modifications But the origination of Forms and Active Qualities is a large Theme and not intended to be prosecuted farther by me in this place CHAP. III. Concerning some other more universal or common Causes assigned of Motions viz. Anima Mundi Spiritus Naturae Principia Hylarchica TO solve or give an account of divers motions in Nature there have been those that not content with the particular inherent active Principles in particular Subjects as is mentioned in the former Chapters have supposed certain more Catholick and indeed nobler Existences that manage the various Phaenomena in the Universe Plato and his School and after him the Arabian Philosophers especially Avicen supposed an intelligent Nature subordinate to Almighty God to preside and manage the Universe which they call Anima Mundi as they assign one common intelligent Nature and depute it to the excitation action and regiment of the humane Soul in his intellective operation which they call intellectus Agens Others that have assigned several Systemes of the world each having a special Province which they stile Vortices or Systemata assign a certain common intelligent Nature to be as it were the common Soul of every particular Vortex and thus our Vortex whose Center they suppose to be the Sun and the terms of extent to reach the remotest Limits of Saturn and his Orb hath its Anima vorticis for the regiment of the Phaenomena and motions within that Vortex Others again have substituted another Principle not altogether unlike the first but differing in name and some qualifications This they call Principium Hylarchicum and sometimes Spiritus Naturae which though they make not an intelligent being yet they make it plastick vital incorporeal and possibly sentient but howsoever accommodated to the regiment of Matter in the best and most orderly and convenient way and this I take it they suppose a subordinate regent principle somewhat resembling the Archeus of Helmont which is supposed a middle principle intervening between the Souls of Animals and their Body and an immediate active instrument in its motions and operations If by this Principium Hylarchicum these men would understand the Soveraign Creator and Lord of the world as many of the Ancients understood the Anima mundi who is intimately present with all his Works and by a continual influx supports them in their being and motions according to the most wise Laws and Institutions that he hath established for them and fixed in them Or if by the Spiritus Naturae they understand those active essential Virtues communicated to every created Being by the Glorious God and that statuminated Law and Order and Method and Oeconomy which he hath given them and according to which those active principles which he hath planted in them do exert and operate this will be readily agreed to them as most rational and in a great measure evident not only to our Reason but to our very Sense and Experience and the Dispute about words would cease and be at rest But the substitution of such a vicarious immaterial common Principle to regulate order excite and govern Matter and its motions subordinate to Almighty God a common Spirit and different from the particular active principles variously implanted in Physical Bodies though it be a pleasant supposition yet it is difficult if not impossible to evince to any tolerable satisfaction Only I must needs say that as Suppositions of this nature that are founded upon Notions are for the most part unaccessible by those common Media whereby things are to be proved to humane understanding so upon the same account they are difficult to be confuted If any man should tell
easily observed that in truth all kind of Gravitation is but Motion or Conatus ad Motum But in that Conatus or Nisus ad Motum we are necessarily to consider two things 1. The Principium Motivum 2. The Terminus Motus or Conatus ad Motum The Principium Motivum may be various and tending to various terminations it may be extrinsecal and accidental as when I throw a Stone into a Bucket of Water the motion of the Water is thereby caused upward and raiseth its Superficies and the motion of the Water upward is not altogether improperly called Gravitation upward coming from an external force Again The Principle of the Motion or Conatus ad Motum may be intrinsick and from that intrinsick Principle may have a motion or Conatus ad Motum downward which I call the intrinsick quality of Gravity this intrinsick quality governs and enclines the Motion and Conatus ad Motum to a central termination when it hath no collateral impediment Any man with half an eye may see here is a Conatus ad Motum of the heavy Body to a central motion which is its Gravitation and yet the Principle that impresseth this kind of termination of its Motion is that which I call and call truly the Quality of Gravity in the heavy Body In the very Instance of the Motion of Water in relation to the Rundle of Wood specifically lighter than Water we may observe both these Gravitations or Motions the Water presseth downward from its intrinsecal Principle or Quality of Gravity and thereby undermines and gets below the Rundle and then by a relative occasional or accidental motion in relation to the Rundle of Wood it presseth upward and drives up the Rundle of Wood with a force and kind of gravitation or motion upward to the Superficies of the Water The same Water hath these various terminations one downward from its own intrinsick quality of Gravity though the exercise thereof be suspended till it find a lighter Body within its dimension to exert it the other upward in relation to the Rundle of Wood which by circumpulsion it drives upward And therefore the kind consequences that I hold there is nothing but mobility in Bodies and that I use the phrase of Gravity according to the vulgar acceptation and as Idolum fori or that the actual descent of Water or other heavy Body is from a distinct Being as is inferred in the first second and sixth Sections of that Chapter are but mistaken Collections and have no concession from me or any thing I have therein asserted nor are at all true as I think As to the 4 th and 5 th Illation in that Remark where it is said The Water hath no Nisus ad motum upward into the Tube immersed and stopped at the lower end till opened that in the Sequel of this Enquiry will appear not to be altogether true But if it were never so true yet it impugnes not what is above by me delivered for the Water is driven up into the Tube by the weight of the body of the Water in the Bucket upon the Cavity of the Tube filled only with Air and so the rising of the Water into the Tube is by the pressure of an accidental Position and the fluidity of the ascending Water meeting with an Element in the Tube lighter than the Water We see in a pair of Scales a weight of two pound in one Scale makes the weight of one pound in the other Scale to ascend though both are heavy Bodies and this by Mechanique and Statique Principles So in the Siphon A B Water poured into the Leg A raiseth the water in the other Leg to an equal Superficies upon necessary statique grounds without calling in any subsidiary Spirit of Nature to effect the ascent for rhe Siphon is a kind of natural Libra And so when the Tube stopped with the Finger beneath is immersed into a Bucket of Water and then opened the circumjacent water being both fluid and heavy is driven up into the vacant Tube till it come to an equal Superficies with the rest of the water in the Bucket by a kind of due Equipondium And all this is most regularly and necessarily effected according to the common Mechanism of Statique Principles without any help from the supposed Spirit of Nature to fetch out the Air out of the Tube or to raise the Water into it There be many accidental causes of the motion of water vertically upward which yet consist with its intrinsecal principle or quality which I call Gravity or Conatus to a central motion For instance 1. It is moved upward by casting into it a heavier Body which takes up some of its room as throwing a Stone into a Bucket of water 2. It is moved upward by attraction as in Pumps and Syringes 3. It is moved upward when within its own dimension it meets with a lighter body than it self as in the instance of the Tube of Air immersed and then unstopped at the bottom or where a Rundle of lighter Wood is immersed in it it is apparent the water raiseth it and casteth it to the Superficies with a kind of Force so that it will leap above the Superficies of the water when it comes thither But these accidental vertical Motions do not at all take away the intrinsick principle of its Gravity but consist with it and therefore it is no contradiction to say that Gravitation is but Conatus ad Motum be the motion lateral or vertical or central and yet at the same time to say that Gravity is a quality in heavy bodies that specificates and determines their Conatus ad Motum to be central or perpendicular REMARK II. Descent of Bodies THis Remark would surely have have been spared if the Author had been pleased to have read the next Page where it is affirmed that Water powred through the Air hath a direct central Direction and Gravitation Pag. 14. of the Essay REMARK III. Touching the Gravitation of Parts of Solid Bodies one upon another THat every part of a Solid Body hath its common quality of heaviness and would in a state of Separation descend and that every part contributes to the weight of the whole is no where questioned only when the Body is in continuity and of an equal consistence that there is a suspension of actual Gravitation of one part upon another is that which is affirmed But where they are of different Consistencies there many times happens actual and sensible Gravitation of one part of a Solid Body upon another This is observed in the Third Chapter of the Nugae pag. 1. And had it been observed the Remark I suppose would have been spared REMARK IV V VI VII Upon the Fourth CHAPTER FOr the rendring my Thoughts more intelligible touching Gravitation of FLUIDS and to make my Approaches to it the more easie and fair I give in that Chapter Instances of solute solid Bodies and how the pressure of their parts are refracted I
In some things therein mentioned we very well agree namely in the exclusion of that prodigious Gravity and Elasticity of the Air whereunto the late Philosophers attribute the Solution not only of the Torricellian Experiment but many other Phaenomena In some things we differ he from me in my Solution of many of the Phaenomena mentioned in my Pamplets by Rarefaction Condensation and Attraction I differ also from him and the state of that difference I set down shortly thus both in the Negative and in the Affirmative 1. I do not deny but do really assure my self there are created Spirits some simply void of all corporeal or physical matter others that though possibly they may have a material or physical Hypostasis or Substratum yet it is so subtil that it may deserve the name of a spiritual being in common expression 2. I do not conclude it impossible in Nature but that there may be such a kind of common Spirit of Nature as the Author would have and not much unlike to Helmonts Archeus which he puts into a middle Office between the Soul and Body or the Colcoda of Avicen 3. But yet I do say I am not satisfied that there is sufficient evidence clearly to evince the same the rather because I see no necessity for such a being in as much as Almighty God and his intimate presence with all his Works and the Laws that he hath alligated to the natures of things abundantly supply all the general Offices for the common good and order of the Universe deputed to this Spirit of Nature And the particular active Forms or Principles of Life or Motion placed by the God of Nature in the several Ranks of Beings supplies what is necessary for their particular motions operations and instincts 4. That the existence of a Spirit of Nature is not at all proved by those Motions and Effects in Nature that are either purely mechanical or that have any other immediate cause of greater or but as great probability as such an unseen Spirit of Nature 5. That consequently the rising of a Rundle in the Water or the suspension of a weight in the Embolus of an Air-Pump the Phaenomena in the Torricellian Experiment or in the Magdeburgh Hemispheres or in Pumps or Siphons are non only invalid Arguments to prove such an Hylarchical Spirit but very improper and disadvantageous to the Supposition it self 6. But if there be any such Hylarchical Spirit the proofs thereof should be made from such things as seem to have in themselves the Principles of their own motions or at least no other visible or probable immediate external cause of such their motions 7. That if there be such an Hylarchical Principle as is contended for and that he doth interpose in many things that are not Automata yet it is most reasonable to suppose that the most exquisite methods of Mechanism are the most probable Media whereby it performeth such operations 8. That therefore the Author of the Remarks should not be too much averse to the Mechanism of those Motions in Nature as purely inconsistent with his Hylarchical Hypothesis for hereby he renders it less credible by denying things that are evident to Sense and transposing them beyond credibility lest they should seem to prejudice his Supposition of an Hylarchical Principle It is too much the fashion of men engaged in Suppositions to run into extreams and that even in this Instance of Mechanism and Mechanical Motions in Natural Bodies as I have shewed in the second preliminary Chapter of this Book some attributing too much to the Mechanism of things in Nature and some too little And it seems to me that the Learned Author of these Remarks out of the zeal he hath for the asserting of a most certain Truth namely the existence of incorporeal Spirits hath gone farther than was either fit or needful in the attribution of these Phaenomena in Nature whereof we have been debating to the immediate operation of an incorporeal vital Spirit which he calls the Spirit of Nature which yet are reasonably salved by the Mechanism of Bodies and the most wise Order Institution and Laws setled by the great Creator of all things which Laws are called the Laws of Nature FINIS Books printed for and to be sold by William Shrowsbury at the Sign of the Bible in Duck-lane AN Essay touching the Gravitation or Non-Gravitation of Fluid Bodies and the reasons thereof in 8. Stereometric or the Art of Practical Gauging shewing in two Parts 1. Diverse facile and compendious ways for Gauging of â—uns and Brewers Vessels of all Forms and Figures either in whole or gradually from Inch to Inch whether the Tun or Vessels Bases above and below be Homogeneal or Heterogeneal parallel and alike situate or not 2. The Gauging of any Wine Brandy or Oyl-Cask be the same assum'd as Sphaeroidal Parabolical Conical or Cylindrical either full or partly empty and at any position of the Cask or Altitude of contained Liquor performed either by brief Calculation or Instrumental Operation Together with a Large Table of Area's of a Circles Segments and other necessary Tables and their excellent Utilities and Improvements with a copious and methodical Index of the whole rendring the Work perspicuous and intelligible to Mean Capacities By John Smith Philo-Accomptant in 8. Franconis Burgersdicii Idaea Philosophiae Naturalis sive Methodus Definitionum Controversiarum Physicarum Editio Novissima Huc accessit Idea Oeconomicae Politicae Doctrinae Eodem Auctore Opus Posthumum 12. De Antiqua Ecclesiae Britannicae Libertate atque de legitima ejusdem Ecclesiae exemptione à Romano Patriarchatu Diatribe per aliquot Theses diducta Autore I. B. S S. Theol. Professore 4. Contemplations Moral and Divine First and Second Part in 8. Spadacrene Dunelmensis Or A short Treatise of an ancient Medicinal Fountaln or Vitrioline Spaw near the City of Durham Together with the Constituent Principles Virtues and Uses thereof By E. W. Doctor in Physick