the Gauls of his time weak in war because they were rich For what is commonly said That Gold is the sinew of War is true as to the power of levying and maintaining of men but not as to the performing of great exploits and enterprises Mercenary Souldiers and Venal Souls being ordinarily base and of ill qualities if they do any thing 't is forc'd and of little duration nor do they continue longer then the Gold lasts Iron on the contrary is maintain'd by it self and its own power Every one fears to offend such as have only Iron by their side as those by whom nothing is to be gotten but much may be lost For to use Gold for repelling enemies and diverting them elsewhere constant experience manifests it a very dangerous remedy since besides the ignominy of becoming as it were tributaries they are never driven so far but they soon return more irritated with the thirst of this Gold then they were before with the honour of Victory In fine since men yield sooner to violence then to gentleness Iron which constrains and forces is much more powerful then Gold which perswades but chiefly in War where the bravest and most generous exploits are perform'd by open force and not by surprises and treacheries he not being properly overcome who was willing to be so and suffer'd him self to be corrupted but a Victory gotten by pure Valour ordinarily takes from the enemies the desire of returning The Second said That Victory being the end of War it matters not by what means that end is obtain'd the easiest and least bloody of which are stratagems and surprizes which besides being the effects of Wit and Prudence seem more proper to man then down-right force wherein beasts surpass us and which is oftimes accompani'd with injustice Wherefore Gold whereby all secret intelligences are contriv'd seems to have the advantage of Iron as slights in War are more efficacious then open force As also it makes less noise and hath more fruit whereas Iron oftentimes equally subdues and weakens both parties And Victory the thing aimed at by War cannot be call'd such unless it be intire Iron indeed subdues bodies not hearts but Gold wins both together The Third said That Gold and Iron may be consider'd either simply as Metals or else as Instruments of civil life In the former consideration Gold being of a more perfect nature hath also more power then Iron the most imperfect and terrene of all besides its ductility makes it more capable of extension then any other which is an evidence of its perfection If they be consider'd as means and instruments destinated to the use of life which is the noblest end whereunto they can be imploy'd Gold will still have the advantage over Iron since if we credit the Chymists potable Gold is profitably employ'd for health and the prorogation of life and the same Metal is also the bond of humane society which cannot subsist without commerce nor this without money for which Gold is the most proper as containing in small bulk the value of all other Metals of lower alloy Hence we see the people commonly raise the price of it beyond what the Prince sets upon it and 't is as much desir'd by all the world as Iron is abhorr'd all Professions and Trades aiming at the enjoyment of gold which seems to be the ultimate end of all humane actions in this life whatever disguises men assume under the pretexts of honour and vertue whose lustre is also set off by that of Gold employ'd for this purpose to crown the heads of Monarchs and to render divine worship more magnificent The Fourth said That as Iron makes Hammers and Anvils which serve to give Gold what form we please so 't is every where the master of gold and consequently more powerful in Peace and War affording Grates Locks and Keys for securing Gold in the former and Swords for defending it in the latter For Gold serves only to make the possessor envi'd and inflame the desires of such as want it 'T was with Iron that the Romans became masters of the Gold of other Nations and the Portugals conquer'd that of Peru and the Swisses overcame the Duke of Burgundy the History observing that all their wealth was not worth the Gold wherewith the Burgundians had enrich'd their horses bridles The Fifth said That the end being not only more noble but also more powerful then the means Iron which is commonly employ'd for the getting of Gold must be also inferior to it And 't is universally acknowledg'd that Gold is the sinew of War it levies and keeps men together it makes the Cannon move and all its train 'T is with Gold that we corrupt Spies without whose informations all Iron and strength would be oftentimes unprofitable Wherefore since Iron borrows its power from Gold by the Philosophical Maxim it hath less power then it CONFERENCE CXV I. Of the cause of Vapours II. Which is less culpable Rashness or Cowardice THe First said The material cause of Vapours is aqueous humidity the efficient external heat the formal rarefaction the final is various according to nature's different intentions but commonly the elevation of an aqueous body which remaining in its first consistence would weigh more then air and consequently could not be carried to those higher places where 't is needful for the generation of Mixts which cannot be done without transmutation of the Elements into the places yea and natures also one of another So Roses in an Alembick would evaporate nothing if they were depriv'd of all humidity as appears in their dry'd Cakes nor what humidity may be in them without heat which humidity is rarifi'd and carri'd upwards before it descends being again condens'd into the water which resided in the Cake before its separation by heat which consequently is the most evident cause of Vapours The Second said There are some vapours that are hot and dry as appears not only by the smoak exhaling from boiling Pitch and other unctuous bodies but also by the vapours that issue out of the earth which would never be inflam'd some in the surface of the earth others in the middle of the air and others beyond the highest region and even in the heavens if they were only of the nature of water which quencheth instead of conceiving fire as on the other side Rain Hail Snow Dew and other aqueous and incombustible Meteors argue that all Vapours of which they must be produc'd are not hot and dry Whence I conclude that as the matter of vapours is various so their other causes are all different especially the efficient For the degree of heat that evaporates water will not make Oyl exhale as we see a great glass will be sooner evaporated then a spoonful of the latter and the Chymists make use of a small fire or even of the Sun to distill their waters but augment their fire to extract Oyls Moreover as to the material causes the vapours of hot
contrary maintain'd that all things were done by Chance in the Universe which they said it self was made by the casual occourse of their Atoms these denying the Providence of God those his Power by subjecting and tying him to the immutable Laws of Fatality But without considering things in reference to God to whom every thing is present and certain we may distinguish them into two sorts Some acting necessarily have alwayes their necessary effects others which depend absolutely upon Man's Will which is free and indifferent have accordingly Effects incertain and contingent Thus the accidents of the Sea where the vulgar believes is the chief Empire of Fortune natural deaths the births of poor and rich have regular and necessary Causes On the contrary Goods freely given or acquir'd with little industry or found have contingent Causes which being almost infinite for there is no Cause by it self but may be a Cause by accident by producing another thing than what was intended they cannot fall within the knowledge of Humane Wit which knows onely what is finite and terminate Other Events have Causes mixt of Chance and Necessity as the death of the Poet Aeschylus hapning by a Tortoise which an Eagle let fall upon his bald Head As for the second manner wherein Happiness may be consider'd namely Whether it render us happy in Reality or in Imagination 't is an accusing all Men of folly to say that Felicity is imaginary and phantastical since Nature which hath given no Desire in vain as she should have done if she had caus'd us to desire a thing that exists not makes all Men aspire to the one and fear the other There must be an Absolute Happiness as well as an Absolute Good namely the possession of this Good as that of Existence is which being the foundation of all Goods must be a Real and Absolute Good Virtue and the Honor attending it being likewise true and solid Goods their possession must adferr a semblable Felicity the verity and reality is no more chang'd by not being equally gusted by all than the savour of Meat or the Beauty of Light would be by not being perceiv'd by a sick or a blind person Yea as he that ha's a rough Diamond is not less the possessor or less rich for not knowing the value of it so he that possesses some Good ought not to be accounted less happy though he think not himself so Moreover 't would be as absurd to call a Man happy or unhappy because he thinks himself so as to believe a fool is a King or Rich because he phansies himself to have Empires and Riches The Fifth said That Happiness which is rather an Effect of our Genius as the examples of Socrates and Simonides prove than of our Temperament much less of the Stars and their influences depends not onely upon the possession of some Good or the belief a Man hath that he possesses it but upon both together namely upon the reflexion he makes upon the Good which he really possesses for want of which Children Fools Drunkards and even the Wise themselves whilst they are a sleep cannot be call'd Happy CONFERENCE CXXXVI Of the Original of Precious Stones A Stone which is defin'd a Fossile hard dry and frangible body is either common or precious Both are compounded of the Four Elements chiefly of Water and Earth but diversly proportion'd and elaborated Coarse Stones are made with less preparation their proximate matter being onely much Earth and little Water whereof is made a sort of Clay which being dry'd by Nature is hardned into a Stone Precious Stones have more of Water and less of Earth both very pure and simple whence proceeds their Lustre which attends the simplicity of the Elements and exactly mixt by Heat which concocting the aqueous humidity purifies and sublimes the same to a most perfect degree by help of that Universal Spirit where-with the Earth and whole world is fill'd on which account the Pythagoreans esteemed it a great Animal The Second said Three things are to be consider'd in reference to the original of Stones their matter their efficient cause and the place of their generation Their remote matter is Earth and Water which two Elements alone give bulk and consistence but their next matter concern'd in the Question is a certain lapidifick juice supplying the place of Seed and often observ'd dropping down from rocks which if thick and viscous makes common stones if subtil and pure the precious Now this juice not only is turn'd it self into stone but likewise turns almost all other Bodies as Wood Fruits Fishes the Flesh of Animals and such other things which are petrifi'd in certain Waters and Caves Their remote efficient cause is Heat which severing heterogeneous bodies unites those of the same nature whereof it makes the said homogeneous juice which is condens'd by cold which giving the last form and perfection to the stone is its proximate efficient cause Lastly their place is every where in the middle region of the Air which produces Thunder-bolts in the Sea which affords Coral of a middle nature between Stone and Plant and Pearls in their shells which are their wombs by means of the Dew of Heaven in Animals in Plants and above all in the Earth and its Mines or Matrices which are close spaces exempt from the injuries of Air Water or other external Agents which might hinder their production either by intermixtion of some extraneous body or by suffering the Mineral Spirits serving to the elaboration of the Stones to transpire The Third said Precious Stones produc'd for Ornament as Metals are for Use of life are of three sorts namely either bright and resplendent as the Diamond Ruby Crystal Amethyst or a little obscure as the Turquois Jasper and other middle ones without perfect lustre as the Opal and all Pearls And as the matter of common Stones is Earth the principle of Darkness so that of the precious is an aqueous diaphanous humour congeal'd by the coldness of water or earth or by the vicinity of Ice and Snow which inviron Mountains and Rocks where commonly their Mines are found and amongst others Crystal which is as 't were the first matter of other precious Stones and the first essay of Nature when she designs to inclose her Majesty in the lustre of the most glittering Jewels is nothing else but humidity condens'd by cold Whence a violent heat such as that of Furnaces resolves and melts it Moreover the effects attributed to these Stones as to stop blood allay the fumes of wine and resist hot poysons argue them caus'd only by cold which also gives them weight by condensation of their parts The Fourth said If Crystals and Stones were produc'd only by cold they could not be generated in the Isles of Cyprus the red Sea and other Southern parts but only in the Northern where nevertheless they are most rare there being Mountains where cold hath preserv'd Ice for divers Ages without ever being converted into
attribute Crisis to the Moon viz. her moving by quaternaries and septenaries her notablest changes hapning every seventh day is too general For though she rules over Moistures or Humidities and a Crisis is only in Humoral Diseases yet she cannot introduce any change in the above-mentioned Critical Days rather then in others because then she must have this power either from her self or from some other and the several Aspects of the Sun Not from her self for then no change would happen in the Moon her self nor consequently in us by her means since things which are of themselves in some subject continue always the same Not from the Sun for then these alterations in Diseases should happen onely at certain postures of the Moon and not in all Now suppose Alexander fall sick to day and Aristotle to morrow yet neither of them shall have a Crisis but on the seventh day Besides the opposition of the Moon being less at the seventh then at the thirteenth day the Crisis should be rather on the latter then on the former And the same effect of the Septenary in the Conception Life Nutrition and Actions of Animals which is not observ'd hitherto the stomach digesting not better on the seventh day and the seed not being stronger that day in the matrix then on any other and the eighth day wherein the Moon is further from the first then she was on the seventh should cause the Crisis and not the seventh In brief the septenaries of diseases rarely agree with the Septenaries of the Quarters of the Moon whose motions being unequal according to the different elevation of her Epicicle would render Crisis uncertain Wherefore Galen not finding his reckoning hit with the Lunar Motion feign'd a Medicinal Moneth consisting of six and twenty days and some hours but he hath had no followers therein Fracastorius went a better way attributing the cause of Crises to the motion of Melancholly which is on the fourth day but as the bilious humor moving alone on the third day without melancholly doth nothing so melancholly alone produceth not any Crisis on the fourth day The fifth hath also the motion of Bile alone and consequently is without effect The sixth is quiet in reference to these humors being the day of neithers motion but on the seventh these two Biles concurring together make a great critical agitation But if the matter be not then sufficiently fermented and concocted the Crisis will not come till the fourteenth when the same motion of those two humors is again repeated The Third said That this opinion of Fracastorius makes Crises fall upon dayes not critical as the tenth thirteenth sixteenth ninteenth and two and twentieth contrary to all antiquity and daily experience and is founded in an errour namely that one humor cannot putrifie in the body whilst the rest remain pure seeing Quotidian Fevers are caus'd by Phlegm alone Tertians by Choler alone and Quartans by Melancholly alone and that no other reason can be given of the regular motion of Crisis but that of the motion of the Heavens CONFERENCE CLXIX What Bodily Exercise is the most healthful WHat motion is to the Aire and Water yea and to Fire too which it maintains that is it to our Bodies Ease makes them heavy and of the nature of the Earth which of all the Elements alone delights therein For the Body consisting of the Elements it necessarily without motion falls into the corruption which Rest introduces into them and the excrements remaining after nutrition either recoile back into the masse of Blood or else resting in that part of the body which is satiated with them overcharge the same and cause that plenitude which is so much suspected by Hippocrates On the contrary Motion awakens the natural heat drives out the excrements collected by ease strengthens the Members and renders all the Faculties more vigorous provided onely that it be us'd after evacuation of the grosser Excrements and before meat because then rest is necessary otherwise the food in the Stomach will be subverted and the motion of the outward parts will too soon attract from the inward the food undigested whence many diseases arise And this right use of Exercise is so necessary to health that the Athenians purposely dedicated a place for exercises call'd Gymnasiun to Apollo the God of Physick for which word the Art which treats of exercises is call'd Gymnastica and the Sorceries of Medea may be better understood of Exercises which make young and strengthen bodies formerly soft and effeminate than of Herbs wherewith she stuffed the bodies of old men whom she had jugulated an Art without which Plato and Aristotle thought a Commonwealth could not be good and to which chiefly is to be attributed the difference found between our modern Souldiers and the Roman Legionaries yea between the good habitude of their bodies and the weakness of ours who have so intermitted their exercises that onely the names of many are left Now since motion which to deserve the name of exercise must alter the respiration of the Animal is violent to it and of violent things we cannot take too little I conceive that such exercise as holds the mean between rest and extream motions is the best As Riding or going on Horseback which giving us motion diminishes the labour thereof and stirs all the parts of the body which happens not when only one part of the same body is exercis'd and the rest remain unmov'd The Second said That Exercise which is a voluntary motion and agitation of the Body with respiration increas'd whereby 't is distinguisht from the labour of Artisans and Labourers and from Actions accompany'd with no striving as playing on Instruments was transferr'd to the use of Physick by one Herodicus according to Plato in the third Book of his Republick and 't is taken two wayes either for that which is made by the proper motion of the Body or for such motion as is external to it as Swinging the Petaurum of the Latins Navigation going in a Coach or Litter As for those made by the Body alone they are of three sorts Athletical Military and Ludicrous or Pass-times The Athletick though the ancientest yet to me seem the most unprofitable serving onely to harden the surface of the body and the extream parts as the Armes and Legs such were Wrastling which is still in use among our Britains and at Constantinople before the Grand Seignior's Gate amongst some Tartars whom they call Pluyanders Acrochirism which consisted onely in keeping the fingers interlac'd one within the other Fifty-cuffs call'd anciently Pugilatus and imitated at this day by the Gondoliers at Venice Cae'stus wherein the hands were arm'd with plates of Copper and Pancratia which was compounded of Wrastling and Pugilate Of this sort were also Running commended by Seneca in his fifteenth Epistle for the Chief of Exercises and by Plato in the eighth Book of his Republick Leaping on high and in length either on both Feet or on
The Third said That there are four colours answering to the Elements viz. Black to Earth White to Water Yellow to Air and Red to Fire For discovering the Causes of whose diversities the ancient Philosophers prepar'd a Matter which by the degrees of fire they pass'd through all the colours of Nature and perceiv'd sometimes in their vessel what they call'd the Peacock's tail representing all colours in one single Matter whence they concluded the variety of colours to proceed from that of External Fire moving the Matter less in one part than in another Thus Antimony which is at first Black is rais'd into White Yellow Red and mixt Flowers according as they are sublim'd more or less But you can draw no consequence from hence to the Colours of Plants since redness which in works of Art argues perfect Digestion and Fire predominant doth not so in Simples CONFERENCE CLXXXVIII Whether we are more perspicacious in the Affairs of others or our own and why IT may seem superfluous to make this a Question since by the enumeration of all sorts of Affairs it appears that we are Moles yea perfectly blind in the Judgement we make of our selves and more clear-sighted than the Lynx in those we make of others Which also the Gospel testifies by the comparison of a mote which we espy in the Eye of a Neighbour not seeing the beam which is in our own for according to the direction of the Lawyers who are to be believed in point of affairs in the first place in reference to persons every one understands himself much less either in Mind or Body than he doth another most esteeming themselves more capable and worthy of praise for Witt than they are and as the Eye sees not it self but every other visible thing so he that hath any perfection or imperfection cannot consider the same in its true Latitude but easily adds something to the first or diminishes from the second whilst the various bent of our Passions always exalts and depresses the balance and keeps it from that aequilibrium which is necessary to a right Judgement Hence Physicians although they ought to know themselves better than they can be known by others yet when sick permit themselves to be treated by their Companions and never succeed so well in the Cure of themselves or their domesticks as they do abroad elsewhere In the second place we are less quick-sighted in things that concern our selves than in those of others whence commonly the greatest Lawyers leave the affairs of their own Houses more imbroiled than others Which was the cause that the Wife of Pacius the famous Lawyer of our time sent to him to ask his Advice concerning his own affairs under fancied names making him pay a Solicitor with his own Money In the third place Actions are in a very evill hand when they are to be managed or defended by their Authors either Modesty on the one hand extenuating them or Thrasonical pride dilating them and adding thereunto more than is fit Lastly the Laws shew sufficiently what hath been the opinion of Legislators upon this matter when they forbid Advocates and Procurators to plead and practise in their own Cause and when they injoyn Judges to forbear not only their own but also from all those wherein their kinred or alliances may have any interest Thus much for the first Head of the Question The Reason which is the second ariseth hence That the Eye as well as all other Organs of External and Internal Senses such as the Judgement is must be serene and not prepossessed by any tincture or Prejudice Now to require this serenity and indifferency in our own affairs is to demand an impossibility The Cause whereof may come from the pureness and subtilty of the Humane Spirit above that of other Animals compared to the Elements of Earth and Water which contracting themselves round about their own Centre move not but in quest of their food others more ayerious rise a little higher but yet have a bounded Region such are the spirits of Women whose Knowledg and Curiosity is limited to the affairs of their houswifrie or at most to those of their neighbourhood But the Mind of Man resembling Fire which hath no other bound but Heaven penetrates even to the Centre of the Earth carries its point every where and is like flame in a perpetual agitation oftentimes resembling our natural heat in Summer which abandons the Internal parts to carry it self to the extremities The Second said There is as great diversity of Judgements and Witts as there is of Eyes amongst Men. As there are some blind other Eyes from which the Objects must be set at distance to become visible some also to which they must be approached and lastly others which require a moderate distance between the Visible Object and the Organ Iin like manner there are some Judgements absolutely blind others which judge not things too near but require to have them removed or set at a middle distance there are others also which judge them better near hand than a far off and this truly is the custom of the best Judgements and of such as least suffer themselves to be prepossess'd Indeed what is more absurd than for us to remove far from Objects in order to judging of them after the manner of old men and of those that are short-sighted and if the saying of Aristotle be true The Species of the thing to be known must be not only introduced into but also made like the Mind Is the divesting our selves of it away to know it well By this reckoning we shall never see clear in any affair not in our own because 't is ours nor in those others in regard of the Envy Men bear to the prosperity of their Neighbours which makes them think that their Vines are more fruitful and their afflictions less severe If some Physicians resign themselves to the cure of others of the same profession 't is because they believe them as able as themselves or perhaps because their own Judgement is disturbed by the disease otherwise since the particular Knowledge of every one's Temper is the condition most requisite to a good Physician for curing his Patient and every one knowing his own better than another can in along time none can be a better Physician of another than of himself and if domestick cures be effected with less notice yet they are not less sure and remarkable to him that would consider them That Lawyers are not admitted to plead in their own Case is rather from their too much than too little Knowledge the Court foreseeing that they would be too prolix and hot in the prosecution thereof besides the greater temptation to dishonesty in disguising their own actions Nor is exception against Judges in the case of their kinred allowed because they see not clear enough into the affair in question but because interest which is inseparably fixed in humane minds might lead them to relieve their Relations to
which is in Caves and places under ground where it continues in its own nature is not frozen Nor yet that which lies expos'd to the influence of a cold air especially when it may easily insinuate it self into it Whence it comes that to cause water to freeze in a short time it must be warm'd before it be expos'd to the Air which finding its pores open by the heat so much the more speedily insinuates it self into it For as to what is maintain'd by some Physicians to wit that the Air is hot and moist seems to have been advanc'd by them rather to make a correspondence of the four possible combinations of qualities to so many Elements than for any convictive reason since the Air is never hot if it be not warm'd by some other heat then it hath in it self such as is that of Fire or the Sun-beams and these too must be reflected by the Earth On the contrary when it continues in its own nature as it does in the night-time during the absence of the Sun it is actually cold nay even in the greatest heats of Summer it keeps its coolness provided there be no application made to a hot body as may be seen in our Ladie 's Fanns who forcing away the Air from their hot faces are refresh'd by its coolness which then cannot proceed from any other principle than the proper nature of Air inasmuch as motion would be more likely to imprint heat on them then cold And this is further confirm'd by the Air we breathe the reciprocation whereof cools our Lungs whereas it should warm them if it were hot as the Peripateticks would have it It happens therefore that the Air for that reason call'd by some Philosophers primum frigidum the first cold insinuating it self into the Water produces therein the effect which Aristotle attributes to it to wit that of congregating all things as well of the same as of several kinds And whereas our common water what simplicity soever there may be in it consists of all the Elements especially Earth and Air the Air joyning it self to what it meets withal of its own Nature does in the first place render that cold and being by that means united to the other parts viz. to the Earth unperceivably intermixt with the Water and to the Water it self contracts and compresses them so as that they take up less space then they did before as may be seen in a Bottle fill'd with water and frozen up which though it had been full is nevertheless found to contain air in its upper part And yet this compression cannot be so well made but that there remain several particles of Air enclos'd in the Spaces of the Ice which were it not for that air would be vacuous and this by reason the surface as was said before freezing up first it from thenceforward hinders from making their way out those parts of air which either were got in before or caus'd by the avoiding of vacuity when the Center and other parts of the Water are forc'd by the Cold to take up less place then they did before We conclude therefore and say that though the Ice be dense and hard by reason of that compression of all its parts yet is lighter than Water because there is air enclos'd within it which cannot return to its sphere as that does which gets into the Water which by reason of its liquidity makes way for it So that it is no more to be wondred at why Ice is lighter than Water then that cork being harder is lighter than the same water Otherwise had the Ice no Air inclos'd within it as it happens to that engendred in Mines which in process of time comes to be Crystall it would fall to the bottom of the water as the other does The same thing may be instanc'd in porous wood which swims upon the water whereas Ebony by reason of its solidity and want of pores will sink The Second said That whether the Air be granted to be light or not or that it pass only for a body less weighty than the water as this latter is less heavy than the earth certain it is that the intermixt Air not that comprehended within the concavities but that diffus'd through the least parts of the Ice is that which makes it lighter inasmuch as it augments its sinnuosities as may be observ'd in a bottle fill'd with water which breaks when the water is congeal'd in regard that being converted into Ice the bottle cannot contain it So that as Snow is lighter than Hail so this latter is lighter than Ice and this last is lighter than water in regard it contains less matter in an equal space Accordingly it is the Air that freezes the water yet dos it not follow thence that it should be the primum frigidum as the Iron which is red hot burnes more vehemently than the elementary fire yet is not that red hot Iron the primum calidum that distinction proceeding from the difference of matter which as it must be the more compact in order to a greater burning so the cold for its better insinuation into all the parts of the water requires the conveyance of the Air. As to the lightness of Ice it seems to be the more strange upon this consideration that Physicians explicate lightness by heat as they do heaviness by cold But the fiery vapors which are in the water as may be said of that which hath been warm'd contribute very much to that lightness it being not incompatible that these contrary qualities should be lodg'd in the same Subject considering the inequality of the one in respect of the other and it is not to be thought a thing more strange that there should be potentially hot Exhalations in the water than that the Nile should abound in Nitre which is of an igneous nature Now from what matter soever the cold proceeds 't is evident by its action that it is not a privation of heat as some Philosophers would have maintain'd since that which is not as privation cannot have any effect But those who have referr'd freezing as well as thawing to the Constellations seem to have come near the mark in as much as those making certain impressions in the Air which serves for a mean to unite the Influences of the celestial bodies to the inferior diversly affect them one while contracting another dilating them according to the diversity of matter there being some not susceptible of congelation as the Spirit of Wine and Quintessences either upon the account of their heat or simplicity The Third said That if the first qualities of cold and heat were the Causes of freezing and thawing they would always happen accordingly the former when it is most cold and the other when the cold diminishes Now many times we find the contrary there being some dayes without any frost on which thaws we are more sensible of cold and sometimes we perceive it yet without any perceivable remission of the
Meteors where the greatest difficulty is to know whether that effect is produc'd by the expulsive or by the attractive and retentive vertue That we should affirm it proceeds from the expulsive vertue cannot with any probability be done inasmuch as expulsion is to be wrought by somewhat that is more powerful and more subtile Now there is not any likelyhood that Iron should be more powerful and more subtile than Air inasmuch as the Iron is of a more weighty matter passive earthy and hath somewhat of the nature of that Passive Element We may therefore rather affirm that this effect is wrought by the attractive and retentive vertue which opinion is prov'd in regard there is but one humid matter which the central fire forces from the deepest part of the Earth and of the more unctuous and weighty part of this matter Metals are made of the less weighty Minerals and Salts from the subtiler part Vegetables and Animals derive their nourishment of the most subtile are produc'd the Winds Thunder and all the Meteors which participate of Heat and Drought which make several combinations in the Air. Now whereas it is from the most imperfect part of this unctuous matter that Iron is made of an earthy and impure Sulphur it is deducible thence that there is a Sympathy between Iron and the gross vapours of Thunder and Lightning To make which out a little more clearly we find that the places through which Thunder hath pass'd smell of Sulphur nay there is fram'd in the Air that which is commonly called the Thunderbolt which somewhat resembles Steel as it were to shew the correspondence there is between Iron and Thunder So that the Air being impregnate by those noisome terrestrial vapours which are of the same nature with Iron meeting with some piece of it laid on a vessel is joyn'd to the Iron by Sympathy makes a sudden stop there and puts a period to its operation and the Iron by its attractive vertue receives them as by its retentive it retains them and by that means prevents their effect The Third said That though that opinion were probable yet doth it require a more ample discussion and we are to examine how this attractive vertue operates Now there are four Natural Vertues which govern all the operations of Nature and Art the Attractive which is now under consideration acts by heat and a temperate drought the Retentive by drought and cold the Expulsive by moisture and heat the Digestive by heat and a temperate moisture The Iron then which is said to attract these vapours hath indeed those qualities of heat and drought yet can it not be easily conceiv'd that a little piece of that mettal can check the malice and infection of a great quantity of Air spread all over a spacious place besides that it is also necessary that the Iron should send forth out of it self the effects of its qualities that so the attraction might be made the marks whereof are neither seen on the Iron nor the effects of the qualities out of the Subject inasmuch as mettals being quench'd in cold Water are not evaporated but by a violent fire So that it may as well be said that the attraction is wrought by some occult vertue which draws yet so as that neither the attraction nor the manner of it can be observ'd The Fourth said That the operations of Nature are not like those of Art her ways and contrivances are more obscure and the causes of things are occult as for example the Load-stone draws Iron yet so as that there cannot be any thing perceiv'd of any body of air and smoak issuing out of the Loadstone And the magnetical Balsom or Weapon-salve cures a wounded person though at a great distance having only some part of his Cloths yet can there not any thing be observ'd on the Subject which receives the Plaister so secret and silent is Nature in her Operations On the contrary the designs and contrivances of Art may easily be discover'd as those of a Clock or Watch. But the reason of this diversity of operations between Art and Nature is that Art goes to work publickly and before the Senses and Nature does her business within doors and secretly the latter works in the Centre the other in the Circumference one produces the seed of the combination of the Elements whereof she keeps an exact account of the weights and proportions and the other can neither make nor produce any thing as being only in a capacity of making use of the substance and materials of Nature in order to their joyning together after she had prepar'd and purify'd them But on the other side Art hath this advantage that her works are much more perfect inasmuch as she makes use of purify'd essences and the other of accidents and superfluities having not instruments fit for the purifying of her Materials So that there are some who doubt of the reality of the effect now under consideration And therefore ere we proceed any further to the finding out of the causes and reasons thereof it were requisite a strict enquiry should be made whether it be certain that Iron prevents the effects of thunder by preserving Wine and Eggs under a Hen that sits from receiving in any prejudice The Fifth said That what was confirm'd by general experience was not any longer to be question'd and that whoever stood upon the Negative betray'd his own ignorance that for us to think to find solutions for all the possibilities of nature were an attempt somewhat like that of exhausting the Sea That there are certain secrets in Nature of things dreadful to humane Reason incredible according to the principles of Art and of our Knowledge That Nature is the great Circe the grand Sorceress That the Load-stone draws Iron to it That there is a certain Stone called Pantarbe which draws gold to it That dead Arse-smart being laid under a Stone cures the wound on which it shall be rubb'd sooner or later according as the Herb putrifies That the hair or wool of a mangy beast being thrust in for a certain time under the bark of an Aspen-tree cures the beast of vermine That the Menstrua of Women trouble Springs spoyl Looking-glasses and Powdering-tubs And if there be some things that corrupt them it is not to be imagin'd that Nature is so cruel a Step-mother but that there may be others whereby they are preserv'd and so the Remedies may come from the same hand as caus'd the disease That the Hazel-tree discovers hidden Treasures and Mines That Talismans are made against Serpents and Insects nay against some Diseases That there is a mutual friendship between the Olive-tree and the Myrtle whereof it would be as hard a matter to give any reason as it would be to give any of the enmity between the Vine and the Laurel and the inclination which the Male-palm hath towards the Female That the crowing of the Cock frightens Lyons and that that Bird should be so exact
Land had no doubt experienc'd the michiefs of that unfaithful Element the cruellest whereof is the Scurvy a Disease complicated with several others and whose chief symptoms are the ulceration and swelling of the Gums and Legs with pains over all the Body caus'd by the impurity and malignity of the Air. But the most frequent is vomiting caus'd by the sole agitation and violence of the Air. For our aerious Spirits not only receive the qualities of the air we breathe but also follow its temper and motion as is seen by the Head-ach seising those that are beaten by winds in the Country and by the seeming turning of their heads who attentively behold the circumgyration of a Wheel or some other Body So the Air at Sea being much agitated puts in motion the Spirits which are of the same nature and these being stirr'd set the humours on work which incommoding the parts are by them driven out by vomits and other ejections according to every one's temper and propensity For the cholerick and broad-breasted vomit more easily and successfully then the phlegmatick and narrow-breasted whose Organs of respiration are not sufficiently free Whereunto also the season of the year contributes for Summer provokes vomit more then Winter when the humours being more heavy rather tend downwards But especially Custom is considerable herein which renders those that go frequently to Sea not obnoxious to its inconveniences The Fourth said That the Earth consists of three substances one Unctuous which is the inflammable moisture call'd by the Chymists Sulphur another Cinereouâ— which they call the Faeces or Caput mortuum the third humid and incombustible which they divide into Mercury and Salt this latter again into Salt-nitre and Vitriol of which the Sea being full the same is communicated to the first Region of the Air contiguous to the Waters and insinuating it self into our Bodies by inspiration produces the same effects therein that it doth taken in substance four Grains of which is a sufficient Vomit Whereto also helps the gentle agitation of the waves which makes it penetrate the examples of others vomiting and especially the fear commonly incident to such as were never upon the Sea before who are most obnoxious to this trouble For that Passion so constringes the whole Body especially the inward parts that it weakens and relaxes the Nerves especially the Fibres which keep the parts in a just tenor and so the oblique Fibres and orbicular Muscles which serve to retain them being languid suffer the juices and humours to pass out The same fear which causes relaxation of the Sphincter Ani Vesicae relaxing the Muscles which serve to open and close the upper Orifice of the Ventricle Hence fear is commonly accompani'd with the pain of this part whose sense being very exquisite is the cause that the Vulgar call it The pain of the Heart which also for the same reason happens to such as look down upon low places CONFERENCE CXIX Of Love by Inclination or Sympathy 'T Is not only amongst the Poets that Love is blind the obscurity of this causes evidencing him no less so amongst the Philosophers who assign two sorts of it one of Knowledge which tends to a good known the other of Inclination whereby we love without knowing why Indeed there is no love without ground and some sort of knowledge but yet when the cause obliging us to love is manifest it makes the former kind of love when obscure the latter whereof we have many examples in nature not only in the Symbolical qualities of the Elements Electrical and Magnetical attractions of Stones particular alliances of Metals and all the amities of Plants and Trees as of the female Palm which is said to lean towards the male and those which are found amongst Animals but especially in the particular inclinations of some Persons to others unknown and void of all recommendations to qualifie them for the same and the emotions some have felt both in Soul and Body at the first sight of their unknown Parents as also of a contrary effect when a dead body bleeds upon the presence of its Murderer which is a testimony of an antipathetical hatred contrary to the abovesaid Love which we find in our selves almost upon all occurrences as when two equally strangers play at Tennis we wish that one may win and the other lose For the first motions of Love as well as of all other Passions are not in our power and afford not the Mind time to deliberate and make reflexion upon them Hence oftentimes Anger Sadness Panick fright and such other Passions seise upon us without cause and Love doth the like frequently without any apparent reason Yea we may say there is no Love of Knowledg but what took its first rise from that of Inclination which presently makes us enamor'd of the proportions of a Face which displeases another that understands the same as well as we but without being any way affected therewith because he finds not in it that correspondence and sympathetical resemblance that produces a Love of Inclination which may also arise without any knowledge as in that blind man who lov'd a Lass whom he had never seen as also in Petrarch who made so many Verses upon his Lawra whom he could never behold The cause whereof I should attribute to the power of the Imagination which fancies somthing of loveliness where there is none or else to the sole action of the Will which not able to remain neuter between love and hatred since its action is to will and to will is to love when it meets no cause of hatred in an object loves it and hates it when it finds nothing amiable therein For if you assign the reason of this love to the transpiration of Spirits issuing out of the lov'd person's body their substance is too volatile to act so far off and their issuing being never alike because the pores of the skin are more stopt at one time then at another this love would be remarkably alter'd every moment Besides we many times love by an inclination an absent person for his merit and many have been enamour'd of Beauties at the first sight of their Pictures but love was never produc'd between two blind persons notwithstanding any emission of sympathetical Spirits Moreover 't is the Species and not the Spirits that are receiv'd by our Senses and so none should ever love those they had not seen but by a Prospective-glass The Second said That it imports not much to the causing of love whether the object be really or only imaginarily good and indeed our minds seem to interess themselves more in the pursute and preservation of the latter then the former which maintains it self by its proper worth Wherefore if Love of Inclination presuppose goodness in the object the same must be apprehended either by the Imagination or by some other Faculty to which it must therefore be approximated either immediately by it self or by it self So the
conformation The Fifth said That not only the desire of eating and drinking which is pacifi'd by enjoyment but any vehement passion even a sudden fright against which there is no remedy sometimes leads the variable Fancy of Women to interrupt the work of the Formative Vertue otherwise always very regular As a certain Woman having seen a Criminal broken upon the Wheel brought forth a child that all the bones were broken Hereunto also contribute the excess or defect of the Matter its evil quality and the deprav'd conformation of the Womb. But to attribute the communication requir'd for this effect between the Imaginative and Formative Faculties to the Umbilical Vessels cannot hold there being but one Vein two Arteries and the Vrachus without any nerves by which alone the animal spirits are transmitted from the Brain Nor can those Species without dissipation and confusion separate themselves from the mass of Blood and pass by the circuit of the Mother's Veins into the Umbilical Vein of the Foetus wherefore 't is more rational to ascribe this effect to the correspondence of the Faculties whereof the Superior indeed move the Inferior but by a simple and pure irradiation without transmitting any thing to them There needing no other communication then that of a Lutinist's finger or a Dancing-master's foot with their Imagination which yet follow one the other although it transmits not to the ends of their hands and feet the notes and cadences which they represent Thus for the imprinting of a Mark the Formative Faculty being mov'd by the Imagination hath no need to receive any Species as the Cognoscitive Faculties have of which number the Formative is not Nor is it more strange that the Foetus indu'd with a particular soul yet feels the effects of its Mothers Imagination than that Fruits receive the changes and alterations of the Trees to which they adhere CONFERENCE CXXII Of the Original of Forms A Form is that which gives either Being or Motion When it gives only Motion 't is call'd an Assistent Form as that which moves the Heavens When Being an Informant Form styl'd also an Act Perfection Essence Vertue Beauty For what ever is excellent in a Subject proceeds from the Form which determining the Indifferency of the matter of it self imperfect makes it to be one that is to say not divided in it self and divided from every thing else Created Forms are either spiritual or material and both these again either substantial or accidental Spiritual accidental Forms are Vertue Science and all Habits of the Soul Substantial spiritual forms are Intelligences and Rational souls Material accidental forms are either simple as Heat and Whiteness or compounded as Beauty and Health Under Material substantial Forms are comprehended Vegetative and sensitive Souls which are the Forms of Plants and Brutes and the Subject now in hand although I will not grant them to be Substances but only Accidents All agree that there are Forms because there are Actions which presuppose Powers These Powers are properties flowing from some active principle which sets them on work which the Matter because purely passive cannot do and therefore it must be the Form But the doubt is whether this Form be substantial or accidental as whether it be only a certain degree of Heat which makes Plants and Animals be nourisht grow generate and move or else some Substance and Form more excellent that employs Heat as its Instrument for producing those Actions And this is most probable For otherwise A Substance compounded of Matter and Form should contrary to the Maxim be made of that which is not Substance if Forms were only accidental They are introduc'd into a capable Subject by an Univocal Agent which by generation communicates a soul of the same Nature with its own which is material and consequently divisible yet so divisible as that it is not diminished in the traduction no more than the Species of a Looking-glass which produces it self wholly and entirely in all bodies capable of it or then the flame of a candle wherewith a thousand others may be lighted without any diminution of its substance The second said That Forms are primogenial Principles no more generable than the Matter which they always accompany and according to whose dispositions they only change appearance For 't is not credible that Forms the principal pieces of the world without which it would be depriv'd of that from which it bears its name to wit Ornament and Beauty are subject to continual corruption otherwise the world and the natures therein contain'd would have been chang'd in so long a time and yet they remain still the same Besides if Forms perish they must either be annihilated but nothing is so in nature or else resolv'd into that whereof they are compos'd since they are suppos'd material and nevertheless we see no remainder of them 'T is therefore always the same form but diversly dress'd and said to be generated when it changes from an imperfect to a perfect state and to be corrupted when it returns into a worse condition then what is had before both according to the several dispositions of its Subject The third said That all natural Forms are nothing but Accidents since they are in matter as in a subject from which they are inseparable and not as parts for they are parts of the whole but not of the Matter The Forms of the Elements are the first Qualities And as all Mixts are compounded of the four Elements so they derive their form as well as their matter from them which follows the nature of the Element predominant in the Compound Thus Driness is the Form of a stone which hath more of earth than of any other Element Oyl is humid because aerial all Living Creatures are Hot by reason of Heat the noblest and most active quality which attaining to the proportion requisite for performing the offices of life is call'd a Soul and according as it is more or less refin'd and meets with different subjects 't is called a Vegetative Soul in Plants and a Sensitive soul in Brutes I say further that these Forms are nothing but Modes and Fashions of Being For as Water turn'd into Air and this into Fire by rarefaction or into Water by condensation are still the same not differing but according as their parts are more or less close so as well Forms purely natural as other living Forms are nothing but Modes and Fashions of Being of the Elements their Qualities and the several Mixtures from which those Forms result The fourth said according to Anaxagoras's opinion That all things are in all and consequently Forms in the Matter out of whose bosom they are educ'd by Agents conjoyning things of the same Nature and separating others As Art which imitates Nature makes not Wine but only presses out that vegetal juice which was before in the Grape and out of Marble forms a Statue only by paring off what was superfluous so out of the Earth Nature forms Plants
Mixts are compounded The Sun indeed is the Efficient Cause of all productions here below but being a celestial and incorruptible body cannot enter into the composition of any thing as a Material Cause Much less can our common Fire which devours every thing and continually destroyes its Subject But it must be that Elementary Fire which is every where potentially and actually in its own Sphere which is above that of the Air and below that of the Moon Moreover being the lightest or least heavy of all the Elements the Harmony of the Universe which consists chiefly in their situation requires that it be in the highest place towards which therefore all other Fires which are of the same Nature ascend in a point with the same violence that a stone descends towards its Centre those remaining here below being detain'd by some Matter whereof they have need by reason of the contraries environing them from which that Sublunary Fire being exempt hath nothing to do with Matter or nourishment and by reason of its great rarity and tenuity can neither burn nor heat any more then it can be perceiv'd by us The Second said That subtlety one of the principal conditions requisite to the conversion of Matter into Fire is so far from hindring that it encreases the violence and activity of Fire making it penetrate even the solidest bodies whence that pretended Fire not being mixt with extraneous things to allay its heat as that of Aqua Vitae is temper'd by its Phlegm or aqueous humidity but being all Fire in its own Sphere and natural place which heightens the Virtue and qualities of all Agents must there also heat shine burn and produce all its Actions which depend not upon density or rarity or such other accidents of Matter purely passive but upon its whole Form which constituting it what it is must also make it produce Effects sutable to its Nature Wherefore as Water condens'd into Ice or Crystal is no longer Water because it hath ceas'd to refrigerate and moisten so the Fire pretended to be above the Air invisible and insensible by reason of its rarity is not Fire but subtile Air. They who say its natural inclination to heat and burn is restrain'd by the Influences of the Heavens particularly of the cold Starrs as Saturn and the Moon speak with as little ground since the circular motion of the Heavens whereby this Fire is turn'd about should rather increase than diminish its heat And besides Fire being a necessary Agent its action can no more be hindred by such Influences than the descent of a stone downwards Whereunto add that the beams of all Stars have heat and were any cold yet those of Saturn are too remote and those of the Moon too weak in comparison of this Fire the extent whereof is about 90000. Leagues for the distance between the Earth and the Moon is almost as much namely 56. Semidiameters of the Earth from which substracting between 25. and 30. Leagues which they allot to the three Regions of the Air the rest must be occupy'd by the Fire which they make to extend from the Concave surface of the Moon to the convex surface of the Air which it would consume in less than a moment considering the great disproportion between them Moreover were there such a Fire it could not be own'd an Element because its levity would keep it from descending and entring into the Composition of mixts and were it not leight yet it would be hindred from descending by the extream coldness of the Middle Region of the Air accounted by some a barrier to the violence of that Chymerical Fire which ought rather to be reckon'd amongst their Entia Rationis than the Natural Elements whereunto Corporeity and Palpability are requisite For these Reasons I conceive with Pythagoras that the Sun is the true Elementary Fire plac'd for that purpose in the middle of the World whose Light and Heat enter into the Composition not onely of all living things but also of Stones and Metals all other Heat besides that of the Sun being destructive and consequently no-wise fit for Generation The Third said He confounds Heaven with Earth and destroyes the Nature of the Sun who takes it for an Element that is to say a thing alterable and corruptible by its contraries which it must have if it be an Element The Heat of his beams proves it not the Elementary Fire seeing commonly the nearer we are to Fire the more we feel the Heat of it but the Supream and Middle Regions of the Air are colder than ours Besides were our common fire deriv'd from the Sun it would not languish as it doth when the Sun shines upon it nor would the heat of dunghils and caves be greater in Winter than in Summer Wherefore I rather embrace the common Opinion which holds That the heaviest Element is in the lowest place and the leightest in the highest whose Action is hindred by the proportion requisite to the quantity of each Element The Fourth said That the qualities of Fire viz. Heat Dryness and Light concurring in the Sun in a supream degree argue it the Elementary Fire for Light being the Cause of Heat the Sun which is the prime Luminous Body must also be the prime Hot that is to say Fire For as the pretended one above the Air was never yet discover'd so 't is repugnant to the Order of the Universe for the leightest of Elements to be shut up in the Centre of the Earth where some place it We have but two wayes to know things Sense and Reason the latter of which is founded either upon Causes or Effects Now we know nothing of the Sun or any other Celestial Bodies otherwise then by its Effects and sensible qualities which being united in Spherical Burning-glasses as they are in the body of the Sun notifie to us by their Effects the Nature of their Cause The Fifth said That Fire being to the World what the Soul is to the Body as Life is in all the parts of the Body so also is Fire equally diffused throughout the whole World In the Air it makes Comets and other Igneous Meteors In the Earth it concocts Metals and appears plentifully in Volcanoes whose Fires would not continue alwayes if they were violently detained in those Concavities yea 't is in the Waters too whose saltness and production of Monsters cannot be without Heat Yet being the most active of all Elements it is therefore distributed in much less quantity than the rest Nature having observed the same proportion both in the greater and lesser World Man's Body in which there is less of Fire than of the other Elements Otherwise had the Fire been equal to the rest it would consume all living things to ashes Nevertheless as the fixed Heat of Animals requires reparation by the Influent Heat from the Heart the Soul 's principal seat in like manner the Elementary Fire dispersed in all part of this great body of the World needs the
tuft of Hair upon the Forehead 'T is cover'd with very soft Hair employ'd by the Natives to make Caps of It s Flesh resembles that of Crevices and being wounded sends forth blood being also of a very sweet taste It adheres to the earth by its root which sends forth a Stem or Stalk which is inserted into its Navil To all which wonders they adde That it lives as long as there is any green Grass about it and dyes when the same is wither'd either by time or purposely And to make the comparison full they say that of all devouring Animals Wolves alone desire to feed of it We finde also some example of this double Life in the Wood of Scotland which being humected in water is turn'd into Ducks as also in the Leaves of another Tree like that of the Mulberry which Anthony Pigafet reports to have two little feet on which they run away as soon as one touches them and live onely of Aire Such likewise are the Mandrakes of upper Hungary which grow in the axact shapes of Men and Women The Baraas mention'd by Josephus which shines in the night and whose flight cannot be stopt but by the menstrual blood of a woman The Balsam-Tree which Pliny affirms to tremble at the approach of the Iron that is to make incision in it and that other Tree which Scaliger saith grows about eight foot high in the Province Pudiferam and upon the approach of a man or other Animal contracts its boughs and extends the same again upon their departure whence it took the name of Arbor Pudica which constriction and dilatation is also attributed to the Spunge In all which effects we observe powers and faculties near of kin to those of Animals The same uniformity of nature between Plants and Animals is prov'd also in that both the one and the other live and dye have their nutrition augmentation and generation If Animals have their time of being salacious Plants have theirs of being in Sap. They have dictinction of Sex as appears particularly in the Cypress Hemp and the Palm which beareth not fruit unless planted near the Male or at least some branch thereof be fastned to it They seem too to have some kinde of respiration for besides that they love the free Aire towards which they encline when planted near a high Wall or under great Trees their Root which is their mouth hath some discernment of taste eschewing hurtful soils and spreading freely into good ground and not imbibing all sorts of liquors indifferently but onely such as are convenient for them Hence their parts have names common to those of Animals as the Marrow Flesh Veins Skin In a word they seem to want onely local-motion which yet besides the foregoing examples is found in the Herba Viva of Acosta which folds up it leaves and flowers when it is toucht as likewise Tulips do in the evening and open the same again in the morning Marigolds follow the Sun and thence have gotten the Latin name Solsequia but more manifestly the Sun-flower and the white Carline Thistle call'd the Almanack of Peasants who therefore hang it at their doors because it folds up its flowers when a Tempest is at hand 'T is notorious that the Bon-Chretien Pear-Tree and the Mulberry-Tree languish in places not frequented by men and on the contrary testifie by their vigour and fertility that they delight in their conversation Hereunto might be added the experience of Wood-Cleavers who finde that a wedge enters further at the first blow then for many following as if the substance of the Tree clos'd it self upon the first feeling it hath of its enemy But the bending of Hazle-rods towards Mines of Gold and Silver seems to denote something more in them then in Animals themselves In brief the motion of creeping Herbs may be call'd progressive amongst others that of the Gourd and Cucumber which follow the neighbouring water and shape their fruit in length to reach it CONFERENCE CLXV Of Trubbs or Truffs and Mushroms AS there is some middle nature between a Plant and an Animal partaking of both so there is also between a plain Mixt Body and a Plant to wit those Exuberances which grow sometimes on Trees as Agarick sometimes only out of the Earth as Mushroms and other such fungous Productions which are driven forth by the inward heat of the earth helpt by that of the Sun The matter of them is a slime or unctuous or viscous moisture fit to receive a sutable Form which is various according to the strength of Nature and the Disposition of the places through which it is driven as the Water of our Artificial Fountains puts on the shape of the pipe through which it passes And as for Trubbs 't is Cardan's Opinion That melted Snow sinking into the surface of the Earth and finding fit matter there produceth this Plant. Which the plenty of Spirits found in Snow makes me willing to assent to because they may serve for Seed to its Production The second said That he lik'd the common Opinion that Trubbs proceed from Thunder whose agitation of the Air and so of the Earth awakens the hidden Seed of this Plant as well of many others that grow of themselves or else perhaps the Rain that follows Thunder being full of Celestial Vertue proper for this Production is the Seed thereof For the Providence of Nature sometimes supplies by an Universal Efficient the Defect of particular Causes destinated to the production of other Plants which in most Trees and Herbs is the Seed which this wants as also all the ordinary parts of other Plants because 't is of the Nature of those Animals who have not their parts distinct one from another having neither stalk nor leaves nor flower nor root unless you will call it all root because it hath more appearance of than of any other part of a Plant which perhaps is the cause of its excellent taste which is neither sweet as most roots are nor sowr as most leaves are nor of any other kind of tast observ'd in the other parts of Plants but mix'd of all tasts together being very pleasant after coction hath matur'd what was terrestrial and aqueous in it As for Mushroms both their Nature and Cause is different but all proceed from an excrement which the Earth casts forth of it self and which was bred therein by the perpetual transcolation of the Humidities of the earth whence they are more or less hurtfull according to the greater or less malignity of such Humours but always of bad juice sutable to its Source and Material Cause The Third said 'T is the Rain of Autumn that makes the Mushrom the too great cold of Winter and that which yet remains in the Spring not permitting that Excrement to come forth but shutting it up as 't is the property of Cold and the heat and drought of Summer consuming the Matter that produces them as fast as it comes out of the Earth But in Autumn
and diminish upon the appearing of the Tumour Some have held it to be Blood alone others Melancholy some Bile in regard of its mobility and activity many following the authority of Fernelius that 't is a cold phlegmatick and serous humour and that every Gowt is cold Mercurialis observing that Blood could not cause such great pains that Melancholy was too heavy and thick to be active Bile too subtile to descend and Phlegm too cold to excite such pungent pains and sudden motions which cannot proceed from a cold cause conceiv'd it was Phlegm mingled with Bile the latter serving as a Vehicle to the former and that former to precipitate and make this latter descend Some others confessing their ignorance acknowledg Qu' on n' y void goutte that they see not a jot in this Matter referring this Disease to occult and malignant causes acting by an unknown property as contagious and venemous diseases do I conceive it to be a salt humour subtile and picquant partaking of the nature of Salts which are all corrosive which acrimony and mordacity of this humour is caus'd by the Salt or Tartar contain'd in its substance or deriv'd to the Aliments whereof the humours are produc'd from the Earth which is full of such Salt Nitrous or Tartareous Spirits without which it would be unfruitful and barren as is seen in Earth whence Saltpeter is extracted which can never produce any thing This Nitrous Spirit being all drawn out of the Earth by the Plants which serve us for food and not being tameable by our heat much less convertible into our substance for an Animal is nourish'd with what is sweet and hath had life wherewith these Mineral Spirits were never provided if the natural Faculty be strong it expells them with the other unprofitable Excrements of the first concoction and Urine and Sweat and sometimes forms the Stone in the Kidneys Bladder or other Parts But if it happens either through the weakness of the expulsive Faculty or the quality of the Matter or some other defect that this Tartareous Spirit is not expell'd then it is carry'd with the Blood into the Parts and being unfit for nutrition transpires by the Pores if it be subtil enough or else in case it be thick and cannot be resolv'd flows back into the great Vessels and thence into the Joynts where sometimes it is coagulated into knots and grits and turn'd into a hard matter like chalk or plaister which shews that the four Humours are not the matter thereof since the same do not suppurate rendering then the Gowt incurable and the Reproach of Physians because they find no Cure for it no more than for that of old Men those who have a dry Belly and who live disorderly But 't is curable saith Hippocrates in young people in such as have no gritts or hardnesses form'd in the Joints those who are laborious obedient and to whom some great Evacuations arrive many having been cur'd of it by a Dysenterie As for the Place where it is form'd and the Way whereby the Matter which causes this Evil descends most with Fernelius conceive 't is the Head not the internal part of the Brain whose Excrements are easily voided outwardly by the Nostrils or inwardly by the Infundibulum or Tunnel and other Cavities but the outward part between the skull and the skin which being too thick and compact to give issue to the phlegmatick and serous humours there collected being begotten of the Excrements of the Jugular Veins which are expanded over all these Parts those serous and thin humours glide down between the Skin and other Feguments into the Joints But the Place of this Nitrous Matter above-mentioned are the Viscera of the Liver and Spleen which generate this Matter two ways 1. By the vitiosity of Aliments impregnated with this Nitrous Spirit which they plentifully attracted from the Earth whence it is that Wine which hath more of this Spirit and Tartar then any other Aliment is by consent of all very hurtful to the Gowt 2. By their proper vitiosity namely a hot and dry Intemperies whereby instead of concocting they adure the Blood and so fix that salt serosity which is the Salt or Tartar extracted out of its substance Unless you had rather say That as in the Kidneys of Persons subject to the Stone there is a certain arenaceous or lapidifick constitution proper for producing the Stone so in the Viscera of those who are subject to the Gowt there is a particular arthritical disposition apt to beget that tartareous matter which produces it The Way whereby this Matter is expell'd is the Veins and Arteries these Vessels manifestly swelling when the fits of the Gowt begin Moreover as this Disease unexpectedly invades by a sudden afflux of the Matter so it suddenly changes place especially by means of Refrigerants and Repercussives which drive the Gowt from one Foot to the other or into the Hand and other Parts which cannot be done but by the Veins and Arteries Lastly The Parts upon which this Matter falls and which are about the articulations are membranous and sensible because the Membranes being the first subject of Touch ought to be also of Pain a Symptom thereof The Third said That the greatest difficulty was Why this matter rather falls upon the Joints than other Parts which are not incommoded therewith neither the Nerves nor the Veins through which it passes no more than the Membranes and sensible Parts besides those which are about the Joints The cause whereof may be That as in health the Parts by a strange property attract such humours as are fit for their nutrition the Lungs bilious Blood the Spleen melancholy Blood the Kidneys serous the other carnous Parts temperate Blood so in sickness and ill constitution of the Body some of these Parts attract from all the rest certain humours wherewith they have most affinity So in the new Disease call'd Plica Polonica the viscous and glutinous humour which produceth it is chiefly carri'd to the hair which it knotteth and intaâ—gleth together and to the nails of the Hands and Feet which it makes hard and black And in the cure of Fracture of Bones the Stone call'd Osteocolla taken inwardly is carried towards the broken Bones and causes them to re-unite In like manner the Humour producing the Gowt hath some affinity with the Bones of the Joints especially with their Epiphyses The Fourth said That the Gowty have wherewith to comfort themselves not so much for that they foretel the changes of the Air and Seasons as for that this Disease is a token of health and an evidence of the strength and vigour of Nature which from the noble Parts drives the vicious humours upon the Joints But amongst its antecedent causes the Air is not to be forgotten especially the hot and moist Air of the Spring thawing the Humours lately congeal'd by the Winter to the vitiosity of which Air is that popular Gowt to be referr'd of which Athenaeus speaks in
entrails of the Earth and descended into the Abysses of the Waters to get out their most hidden treasures yea he hath pervaded with his sight the vast expanses of Heaven there to consider the Stars But he hath not yet been able to familiarise the Fire to himself which like a Salvage-beast devours every thing it meets Now although it be found almost in all places yet Sicily nourishes it more than any having amongst others the Mont Gibel or Aetna those of Hiera Lipara and many others in the Volcanian Islands which are adjacent to it and of Stromboli twenty Leagues distant from these Such also are those of Modena and Vesuvius in Italy which smoak to this day the three burning Mountains of Hecla Sainte Croix and Helga in Ise-land which cast forth Flames only at their feet their tops being all cover'd with Snow and whose Fire is augmented by casting Water in which serves it for Fewel Such were also that which by the report of Tacitus in the fifteenth of his Annals burnt the Territory of the Vbii under Claundius Nevo and could never be extinguish'd with Water but with Stones Cloth Linnen and other dry things that mention'd by Titus Livius which in three days reduc'd into ashes three Acres of the Territory of Calena at this day Carignola in Campania that which burnt for sixteen years together a great part of Scotland and not long since the Island of St. George which is one of the Asores and divers other fat Lands near the Sea which continually supplies unctuous matter to these Conflagrations whence the most remarkable of them are seen in Islands and other maritim places The Second said That the Pythagoreans who place Fire in the entrails of the Earth as its Centre would not be so much at a loss here as those who with Aristotle hold That it is there in a violent state and contrary to its Nature which requires the highest part of the World For since nothing violent can be of long duration How is it that Fire the most active of all the Elements hath not hitherto been able to free it self out of its Prison and get out of this state of confinement 'T is better therefore to say That Fire being the principal Agent of Nature necessary to all sorts of Generations which are made in all places is likewise found every where especially in the Earth where it is most sensible and is preserv'd longest in regard of the solidity of its Matter For Fire cannot subsist without Matter which serves it for Food and Aliment Whence the Poets describ'd Vulcan the God of Fire lame intimating its need of fewel and sustenance to support it none of which being found under the Orb of the Moon above the higher Region of the Air 't is reasonable to judg that there is no other Elementary Fire on high but that of the Sun who by his heat light and other qualities concurs more perfectly to the generation of all Mixts than that invisible and imaginary Fire 'T is therefore necessary that Fire have Matter to feed upon otherwise it dies and vanishes not only in an Enemy-country and among its Contraries who endeavour to destroy it but also in its own sphere or centre wherever it be since it must needs act there otherwise it would be weaker in its Centre than out of it But it cannot act upon it self for then it should destroy it self But nothing acts upon it self and therefore it must act upon some subject besides it self Wherefore the Matter of all Fire is any oylie fat and aerious Body whence Ashes wholly despoil'd of that unctuous humidity are incombustible That of Subterranean Fires is of two sort Sulphur and Bitumen both which are observ'd plentiful in burning places The Live or Fossile Sulphur which serves for Matter to these Fires is a terrestrial fat or oyl mingled with the slime of the Earth For the other sort of Sulphur found on the surface of Stones is nothing but the purer part of the former which being sublim'd by heat is stop'd and condens'd by those solid Bodies into a Matter call'd Flowers of Sulphur by which example Chymistry makes the like Flowers The Bitumen is also a fat juice which is either liquid like Oyl call'd by some Petroleum and the Naphtha of the Babylonians so inflammable that it attracts Fire at a distance and retains it in the Water which serves it for nourishment as is seen in that Bituminous Fountain which burns four Leagues from Grenoble in Dauphine and many other which cast forth both Flames add Waters at the same Out-let There is some too of the consistence of soft Wax as that slimy Bitumen floating upon the Lake of Sodome Some other hard like the Pit-coal call'd Tourbe whereof our Marshes are full which is the most general Matter of Subterranean Fires to whose violence the Nitre found there may also contribute for as Bituminous Earth makes these Fires durable which otherwise could not subsist so long with Sulphur alone which presently is evaporated and spent So the Nitre and Saltpeter wherewith the Earth is every where impregnated and which hath been before shewn to be the cause of its fertility is the cause of their impetuosity and violence which the situation of places may also promote The Third said That the Earth as well as the Air hath three Regions in its profundity the first temper'd and alter'd either apparently or really according to the various disposition of the ambient Air The second or middle extreamly cold The third always hot and burning And as the Matter of Thunder is a Sulphureous Nitrous and Bituminous Exhalation of the Earth drawn up by the Sun to the middle Region of the Air where 't is inflam'd by Antiperistasis of the ambient cold because being in the next disposition to Inflammation the least concurrent circumstance presently reduces that Power into Act So the inclosed and difficultly evaporable heat of the Earth finding the same easily-inflammable Matter there namely the Exhalations which issue from that third Subterranean Region upon the opening of Mines which testifie by their smell thickness and other qualities how much they partake of Minerals these hot and dry Exhalations ascending to the second Region of the Earth there meet with cold Spaces which being for the most part hollow or cavernous and stor'd with Sulphur Bitumen and other fat Earths become inflam'd by the Antiperistasis of cold and the proximity of those Materials And because the Earth which feeds these Fires consists of two parts the one arid and the other unctuous this unctuosity approaching nearer the Fire coming to be consum'd the Fire must needs be extinguish'd till the heat excited by the conflagration of many years having attracted all the unctuosity of the neighbouring Earth and this having by degrees impregnated that dry Earth which the Chymists call Caput mortuum it becomes again inflammable and continues fir'd till the same be desiccated again and so forward in a circle nothing hindring but
and Evil and consequently an inclination to the one and an aversion to the other she hath also given them means of attaining thereunto to wit Local Motion to go thither of themselves and a Voice to seek of others that Good they want and deliverance from the Evil which presses them The Second said That only such perfect Animals as have Lungs have the gift of Voice others destitute either of Lungs as Fishes or of Blood as most Insects having little heat of which Blood is the foundation have no need of Air which is inspir'd only to cool and temper the excess of Natural Heat and so for want of Air which is the matter of Voice are almost all mute except the Dolphin whose Voice is like that of Man Grass-hoppers Flies Bees and other Insects make a noise and sound indeed by the collision of the Air and their Wings but have no Voice which is defin'd A significative sound made by the mouth of an Animal and by Aristotle The stroak of the Air attracted by respiration and emitted by the Lungs against the Larynx to express something So that the Efficient Cause of Voice is the Soul the Matter Air the Form Sound or the collision of two solid Bodies the End to signifie something And so Animals cry to signifie the grief they resent But why they testifie this grief by so different tones and accents is as difficult to understand as the last differences in which Philosophers have plac'd that diversity as Howling Barking Bellowing Braving Roaring Neighing and such other accents of Beasts the cause whereof is hitherto unknown The Third said Such Animals cry soonest and longest who have the strongest Imagination the most exquisite touch the least ability to suffer and the least conscience because most susceptible of apprehension and pain and their Spirits being diffus'd in a less bulk are aptest to be mov'd and gather'd together about the Heart which by this means being unusually oppress'd communicate the sense thereof to the Lungs which suffering by sympathy and being instruments for the hearts eventilation perform their functions then with more speed and violence by an irregular motion forc'd by the present Necessity and the pain which presses them and so the Air which was contain'd in their spongy substance issues forth impetuously and by collision with the Epiglottis and other opposing parts forms loud and resounding clamours Whence we may judg That the secret intention of Nature who disposes these Organs in such sort that the Cry is a kind of interpreter of the Grief was to give some refreshment or ventilation to the Spirits thronged about the Heart and also intelligible tokens of the Evil suffer'd by the Animal either to move the injurer to compassion or else to invoke the help of its own Species or by unknown instinct that of the Author of Nature For we see that Animals by the motives of natural instinct run to the cries of those of their own kind And since the Holy Scripture tells us That not only Birds and all other Animals but also insensible things praise God 't is credible that in their anguishes they are lead by the same Principle to cry to him to help and preserve the Work of his own Hand Which is so true that the wicked'st Persons are forc'd by the interior motions of a hidden power to lift up their hands to Heaven in their Afflictions and implore Succour and Assistance from on High The Fourth said That the Sense of Touch is both more universal and natural to Animals than any other being the first they have and the last they lose The dolour thereof is express'd with Cries to which Man having the most exquisite Touch and consequently being most sensible of pain is also more subject than other Creatures And if that Ancient said true That Tears are mute execrations of the Sorrows of Life which we begin and end with them Cries may be said the more manifest and earnest since they pierce the clouds and see into ascend to the the Throne of God to demand succour of him when none is found upon Earth 'T is an impetuous sound utter'd by an Animal unable to resist present or imminent Grief For 't is proportional to the violence of the Passion Love which is the gentlest renders it smooth and soft Choler the violentest makes it more vehement And Grief the most pressing of all and tending to the destruction of Being which is equally abhor'd by all Creatures ariseth it to the highest tone of which 't is capable Whence even Speech which being artificially divided into syllables and cadences is peculiar to man yet in the precipitateness of Grief keeps not its measures but breaks into an inarticulate sound like that of Animals For explication whereof it must be known that the Cuticle the chief seat of the Touch and consequently of Pain is the expansion of the Nerves the conduits of the Animal Spirits which in Pain either shrink inwards and so cause stupefaction or being irritated and sent by Nature to the aid of the hurt part by Sympathy move the Diaphragma and other nervous and membranous Parts For as of two Lute-strings set at the same pitch the one sounds upon the touching of the other so in the Harmony of the whole Body there may be the same sympathy between the Spirits and the Parts an evidence whereof is seen in Tickling and Laughter which is caus'd by the contraction of the Diaphragm which is the reason that the aspect of such as Laugh and Weep is much alike And because in Grief the coarcted Spirits hinder respiration and free motion of the Heart ttherefore Nature to ease her self drives them outwards with violence and with them moist vapours which partly transpire by the pores and are partly condens'd in the Brain whence they flow through the eyes in streams of Tears which by this means greatly alleviate Grief as the want of Them and Cries argues its vehemence Besides that they may serve Animals to terrifie their Enemies or else to implore the assistance of their Fellows as we read of Elephants that falling into a Ditch they call other Elephants to their aid Upon the Second Point 't was said That 't is proper to a wise man by God's Example to draw Good out of Evil and benefit from the most pernicious things So Physitians turn the strongest Poysons into wholesom Remedies Men use the spoils of the fiercest Beasts for nourishment cloathing and other purposes of Life And many great Personages have taken occasion from bodily Diseases Shipwracks Losses Banishments and other such unkindnesses of Fortune to give up themselves wholly to Virtue and the Knowledg of Things Since then Enmity is the greatest of all Evils as Unity is the most excellent of all Goods and the noblest of all Virtues as having no Vicious Extremity but being perfect by being boundless 't is a Point of great Wisedom to be able to draw some benefit from ones Enemies whereof the principal is
us And secondly as they issue out of these nearer drops into the Air which is between them and us And thus from this different fraction caus'd by the various rarity and density of the Air and Water the diversity of Colours in the Rain-bow ariseth For Water being not altogether diaphanous but somewhat of a middle nature between perfectly Transparent and Opake reflects part of the Rays which fall upon its surface and lets the other part pass through as 't is observ'd in Rivers and Ponds upon which we see the Suns Image by reflection but Divers and Fish behold it by refraction So 't is with drops of Water those neerest us reflect part of the Sun-beams towards the Sun himself without forming an Iris because these reflected Rays meet not other drops to refract them but when part of those Rays which pass'd through the small intervals of the first drops are reflected by the other remoter from us then these reflected Rays lighting by the way upon the first drops between which they had pass'd they are broken thereby both at their going in and coming out where they represent the Iris which consequently is form'd by Reflection and Refraction reflection by all the drops which receive Light remitting the same towards the Sun and refraction of the same Light so reflected when by the way as it returns it meets those other drops of Water which refract it twice and give it the diversity of Colours which ariseth from the divers reception of the Light into those parts of Water more or less dense and rare But now to give account of the circular Figure of this Meteor which is not only in appearance circular as square Towers seem round at a distance but is so really 't is requisite to take a certain position of the Sun and by one example 't will be easie to judg of others Let us suppose then that the Sun is at the Horizon and consequently that all the Rays he sends directly upon the drops of Rain as well the highest as the lowest are parallel between themselves and to the Horizon for the elevation of a Cloud how great soever being inconsiderable in respect of the Sun's distance from the Earth hinders not but that all his Rays are always parallel between themselves which being reflected as hath been said the reflection of them will be also parallel to the Horizon or very neer so for here we consider only that which is made by the middle of the drop which is the strongest by reason of its round figure and this reflection being receiv'd by the superior part of some other drop which it finds in its way and there twice broken to wit at its going in and coming forth the two Refractions joyn'd together distort the Ray about 45 degrees that is to say the Ray thus twice broken will make with the lines parallel to the Horizon an Angle of 45. degrees a 〈…〉 from on high downwards and falling upon the Earth And because all the drops make such a Refraction as we have mention'd therefore all such Persons as shall be between the Sun and the drops of Rain shall see the Iris of the same heighth namely of 45 degrees although from several stations some in the lower drops namely such Persons as are neerest the Cloud others to wit such as are more remote in the higher drops because they all see it by Rays parallel between themselves and consequently by equal Angles Now the drops make refraction not only by their superior parts but also by their sides and lower parts whence those on either side of the Spectator distant by an Angle of 45 degrees will make him see their refraction and consequently the Iris on either side under equal Angles which being made on all sides about a right line drawn from the Sun to the Spectators eye which may be call'd the Axis of the Iris it necessarily follows That the Iris must appear perfectly round about this Axis So that the drops elevated above this Axis 45 degrees will make the upper part of the Iris by the refraction of their superior parts Those on either side distant likewise 45 degrees will make the sides of the Iris by refraction of their parts which are at the remoter sides and so of all the drops which shall be about the Axis under equal Angles of 45 degrees As for other drops neerer or further from the Axis and the Spectator they will represent an Iris to others who are not in the same Axis but neerer or remoter from the Cloud and situate in such place that those drops appear distant from the Axis by Angles of 45 degrees So that as many Spectators as there are between the Sun and the Cloud and not in the same Axis so many Axes must be imagin'd about which there are different Arches and Rainbows Now in this Horizontal Position the Bow appears a perfect Semi-circle whose Center is in the Horizon at the Point where the Axis terminates But when the Sun is in another Position as elevated some degrees yet fewer than 45 then the Axis of the Iris coming from the Sun through the Spectator's eye penetrates the Earth and so the Center which is always at the end of the Axis is below the Horizon and the portion of the Iris which we behold is less than a Semi-circle greater than which it never appears as Aristotle hath well observ'd For since the Bow is always less than a Semi-circle whilst the Sun is elevated above the Horizon it must be a Semi-circle when he is in the Horizon and none at all when he is below the Horizon because he doth not then illuminate the Cloud Hence 't is seldome produc'd in Winter because when it rains in that Season the whole Heaven is cloudy and covers the Sun-beams as neither in the Summer and Spring at noon when the Sun is higher than 45 degrees but only at Morning and Evening The Fourth said That if Aristotle's definition of the Rainbow be true who defines it An Arch consisting of divers colours which the reflection of the Sun-beams represents upon a hollow Cloud ready to dissolve into Rain we need not seek much for Material Formal and Efficient Causes for he assigns no Final of it but the Scripture doth namely to be a moral sign of the Covenant between God and Men. Of the first there is no doubt unless amongst blind men to whom only God can make a demonstration of it but the rest are very obscure To judg of which we must observe That the Angle of Reflection is equal to that of Incidence so that a right perpendicular Line erected at the common point of Incidence and Reflection will equally bisect the Angle comprehended by the Ray of Incidence and that of Reflection which is not true unless when the Ray of Incidence is terminated by a very smooth and opake Body as that of a Mirror Whence 't is infer'd That a Cloud not having such evenness or smoothness will not reflect
't is fed by Exhalations plentifully supply'd from the Earth whence they are attracted and fired by the Stars in this place For if this Milky-way were of the nature of Comets or other lucid Meteors it could not always subsist but only while its matter lasted which besides would be more copious in some seasons then in others as in Spring and Autumn then in the droughts of Summer or frosts of Winter which closes the pores of the earth and so it would not have the same permanent position and figure no more then density rarity latitude and equality of its parts so constant that on the side of Cassiopaea it always appears alike winding and likewise in other places though we should grant the earth capable to supply fumes enough for feeding this so spacious circle which yet the disproportion of this point of the World compar'd to the vast extent of that circumference palpably prov'd to be in the Firmament allows not For besides that the diversity of Parallaxes would represent it under several Stars to the Inhabitants of several places if it were in the air as it happens to Comets and other aerious impressions and yet 't is always seen in the same place and equally distant from the fix'd Stars its proper motion from West to East whereby it moves one degree in a hundred years demonstrats that 't is in the eighth Sphere whose particular motion is the same And Galileo's Glasses which have discover'd abundance of Stars in this part convincingly manifest that 't is nothing but an assembly of almost innumerable small Stars which not being great enough to transmit their light to us distinctly the same is confounded and united together as 't is proper to all qualities and so of Light to associate it self to other light and thus produces that whiteness which is a weak and imperfect light For 't is not enough that an object be luminous it must be great and large or else near the eye to be visible the Stars as well as all other natural agents having a sphere of activity beyond which their action is not sensible hence the Planets and of them the Moon as nearest us seem greater than the fix'd Stars whose rayes being weakned by their distance cannot come directly to us as those of the Planets do but twinkle and sparkle Now though Astrologers make but six sorts of fix'd Stars according to their six different magnitudes those of the first being 170 times greater then the Earth and those of the last and sixt 18 times yet Tycho Brahe Americus Vesputius and divers others have discover'd some much less and less luminous then these last Nor are they to be credited who have limited their number to 1022 which the Scripture saith is infinite and known to God alone to whom the Prophet attributes it as a prerogative to number them and call them by their names The Third said There are two sorts of Milky-ways one in the Air and the other in the Heaven The first of which alone Aristotle spoke is a light produc'd by exhalations either fired or irradiated as in Comets from which this milky way differs only upon account of its great extent caus'd by the plenty of Exhalations attracted by a great number of Stars which are neer Cassiopaea and the Poles where also this Way is brighter then in other places The other Milky Way is part of the Heaven or Firmament equally dividing the same in two as other Circles do although 't is rather a Zone or Space then a Circle as well as the Zodiack with whom it agrees in that it hath breadth as that hath and is oblique to the Aequinoctial having other Poles than those of the World but differs in that 't is not so broad the Zodiack having sixteen degrees and this commonly between eight and ten for 't is neither equally broad nor luminous in all its parts and its obliquity is much greater than that of the Zodiack the middle of which recedes not from the Aequinoctial above 23 degrees and a half but this about 56 degrees and a half towards the North and neer 63 degrees towards the South It differs also from all the great Circles in that it changes position according to the motion of the Firmament so that 't is mov'd with two Motions namely that of the First Mover from East to West upon the Poles of the World making an intire revolution in one day and another proper to it self from West to East upon the Poles of the Ecliptick in the same time with the Firmament which motion the other Circles have not being either not mov'd at all as the Horizon and Meridian or only by the motion of the First Mover as the Aequinoctial Ecliptick Tropicks and Colures Upon the Second Point it was said That the Earth produces Metals to be imployed for several uses in order to humane Commerce and Society which being founded upon Hope and Fear Reward and Punishment Gold and Iron the two most powerful Metals are highly instrumental to the establishing of the same Gold which an Ancient call'd the Sun of the Earth being the Star which gives light to our hope and the sweet influences of Reward And Iron by its obscure and livid colour being the dark Star of our fear and of death whereof 't is the most usual Instrument But as Fear is without comparison stronger than Hope for the one tends to the preservation of Being the other only to Well-being so Iron the Instrument of Terror must likewise have more powerful effects than Gold which is only the object of Hope Moreover the Law relieves such as the Just Fear of Iron may have constrain'd to any thing as being the greatest violence in the World but not those whom the desire of Gold or hope of Gain hath engaged to any Affair And indeed all Earthly Powers are measured only by the point of the Sword Arms and Iron seem to be the share of Kings and all the Nobility as Gold that of Merchants and the Vulgar from whom all Sovereigns know how to get it when they think fit Besides since Gold hath need of Iron not only for the digging of it out of the entrails of the Earth but also for defending and preserving it an evidence of its weakness it may be said the prey of him who knows how to manage Iron best And Solon had reason to contemn the vanity of Croesus who made a shew of his riches as of his greatest power foretelling him that it would become the booty of him that should have a sharper sword And Philip of Macedon never conquer'd so many places by trucket with Mules laden with Gold as his Son did whole Kingdoms by the Sword But what power can we give to Gold which weakens and enervates its possessors as appears by the Lacedemonians who were masters of Greece whilst Iron alone was in use with them and were corrupted by the Gold which Lysander brought thither The Captain in Tacitus had reason to believe
which are turn'd into the substance of Animals whose bodies are again reduc'd into Earth The fifth maintain'd the opinion of Albert the Great who is for the Generation of things which the preceding opinion over throws holding nothing to be new generated He said that Forms are indeed in the Matter yet not entire and perfect but only by halves and begun according to their essence not according to their existence which they acquire by the Agents which educe things out of their causes The Sixth said If it were so then there would be no substantial Generation because Existence is nothing but a Manner of Being adding nothing to Essence nor really distinguish'd from it Wherefore I embrace Aristotle's opinion that Forms are in the Matter but only potentially and as the Matter is capable of them just as Wax is potentially Caesar's Statue because capable of receiving that form This he calls to be drawn and educ'd out of the power or bosom of the Matter which is not to be receiv'd in it or to depend of its dispositions since this belongs also to the Rational soul which is not receiv'd in the body till the previous dispositions necessary for its reception be introduc'd therein but the Matter it self concurrs though in a passive way not only to dispose it self but also to produce the Form and consequently to preserve it Which is not applicable to the Rational soul whose Being depends not anywise upon the Matter The Seventh said Matter being a Principle purely passive and incapable of all action cannot produce any thing much less Forms the noblest Entities in the world 'T is the principle of impotence and imperfection and consequently the ugliness deformity contrary to the Form whereof it should partake if it contain'd the same in power as Wine and Pepper do Heat which becomes actual and sensible when reduc'd into act by our Natural Heat which loosens it from the parts which confin'd it Wherefore Forms come from without namely from Heaven and its noblest part the Sun the Father of Forms which are nothing but Beams of light deriv'd from him as their Fountain whose heat and influences give motion and life which is the abode of Heat in Humidity not Elementary Heat for then Arsenic Sulphur and other Mixts abounding with this Heat should have life but Serpents Salamanders Fishes Hemlock Poppies and other excessively cold Plants and Animals should not Moreover in whatever manner the Elements and their Qualities be mix'd they are still Elements and can produce nothing above their own Nature which is to calefie refrigerate attenuate rarefie condense but not the internal and external senses the various motions and other actions of life which can proceed only from a Celestial Heat such as that is which preserves a Plant amidst the rigours of Winter whose coldness would soon destroy the Plant's heat if it were of the same nature Hence Vegetative and Sensitive Souls having no Contraries because Contraries are plac'd under the same Genus but the Celestial matter whereof these souls are constituted and the Elements are not therefore they are not corruptible after the manner of other Mixts but like light cease to exist upon the cessation of the dispositions which maintain'd them For such is the order of Nature that when a Subject is possest of all the dispositions requisite for introduction of a Form the Author of Nature or according to Plato the Idea or that Soul of the World which Avicenna held to be an Intelligence destinated to the generation of substantial Forms concurrs to the production of the Form as also this concourse ceases when those dispositions are abolisht CONFERENCE CXXIII Whether Lean people are more healthy and long-liv'd then Fat THe Immortality of our souls having an absolute disposition to length of Life it depends only upon that of the Body that we do not live Ages as our first Fathers did For 't is from some defect in these bodies that the differences of life even in Animals and Plants proceed whence some less perfect souls as those of Oaks are yet more long-liv'd then those of Beasts The signs of long and short life are either simply such or also causes and effects Such is the conformation of the parts of our body A great number of Teeth is held a sign of longaevity as well because 't is an effect of the strength of the Formative Faculty and Natural Heat as that thereby the food is better masticated and prepar'd and the other concoctions and functions more perfectly perform'd whence comes health and long life So also the Habit of the body is not simply a sign but likewise an effect of health and cause of long life namely when the same is moderate that is neither fat nor lean which two though comprisable within the latitude of health which admits a a great latitude are yet so much less perfect as they decline from that laudable disposition which is the rule and square of all others Now to make a just comparison we must consider the Fat and the Lean in the same degree of excess or defect from this Mediocrity and compare Philetas the Poet who was so dry and lean that he was fain to fasten leaden soles to his shoos for fear the wind should carry him away with Dionysius of Heraclea who was choakt with fat unless his body were continually beset with Leeches Or else we must observe in both an equality of Vigour in the Principles of Life to wit the Radical Heat and Moisture in the same proportion the same age under the same climate regiment and exercises otherwise the comparison will be unequal and lastly we must distinguish the fleshy great-limb'd and musculous from the fat This premis'd I am of Hippocrates's Opinion Aph. 44. Sect. 2. that such as are gross and fat naturally die sooner then the lean and slender because the Vessels of the latter especially the Veins are larger and consequently fuller of Blood and Spirits which are the Architects and principal Organs of Life on the contrary the Fat have smaller Vessels by reason of their coldness which constringes them as is seen in Women Eunuchs and Children whose voices are therefore more shrill and who have also less health and life The Second said Nature hath furnisht Animals with Fat to the end to preserve them from external injuries and therefore the Lean who are unprovided thereof must be of shorter life for not many besides decrepit old people die of a natural death that is proceeding from causes within whereas most diseases arise from external causes wherewith the Fat are less incommoded especially with cold the sworn enemy of life the smallness of their pores and the fat which environs them excluding all qualities contrary to life and withall hindring the dissipation of the Natural Heat which becomes more vigorous by the confinement just as the Bowels are hotter in Winter because the cold air hinders the efflux of the heat and spirits caus'd in Summer and in lean bodies whose
from falling but from the bare privation of the heat of the Sun who as by his presence he actually causes heat in the Air so by his absence he causes coldness in the same which penetrating our Bodies calefi'd by the diurnal heat easily therein condenses the vapors which are not yet setled or laid and squeesing them out of the Brain and all the parts just as we do water out of a wet spunge they fall upon the weakest parts where they cause a fluxion and pain The Fourth said That the Air being of it self very temperate can never do any mischief unless it be mix'd with some extraneous substances as Vapors and Exhalations which continually infect the first Region wherein we reside And because those subtle parts of Earth and Water exhal'd into it are imperceptible 't is not strange if they produce such sudden and unexpected effects as we see the Serene doth which is caus'd by vapors rais'd after Sun-set by the force of the heat remaining upon the surface of the Earth like those arising from heated water after it is taken off the fire So that the Serene is that vapour whilst it mounts upwards not when it falls downwards for it cannot descend till it be render'd heavier by condensation into Water Clouds or Mists which make the Air nubilous and not serene as in this effect it uses to be But at their first elevation they are more volatile rare subtle and invisible The Fifth said That the chief cause of this hurtful accident is the change of one contrary into another without medium which is always incommodious to Nature who for that reason conjoyns all extreams by some mediums which serve for dispositions to pass from the one to the other without difficulty And as the alteration of the body from cold to hot is painful witness those who hold their cold hands to the fire after handling of Ice in like sort that from hot to cold is very incommodious whence the hotter the preceding day hath been the more dangerous is the serene because the pores of the Body being open'd and all the humors disorder'd and mov'd by the diurnal heat the cold insinuates into and works upon the same with more liberty just as heated water is soonest frozen by reason its parts are more open'd by the heat and consequently more capable of receiving the impressions of Agents Which is also the reason why the first cold hurts us rather then the greatest frosts namely because it finds the body more open then ensuing hard weather doth So though in Winter the air be colder yet because 't is almost continually the same it makes less impression in the evening upon our bodies already accustomed to its rigor and though the air is colder at midnight then at Sun-set yet the serene is only at the beginning of the night when our bodies more sensibly receive alteration from the same Wherefore 't is only the sudden change of the air which makes the serene whereof our bodies are the more sensible according to the openness of the pores and of the futures of the head and the softness of the flesh which renders the body obnoxious to external causes as hardness which secures it from them makes it subject to internal causes through want of transpiration Hence Peasants Souldiers and all such as are hardned by labour and are of a firm and constant constitution feel no inconvenience from the Serene although they breathe an air more subtle and consequently more capable of being impregnated in the evening with qualities noxious to the body CONFERENCE CXLVI Whether the French are Light and Inconstant and why THere is no more perfect Mirror of Inconstancy then Man as appears by the pleasure his body takes in the change of Pasture his mind in that of Objects and both in that of Condition Hence men look not upon present honours but as so many steps whereby to ascend to new the possession of present goods bringing no other satisfaction then that of their Stomack that is till a second Appetite be excited by new Meats Whereunto the nimbleness of their volatile Spirits the fluidity and mobility of their humours which constitute the temperament too notoriously furnish the efficient and material cause to inquire elsewhere for them for which reason the melancholick are less subject to this defect this earthy humour being less susceptible of change whence they prove more wise But amongst all Nations there is none to whom the vice of Levity is more imputed then to the French Caesar who had long convers'd with them frequently objects the same to them and experience sufficiently shews by what is pass'd that they are very far from the constancy of other Nations as not only their Statutes and Edicts which they cannot long observe but all their Modes and Customs and their desire of novelty abundantly testifie The causes whereof are either from the Climate or the Soil For 't is observ'd that where the Heaven is always in the same posture as toward the Poles or where the Sun heats almost in the same degree as near the Equator which makes the days and nights equal the Manners and Inclinations of the People are also equal on the contrary those that by the several remotions and approaches of the Sun have different constitutions of Air receive sutable impressions from the same which are afterwards manifested in their actions And because what is below is the same with what is on high the Earth consequently partakes of the same alterations which the Heaven produces in the Air and retains them longer Thus our Soul being heated and cooled moistned and dry'd in one and the same day suffering contrary changes in a very little time 't is no wonder if the Aliments it affords make the parts humors and spirits like it self that is to say flitting inconstant and mutable which parts being communicated from Father to Son can no more be chang'd by us even by Travels and Alteration of Soil than the Moor can change his skin which the temper of his native climate hath in like manner given him Add hereunto that the French Courtesie receiving all strangers more civilly than any Nation of the World is also more easily lead by their perswasions and examples And whereas the roughness and rusticity of many other people thinks shame and scorn to change as implying preceding Ignorance the sincerity and frankness of the French is such that he easily alters his Mind and way as soon as another seems better to him than his own other Nations what-ever Pride they take in being always constant and equal to themselves and especially more patient than we in our Adversities surpassing us onely in this particular that they better know how to dissemble their discontents The Second said Lightness of Minds is like that of Bodies respective onely not absolute And as Air is term'd Light in respect of Water and Earth so dull people those of the North and such others as would have gravity alone
there is such a disproportion in the duration of all States past and present that one hath lasted above 1200. years as the French Monarchy whose flourishing State promises as many more Ages if the World continue so long and another hath chang'd its Form several times in one yeat as Florence Upon which consideration the greatest Politicians have put their States under the Divine Protection and caus'd all their Subjects to venerate some particular Angel or tutelar Saint Thus France acknowledges Saint Michael for its Protector Spain Saint James Venice Saint Mark and even the Ethnicks thought that a City much less a State could not be destroy'd till the Deity presiding over it were remov'd Whence Homer makes the Palladium of Troy carry'd away by Vlysses before the Greeks could become Masters of it The Third said The Supream Cause exercises its Omnipotence in the Rise Conservation and Destruction of States as well as every where else yet hinders not subordinate Causes from producing their certain Effects natural in things natural as in the Life and Death of Men which though one of the most notorious Effects of God's Power and attributed to him by the Scripture and all the World yet ceaseth not to have its infallible and natural demonstrations Inlike manner subordinate Moral Causes produce their Moral and contingent Effects in Moral Things such as that in Question is which Causes depending upon Humane Actions which arise from our Will no-wise necessitated but free cannot be term'd natural and constrain'd unless either by those that subject all things here below to Destiny which subverts the liberty of the Will that is makes it no longer a Will or those who will have not only the manners of the Soul but also the actions always to follow the temperament of the Body which were hard to conceive and yet would not infer a necessity in the alteration of States since the effects of Love and Hatred and other passions which give inclination or aversion are oftentimes prevented by thwarting causes When the Lacedemonians chang'd the popular State of Athens into an Aristocracy of thirty Lords whom they call'd afterwards the thirty Tyrants no other cause can be assign'd thereof but the chance of War which subjected the will of the Athenians to that of the Lacedemonians And the same may be said of all other ancient and modern Revolutions Indeed if the causes in Policy had regular effects or States were subject to natural declinations Prudence which is conversant about contingent things to manage them freely and alter its course according to occasion should signifie nothing 'T is more credible that as in the state of Grace God hath left our actions to the disposal of Free-will that we may work out our Salvation our selves so in the administration of Republicks he hath left most things to chance for imploying men's industry according to their will whose motions being free and contingent are diametrically opposite to the necessity of natural causes The Fourth said That these alterations may be though voluntary yet natural yea necessary too our Will being as inclin'd to apprehended good as our Intellect is to Truth As therefore knowing this truth that 2 and 2 are 4 't is impossible but I must believe it so knowing that such an action will bring me good I shall do it so that the causes of humane actions have somthing of necessity and besides having their foundation in nature may in some sort be term'd natural Moreover since things are preserv'd by their like and destroy'd by their contraries which contraries are under the same genus it follows that all sublunary things having had a natural beginning must also have a like end Desire of self-preservation which is natural gave birth to States but if instead of this desire which renders Servants obedient to their Masters these to the Magistrate and him to the Sovereign Rebellion and Treason deprive their Chiefs of the succour they expect from them and by this means exposes the State in prey to the Enemies it cannot but fall to ruine unless that some other natural cause Perswasion as that of Menenius Agrippa taken from the humane body upon a Secession of the Mechanicks of Rome from the Senate or an exemplary punishment reduce the Subjects to their forsaken duty Whereby it appears that the State resumes its first vigor by as sensible and natural causes as 't is to be perswaded or become wise by others harm Amongst many examples the ruines of Troy and Thebes were caus'd by the rape of Helene whom the injustice of the Trojans deny'd to restore to her Husband and the feud of two Brothers aspiring to the same Royalty then which no causes can be assign'd more natural and more necessarily inferring the loss of a State CONFERENCE CLI Which is more healthful to become warm by the Fire or by Exercise THey who question the necessity of Fire for recalefying our Bodies chill'd by cold the enemy of our natural heat deserve the rude treatment of the ancient Romans to their banish'd persons whom they expell'd no otherwise from their City but by interdicting them the use of Fire and Water knowing that to want either was equally impossible Without Fire our Bodies would be soon depriv'd of life which resides in heat as cold is the effect and sign of death And as Aristotle saith those that deny Vertue would not be otherwise disputed with but by casting them into the fire so would not I otherwise punish those that decry it but by exposing them to freez in mid-winter instead of burning a faggot for them What could little Children and old people do without it For though the natural heat be of another kind then that of our material fire yet this sometimes assists that in such sort that those who digest ill are much comforted by it not to mention weak persons and those that are subject to swoonings Moreover the external cold must be remov'd by an external heat as Fire is which heats only what part and to what degree you please but motion heats all alike As the Sun which some Philosophers take to be the Elemental-fire contributes to the Generation so doth Fire concur to the conservation of Man not by immediate contact but by the heat which it communicates to the Air and the Air to our Body which by approaching or receding from it tempers its excess in discretion and thereby renders it sutable to our natural heat not destroying Bodies but in its highest degree as also the Sun offends those at Noon whom it refreshes at rising and setting The Second said That the violent action of Fire which destroys all sublunary Bodies argues its disproportion with our natural heat which disproportion renders the Stoves and places heated artificially by Fire so noxious and makes such as love the Chimney-corner almost always tender scabby and impatient of the least inclemency of the Air that heat against nature not only destroying the natural but corrupting the humors and exsiccating
Day 's Heat which tempering the Cold occasion'd by the Sun's absence renders the same less perceptible during the thickness of the Nocturnal Air less subtile than that of the Day when the Light coming to dissipate those Clouds subtilizes the Air by its insinuating beams whence the Cold thereof more easily insinuates into our Pores by the help of that weak Light which is not strong enough to heat the Air. Just as Vinegar though hot and biting of its own Nature yet mix'd with much water cooles the part whereunto 't is apply'd more than water alone doth The Second said That possibly the comparison of the Heat of our beds out of which we arise in the Morning with the cold of the outward Air makes us guilty of a mistake unless you had rather refer this Effect to the Oblique Aspect where-with the other Celestial Bodies of our Hemisphere are regarded by the Sun at his rising For at mid-night when he is directly under the Horizon the little bulk of the Earth hinders not but he directly darts his Rayes upon those Stars which are above us the Pyramid of the Earth's shadow not passing beyond the Moon so that then the vast and incredible magnitude of all those Celestial Bodies perpendicularly reflects upon us the Heat and Light of the Sun which thus reflected may calefie the Air as the Sun doth in the same posture but not at all at Sun-rise in their Oblique Aspects Whence though the Sun be nearer us in Winter yet he warms us less If it be excepted that the Evening when the same Oblique Aspects return is not so cold as the Night 't is answer'd that this difference proceeds from the Heat of the foregoing Day remaining in the Earth Water and Air which conserve the same till by the absence of the Sun the supervening Night wholly dissipate them The Third said That the Matutinal coolness proceeded from the approaching Suns driving the Clouds before him which agitation raiseth a wind as there is always one at day-break whereby the same coolness is effected in the Air that a Fan causeth to a Lady For all things here below having their motion from East to West 't is reasonable that the Air be so mov'd too and acquire the consequent of its agitation namely coldness That all things come from the East sundry instances manifest Mankind was from thence diffus'd into the other Quarters of the World Rivers run generally Eastward And the greater speed of Navigation from East to West than contrarily argnes the Sea to have the same motion as is chiefly observ'd under the Equinoctial the greatness of which Circle renders that motion more manifest This rule the Winds keep when not diverted to a contrary course by Exhalations And as for the Heavens experience shews us that their ordinary and best-known course is from East to West So that 't is no wonder if they hurry the neighbouring Air with them and by a Mathematical contact and natural consecution all the other Elements I speak not of Sciences Arts Policy and other things which the more curious may find to have been deriv'd from the East It suffices that the Sun taking this road drives the Air befor him the wind proceeding from which motion causeth the coolness we feel chiefly at day-break when the vapours between us and the Sun being by his heat violently driven as the water of the Aeolipila is turn'd into wind and driven forth by the subjacent fire the coolness is more unacceptable in that it succeeds and multiplies instead of diminishing that of the night as the diurnal heat in likelihood ought to do The Fourth said He attributed the increase of cold at day-break to the ordinary action of all natural Agents which is strongest when they arrive at the period or utmost point of their declination So a Candle just upon extinguishing casts forth a smarter flame the violence of a Disease is greatest at its crisis when 't is towards ending a Stone moves swiftest as it approacheth its Centre And to compare the Year to the Day the cold is commonly greater and more insupportable in February the last Moneth of Winter than in the beginning thereof though in reason it might seem rather to be so at the end of December when the Sun is further from us and that the custom of the two first months cold should render this last more tolerable as on the contrary the heat is greater also in the dog-days and afterwards than at the Summer Solstice when the Sun is elevated highest above our heads So also in Summer 't is hotter two hours after noon than at noon it self not so much through any disposition already received in the Air and Earth as by reason of that Rule That Natural Actions are stronger at the end than the beginning whereas violent actions as the motion of a Stone upwards is swifter in the beginning than the end The Fifth referr'd this effect to the Antiperistasis of heat and cold For as fire seems more scorching upon the approach of a great frost so by a contrary reason cold must become more vehement at the approach of the Sun's heat Moreover the like combat is observ'd between the thickness of the darkness of the night and the rarity of the day when the Sun 's light rendring the illuminated Air more subtle what was gross in the dark Air cannot be expell'd in an instant without some conflict and motion of the part condens'd by darkness with the rarefi'd by light from which agitation ariseth a wind commonly at day-break which is probably the cause of the cold at that time Now of that tenebrous part condens'd is made the Dew and Frost in our Climate and the Manna in Southern Countries as the cold which we feel redoubled in Winter in the space between a neighbouring fire but out of its Sphere of Activity and the rest of the Air is a familiar example of this Antiperistasis of heat and cold redoubled upon the approach one of the other For as 't is much colder then elsewhere between that fire which is too distant to warm us and the Air left in its natural frigidity so at day-break our Air being too far off from the Sun to be heated by it augments its coldness upon his approach The Sixth said Air hath no natural quality but supream humidity whereby 't is supple movable and pliant heat and cold being impress'd upon it by outward agents Otherwise being the general medium and mediator of motions local natural vital and animal for the Spirits are of an aerious nature and the Factor of all Agents by whose intervention they communicate their influences it would act against the qualities impress'd upon it sometimes hot and sometimes cold and destroy them by its own Which indeed its humidity doth but to the profit of animated bodies dryness being their enemy Hence cold and dry Saturn hath under him hot and moist Jupiter who tempers his hurtfulness and sutes him to living things Now the Sun
having at the declining of the day rais'd many aqueous and consequently supreamly cold and the heat whereby they were rais'd abandoning them upon his absence the natural cold of those vapours becomes predominant and returns them by degrees into their first state Which refrigerating the Air makes the night the colder the further the vapours are from their extraneous heat that is to say the nearer day approacheth CONFERENCE CLIV. Whence the whiteness of Snow proceeds THe first attributed the cause thereof to the desiccation of water for experience shews in all sublunary Bodies that dryness whitens as Sea-water becomes white when dry'd to Salt the stalks of Corn Pulse and the leaves of all other Plants wax white as they wither and dry The same happens to the Bones of Animals and grey Hairs on no other cause but siccity since the extremity expos'd to the Air is white but not the root Hence water by its transparence already partaking much of light but which its rarity reflects not to our view is no sooner desiccated into Ice Hail or Snow but it acquires this pure whiteness which humidity again destroys So the high ways white with dust grow black upon rain a wet cloth appears darker then a dry and that some things become black by drying as Coal is because there was heat enough to draw the humidity which was at its Centre to the Circumference but not enough wholly to dry it up as appears in that the same heat continu'd reduces the coal to white ashes which would be as perfectly white as Snow did not the Tincture imprinted thereon by the Salts withstand it for if you urge them further by fire you will make them of a perfect whiteness as appears in Chalks which are made not only of grey and black stones but even of Metals as Ceruse is made of Lead The Second said Whiteness is not a real Colour since it appears in all bodies depriv'd of preceding Colours of all which 't is indifferently susceptible But 't is otherwise with real Colours a subject imbu'd with one of which is not apt to receive all others but some only as Nature hath fram'd the Organs of Sense naked of all sensible objects to the end they might be susceptible of the same Wooll dy'd into a sadder colour cannot receive a lighter and black Wooll admits none at all but white being natural to every subject that hath no colour is capable of receiving all So when you wash off the blew or dirty colour of a Band it becomes white Whereby it appears that Whiteness hath the same reference to Colours that Unity hath to Numbers whereof 't is the beginning but is none it self And as 't is the Emblem of Innocence and Purity so also it proceeds from them The Air which is the purest of our Elements for Fire is only in Mixts and water refin'd into vapours which follows the Air in purity hapning to acquire visibility by condensation into Snow cannot represent the same under any other out-side but Whiteness Now that Whiteness is an effect of purity is manifest by the Stars which are represented to us only under the species of Whiteness and cannot be painted but with white in their light which de-albating what it irradiates and leaving the same elsewhere black shews that 't is as the purest so also the whitest thing in the world Likewise Metals are whiter according to their purity Lead is worse then Tin and this then Silver only upon account of their impurity the sole perfect mixture of the yellow incombustible Sulphur of Gold not permitting it to be alter'd and spoil'd of its yellow colour which nearest approacheth whiteness Wherefore Snow being a most pure Body compounded only of two colour-less elements namely Air and Water 't was necessary either that it should have no colour or if any whereby to become visible the principle and origin of all Colours namely White in the perfection with which Nature makes all her Works The Third said That the same difference which appears between the Stars and their Orbs is found between Water and Snow arising only from Density and Rarity As the Star appears white and the rest of the Heaven darker by reason of its rarity so likewise Water seems obscure upon account of its rarity and Snow white upon that of its density The Fourth said If that reason were good then Ice should be whiter then Snow because 't is more solid and yet the contrary appears Besides Snow is so far from being more dense and solid then Water that on the contrary there is less Air in Water then in Ice which is more close and compact then Snow the swimming of Ice upon the Water arguing some aerious parts included in it at the time of its congelation which is not and cannot be made without air Wherefore Snow differs from Water only by its figure or accidental form which reduceth it into flocks congealed by cold in a cloud not as it is resolv'd into Rain for then 't would prove Hail but whilst yet a vapour in the region of the Air. So then in this figure alone is the reason of the whiteness of Snow to be sought which is not found in water partly by reason of its transparence and partly because its smooth surface gives no hold to the visual ray Which is the reason why Water is pictur'd with a blew and darkish colour Thus burnish'd Silver as that of Looking-glasses seems dark if compar'd to rough Silver which doth not dissipate our visual Spirits as that former doth Hence Ice is much whiter then water as being less smooth The Fifth said That 't is proper to cold to whiten as 't is to heat to blacken Thus Southern People are either black or tawney Northern white and the Hair of both grows white with old age by reason of the coldness thereof All the cold parts of our Body are white as the Brain Bones Cartilages Membranes Fat and Skin Linen and Wax are whitened by the coldness of the night For the same reason not only Snow but Hail Frost Ice Rime and all other cold Meteors are of the same colour The Sixth said That though the whiteness of Snow was disputed by Anaxagoras and Armenia produces red by mixture of the exhalations of Vermillion with the ordinary vapors which the Sun raises from the water yet this whiteness is as manifest as the causes are hid no less then those of light which is the colour of Celestial Bodies as colours are the light of Terrestrial However this whiteness seems to proceed from a mixture of Air and Water as appears in froth whose consistence is like that of Snow the whiteness whereof possibly is increas'd by the Spirits wherewith Snow abounds which are luminous Bodies whereof the fertility caus'd by Snow is an Argument to which Spirits which Frost hath not may be ascrib'd what Galen affirms namely that Fish cover'd with Snow become more delicious for to the Moon it can with no more reason be
same to it by its own sole approach Hence such Insects as need fewest parts are soonest and most easily generated of Putrefaction perfecter Animals never The Fourth said That Nothing being made of Nothing some Matter is requir'd to every Generation which being barely alter'd in Animals which produce their like is corrupted in those which are generated of themselves the internal Humidity which serv'd to conjoyn the dry parts together being drawn out whence Carcases become dust And because Nature is never idle therefore when She finds part of that Humidity full of a seminal Vertue and a Vital Spirit and cannot make a Plant or an Animal of it like what it was before then she forms imperfect Creatures Which effect is not to be attributed to the Elements being full of souls nor to that particular Intelligence which Avicenna saith is destinated to the introduction of Forms nor to Heaven call'd by some The Parent Forms but to the establish'd order of Nature That when Matter is indu'd with all the Dispositions requisite to such or such a Form the same must be introduc'd into it which constitutes not a different Species from the Animals generated of Seed though the particular end of those bred of corruption seems to be the purgation of the Elements all whose impurities they attract and are nourisht therewith The fifth said That these Generations must be attributed to the Sun who transmits not only his Influence upon the surface of our Elements but also his Influence and Vertue to the Center of the Earth where it concocts digests prepares and vivifies Metals and makes mineral Waters boil For besides that such Generations happen chiefly when he approaches or makes himself most fell upon our Horizon some have observâ—d That Rats begotten of Corruption without the help of Male and Female are distinguish'd from others in that being expos'd to the Sun after death they have little or no bad smell but are consum'd and become in a manner nothing that Planet resuming what it had contributed to them whereas the smell of other produc'd by ordinary generation is intolerable The Sixth said That both in Univocal Generation which is compar'd to one fire kindling another and in that by Corruption which hath some Analogy with fire excited by a Steel the same difficulty occurrs namely What imperceptible Chain and Link attracts Forms and makes them necessarily descend into the Compound to give it Being so soon as fit Dispositions concur therein whether these Dispositions are awaken'd by the Seed as when you sow a Plant in well-prepared ground or whether they spring out of the earth without sowing as many Plants do which are more vigorous and less need cultivation than others by the Gardener's reason that Mothers have more care of their own Children than Nurses have of those of others Hence Rats bred of Corruption are more sprightly and long-liv'd and multiply more than others As for the manner of their Generation it must have some proportion with that of perfect Animals which are as little understood there being no Philosophy that can tell why a Horse begets rather a Colt than a Calf nor why a Pear-tree rather produces a Pear than a Plum CONFERENCE CLXIIII Of Zoophytes or Plant-Animals THe comprehensiveness of this Universe appears in that in the division of Entity and Substance not onely each Member answers to as many things as are in Nature but there are as many others as there can be several combinations made of the Members of this division Thus in the division of Souls into vegetative sensitive and rational there are found middle ones not onely between sense and reason but also between Vegetation and Sense Examples whereof may be seen in the Families of Animals and Vegetables Some Plants have no Root as Misleto and Mushrooms others nothing but Root as Trubs and Truffles some have onely leaves as Duckmeat others neither flowers nor seed as Ferne some want leaves as Venus-Navil others commonly put forth the Fruit before the Leaf as the Fig-Tree and lastly some Flower without bearing Fruit as the Flower-Cherry-Tree Of Animals some are bred of putrefaction and of others some remain a while without motion or life to appearance as the Silk-Worm in its bag and Snails in Winter others remain alwayes immoveable as Oysters And because this manner of being nourish'd and growing without any progressive motion is proper to Plants and yet by opening and shutting their Shells they testifie some sense therefore they are call'd Plant-animals in which the Soul seems to be compounded and to resemble changeable colours which consist of two extreams as Gray doth of White and Black being wholly neither but both together So also a Zoöphyte is something less then an Animal and more then a Plant. The Second said That Forms and particularly Souls are indivisible Indeed one may be comprehended in another as the Vegetative is in the Sensitive and this in the Rational which comprehends all eminently but it cannot enter into the composition of another much less be divided informing a body that is half Plant and half Animal otherwise by the same reason there might be others half Men and half Beasts which is not imaginable but under the form of a Monster Moreover such division would proceed to infinity there being a Latitude and Degrees without end between one extream and another of one whereof that which partakes most would constitute a new Species or rather a new genius which is absurd and contrary to Philosophy which admits not multiplication of things without necâ—ssity The Third said That by the same reason Plants and Animals being of the same species there can be no doubt but these two attributes might be found in the same Subject For Vegetation and Sense being onely several operations of the same Soul which acts differently according as it findes the Organs of its Subject dispos'd hence the multiplication of Souls is unnecessary seeing they are all but one And as in Brutes the sensitive faculty supervening to the vegetative in their generation adds no new form to the former so the vegetation of Plants is nothing less then the sensitive the dispositions of the matter being the sole causes of this diversity An Animal depriv'd of the use of some senses is no less an Animal then another that hath all why then is a Tree less an Animal because it exercises fewer operations of its soul then Animals do Nor is it a conclusive reason that Plants are wholly destitute of the faculties of sense because the same are not perceptible to our Senses which yet finde something to satisfie themselves in the sensitive Plant growing as Scaliger and others relate in Zanolha a part of Tartary where the Inhabitants sowe a Grain like that of our Melons but somewhat longer from which grows an Herb which they call Borrametz that is a Lamb whereof it hath the whole figure especially the Feet Hoofs and Ears yea all the Head excepting the Horns instead whereof it hath a
colours CONFERENCE CLXXXIV Of the Cold of the middle Region of the Air. THe common Opinion attributes the coldness of the middle Region to the Antiperistasis of the heat of the upper and lower Regions which streightning the cold on either side leave it no other place but the middle whither the vapors rais'd by the Sun-beams ascending and no higher by reason of their weight and the thinness of the air there it comes to pass that the neighbourhood of these vapors returning to their natural cold encreases that of the middle Region But many inconveniences invalidate this Opinion First if this Element were hot and moist as is suppos'd it would shew some effects thereof but 't is quite contrary For he were a fool that should go into the Air to warm himself and the Air hath so little humidity that it dries all Bodies Secondly many Mountains surpassing the middle Region of the Air and retaining figures describ'd in the ashes of a Sacrifice for a whole year which shew that in all that time no Wind or Rain was rais'd there to deface them it would follow that such Mountains reflecting the Sun-beams by their solidity should cause heat in the middle Region of the Air and yet they are commonly cover'd with Snow Lastly this Antiperistasis being only in Summer not in Winter when the cold of the lower Region symbolises with that of the middle this reason should then cease and yet 't is in Winter-time that cold Meteors manifest themselves Wherefore we must recur to some other cause which Cardan takes to be the natural coldness of the Air not regarding the combination of the four first qualities For if cold be natural to the Air it will be easie to conclude that it must be coldest in the middle which is less alter'd by the contrary quality of heat being most distant from the Element of Fire if there be any and from the heat which necessarily follows the motion of the heavenly Sphears The Second said That Cold being no positive Quality but a bare negation it follows that Bodies destitute of Heat are necessarily cold Now the Air cannot have heat or any other quality because 't is to serve for a medium not only to all sublunary Bodies but also to the heavenly influences whose nature would be perverted and alter'd by the qualities of the Air as a colour'd medium imparts its colours to objects It happens therefore that vapours cool not but are cooled by the Air so that they become colder in the middle Region then whilst they were in their natural seats Yea they are so far from rendring the Air cold that they abate its sharpness which is never greater then in clear weather cloudy and misty weather being always more warm and accompany'd with less piercing cold For being rais'd rather by the subterraneous heat then by that of the Sun they warm our air which reaches not above a league from the Earth then being gradually deserted by the heat which carry'd them up they meet in those higher spaces which are void of all heat and begin immediately to condense and congeal them What people talk of the higher Region of the Air is very doubtful because the Element of Fire being but an Opinion cannot counter-balance the report of Acosta who affirms that divers Spaniards were kill'd by the cold in their passage upon the Mountains of Peru which he judges the highest of the World and within the upper region The Third said That if we were to be try'd by experience alone the Earth which in Winter is hot at the Centre and in Summer on its Surface would not be judg'd cold and dry as it is no more then the Water always cold and moist since the Sun's heat warms it and the saltness of the Sea renders it heating and drying But accidental qualities must be carefully distinguish'd from essential because these latter are hard to be discern'd when any impediment interposes As the sight cannot judge of the straitness of the stick in the water but by having recourse to reason which teaches us that all light Elements are also hot Now the lightness of the air is indisputable and its heat is prov'd by its subtlety whereby it penetrates bodies unpassable by light it self Yet this heat is easily turn'd into cold because the air being a tenuious body and not compact retains its qualities no longer then they are maintain'd therein by their ordinary causes So that 't is no wonder if not being hot in the highest degree as Fire is but in a remiss and inferior degree it easily becomes susceptible of a more powerful contrary quality For the Sun-beams which some hold to be the true Element of Fire heat not unless they be united by reflection and this reflection being limited cannot reach beyond our first Region the higher Regions must necessarily remain cold unless upon further inquiry it be thought that the motion of the air carry'd about with the Sphear of the Moon and the Element of Fire plac'd under the same are capable to heat it The Fourth said That if we may judge of those higher Regions of the Air by those of the Earth and Water which we frequent each of these Elements hath three sensible differences its Surface Middle and Centre Those that frequent Mines tell us that the heat which succeeds the exterior cold of our earth penetrates not above a quarter of a league in depth about the end of which space cold begins to be felt again and encreases more and more towards the Centre In like manner 't is probable that the Water follows the qualities as well as the declivity of the Earth That it is hot at the bottom whither therefore the Fish retire in Winter proceeds from the nearness of that middle Region of the Earth So that it being proper to these Elements to have different qualities in their middle from those of their extremities the same may be true also of the Air possibly because a perfect identity of temperature would not have been convenient for the generation of Mixts to which end all the Elements were destinated And it being the property of cold to close and re-unite the looseness and dissipation of the Air it was therefore highly necessary to be predominant in the middle Region thereof CONFERENCE CLXXXV Of the Generation of Males and Females DIstinction of Sex is not essential but consists only in the parts serving to Generation Nevertheless Aristotle makes Male and Female differ as Perfect and Imperfect and saith That Nature's intention is always to make a Male and that only upon the default of some requisite condition she produces a Female whom therefore he calls a Mistake of Nature or a Monster Galen likewise acknowledging no other difference styles Man a Woman turn'd outwards because Woman hath the same Organs with Man only wants heat and strength to put them forth Now indeed this heat and strength is manifestly greater in Males then Females even from the first conception for the
which is so far from being rich enough of its self that it borrows from the Greek and Latine to express the most common things and consequently is not sufficient to teach all the Sciences The Second said The French Tongue is deriv'd from the Greek Latine and Gothick which are Languages much more copious then it and therefore they that will recur to originals will find those Tongues more adapted for teaching the Sciences then the French and yet not any single one of them sufficient for it since the Romans to become and deserve the name of Learned were oblig'd to learn Greek Moreover since Books are the chief instruments for attaining the Sciences the ancient Latine and Greek ones which yet were not sufficient for it are much more numerous than the French and by consequence the French Tongue is not capable to teach every Science and had it more Translations then it hath yet these are but small Rivulets deriv'd from that grand Source of Sciences which is found in the original Languages The Third said If we regard the order of times and particularly that of the Creation when all things were in their perfection and purity 't is most likely that that Language which took birth with Adam and all the Sciences is more fit to teach them then the much more Novel French and since there must be a proportion between Instruments and the Matters upon which they act and this proportion is not found between the French Tongue lately invented and the Sciences which are as ancient as the World who can think it sufficient to teach them and the Cabalists hold that the Language fit to teach the Sciences perfectly must have words adapted to signifie the Vertues and Properties of things which ours hath not The Fourth said That all the Language of Adam who gave names suitable to the nature of every thing being lost except the the name of God for that reason so much esteemed by the Jews The Cabalists in imitation of that Tongue invented one whereof I shall give you a taste It hath five Vowels E A V I O which answer to the Elements and the Heaven E to Earth A to the Water V to the Air I to the Fire and O to Heaven E produceth in pronunciation c d f g l m n p r s t z forasmuch as these Consonants cannot be produc'd without it A produceth h and k v produceth q I produceth nothing because pure and single Fire doth not O likewise produceth nothing because the Heaven only moves and excites Generations whereas E produceth abundance of Letters resembling the Earth which produceth every thing in its bosom being the Centre of Heaven and the Matrix of the Elements Now to form words according to the Elementary Qualities they will have the Vowels which compose such a word answer to the Elements which compose such a mixt body And to specifie degrees because the Vowels whereby they are denoted meeting together would spoil the pronunciation therefore they make foure orders of the sixteen Consonants viz. b c d f denote the four degrees of Fire g l m n those of Air p r s t those of Water x z ss st those of Earth Upon this foundation they build the composition of all their Words which they compose of Vowels according to the Elements predominant in things and of Consonants according to their degree But who sees not the absurdity of this invention which by this means would extend only to corporeal mixts whereof the quality and very degree is known Concerning which Naturalists are so far from being agreed that many attribute most natural effects to other causes as to Occult Properties so call'd in opposition to the Elementary 'T is best therefore not to rove from the common tract which teaches us the Sciences by real Languages amongst which those call'd Dead ones to wit the Hebrew Greek and Latine and others now disus'd suffice not for teaching the Sciences because they are not pronounc'd well and the learned agree not about the importance of many Letters and Syllables Besides the most eloquent express not themselves so naturally in those antick obsolete Tongues as in their own And all confess that in order to obtain the perfection of a Science too much plainness cannot be us'd either on the Teacher's part in establishing their Rules and Precepts or on the Learner's in propounding their difficulties for resolution CONFERENCE CLXXXVII Of diversity of Colours in one and the same subject THe diversity of Colours is commonly deduc'd from the mixtion and proportion of the Elements but more truly from the several degrees of Sulphur which produces them as Salt doth Sapors the most certain indications what degree the quality of a Plant is of For if Colours had relation to the Elements then all red things should be hot and white things cold which is not true in Poppy and Roses on the one side nor Orange-flowers and Jasmin on the other So also green things should be always moist because this colour proceeds from an indigested humidity mixt with a part of putrifi'd earth as appears in standing waters and yet the greenness of Lawrel and Mint hinders them not from being hot and dry nor that of Ranunculus from burning But Colours are either natural or artificial which latter as we find it in Stuffs and Silks is neither the cause nor the effect of their temperament But natural colour such as that in the parts of living Animals is an effect of their Life and alterable after their death Wherefore I conclude that colour and its varieties proceeds from the different degrees of Sulphur in the subject but that one and the same subject is of several colours the causes may be First for that some of its parts are more compact others more loose and so differently receive the impression of the Sulphur and the Internal Fire Secondly the Sun shining more upon one part than another draws the internal colour from the Centre to the Circumference as Apples are colour'd on the side next the Sun Thirdly the same difference which is found between the Root Trunk Leavs Flower Fruit and other parts of Plants and Animals is also found in each portion of those parts as the lower part of the Rose is green the middle part whitish and the top red and the Tulip variegated is compounded of as many several particles which variety of places and matrices serves to determine the colour which Sulphur paints thereon being guided by the pencil of Nature The Second said That this diversity of colours proceeds only from the divers aspect of light which varies the colours of certain Bodies to our Eye as in the Rain-bow the Camelion and the necks of Pigeons in things expos'd to the Sun which seem far brighter than before To which you must add the distance and station of the beholders so water seems black or blew afar off but near hand colourless Turpentine Crystal and the whites of Eggs in several situations do the like
well employ'd Physicians but can add many more Nor is any thing said against Bezoar but what may be objected against all other Antidotes as Sealed Earth Unicorn's Horn and all Cordial Remedies whose Virtue may as well be question'd as that of Bezoar CONFERENCE CCVIII Whence proceeds the sudden Death of Men and Animals upon descending into certain Pits ON the sixteenth of June last an Inhabitant of the Town of Tilliers two Leagues from Virruel perceiv'd a goodly Pigeon which he took to be one of his own fall down into a Well hard by his House whereupon he call'd his Son and to draw it out they let down a basket with a rope to the bottom of the Well into which the Pigeon presently entred but as oft as they lifted it up from the water it fell back again thereunto After their design had fail'd the Son tyes a cudgel to the rope and being let down by his Father endeavors to take the Pigeon The Father ask'd him Whether he had her He answer'd thrice No and after some sighs falls having lost both Speech and Life The Father troubl'd at so strange an accident resolves to go down himself and accordingly without any help descends into the Well where he remain'd as his Son The Neighborhood advertised of this dysaster repair'd thither and amongst others one who had not long before cast the Well He ascribing all to the weakness of those who were dead presently betakes himself to go down but he was scarce come within two foot of the water but he fell down dead without making any complaint A strong and vigorous young Man upon the belief that the company conceiv'd that those persons were not dead but only needed help undertakes to go down likewise he did so but suddenly fell backwards with a little Convulsive Motion which made him cast up his head Hereupon notwithstanding the disswasions of the Curate of the place who began to suspect some mortiferous causes of this effect a fifth descended after he had caus'd the rope to be fastned to his middle he was no sooner in the middle of the Well but he was pull'd up again upon the Gestures which he made with a livid Countenance and other signes fore-runners of Death which he escap'd by being presently succoured with Wine and Aqua Vitae Being recover'd he affirm'd that he had perceiv'd no hurt but only a certain faintness upon him This last attempt cool'd all assistance so that there was no more talk of going down but only of getting the Bodies up which was done and 't was observ'd that none of them had any signes of Life saving the Son in whom were seen some small tokens which presently vanish'd The wonderment of all this was greatly increas'd when a Gentleman of the Country curious of seeing what was reported let down a Dog who continu'd there a quarter of an hour and was pull'd up again safe and sound This Well twenty five foot deep and of water but two is inclos'd with a very ancient Wall at the foot of a good high Hill whereon stands the Castle of Tilliers And which help'd not to diminish the wonder it had been cleansed by two men who found no hurt nor any thing extraordinary in it saving an odour stronger than elsewhere the water being as clear as that of the Spring and without any sediment Now if it was mineral and malignant vapors that suffocated those that descended the same might have done the like upon those that first gave them vent The Second said That this Effect cannot be attributed to vapors barely venomous and of the nature of ordinary Poysons which corrupt our humours sometimes after Applications as the Plague and other Epidemical Diseases do but this steam is so opposite to Life that it destroyes the same in an instant which we cannot imagine to proceed from any other cause but a mineral which is far more active The escape of those that cleans'd the Well may be attributed to the mud which smeared the sides of the Well and so kept the vapor in till growing stronger by that restraint it made way for its self through that remaning crust and produc'd the above-mention'd dismal effects emitting its Poyson in a strait line according to the rectitude of the Well which weakned the Pigeon in such sort that it was unable to rise again as 't is reported that Birds fall down as they fly over the Mare Mortuum or Lake of Sodom in Judea The Third said 'T is not probable that any such slimy crust hindred this Effect at first since the Dog let down afterwards found no hurt unless you think a new crust arose in that little time which pass'd between the death of the Men and the descent of the Dog This Effect therefore may probably be attributed to the Archaeus or Central Fire that Motor of Nature which dries all the vapors of the Elements from the Centre to the Circumference subliming the principals of minerals in order to make its Productions and as the several mixtures of these elevated vapors are in some places wholsome to wit in Bathes and mineral waters so there are others destructive of our Nature But because such elevation is not continual but only at certain times according to the motion of that grand Motor and particularly of the Sun hence Arsenical vapors have produc'd such Effects at one time and stifled those that descended into a Well filled with them which they have not done to those that clean'd it nor to the Dog in as much as those vapors were not rais'd at this time And perhaps these mineral vapors are not always sublim'd in such a degree as to be mortiferous otherwise it would follow that none could ever labor in mines with safety by reason of deadly fumes The Fourth said That such expellations could not extinguish the Fire of Life in so short a time without some fore-running signes But 't is more probable that this Effect proceeds from some venomous Animal infecting the Air which being confin'd in a place incapable of evaporation and suckt by those that descend down the Well they can no more save themselves from Death than in a pestilent Air. Nor are they Fables which History records of certain Grottoes in which Basilisks and Serpents residing infected not only the place but also the whole Country as Philostratus relates in the Life of Apollonins how a Dragon carry'd the Plague into all places where-ever he went Now as to the particulars of the Story what is difficult in them I thus resolve Those that cleans'd the Well open'd the passage to the Basilisk who by degrees creeping forth out of his hole into the Well there darted forth his mortal rays upon what-ever was presented to his Eyes which done he retir'd into his hole again so that the Dog let down into the Well after the Basilisk's retirement could not be hurt For that the spirits issuing out of the Eyes of this mortiferous creature are harmless to dogs and
Ptolemy assignes to Saturn the right Ear the Spleen the Bladder and the Bones to Jupiter the Hands the Lungs the Liver the Blood and the Seed to Mars the left Ear the Reins and the Testicles to the Sun the Brain the Eyes and the Nerves to Venus the Nose the Mouth and the Genitals to Mercury the Tongue the Understanding and Ratiocination to the Moon the Mouth of the Stomack and the Stomack it self But they attribute these marks of the Face to the motion of the Stars of the eighth Sphere which are as it were expressions of the different Inclinations which every one naturally hath and which are bestow'd on him at his Nativity but with this Caution that it is hard to explicate them unless a Man can decipher those Characters and find out the true signification thereof which is the chiefest of all Sciences CONFERENCE CCXXXV Of Auguries and Auspices THere never was any Opinion so erroneous but it met with some Abettors nor any thing in point of practise so extravagant but was in some measure authoriz'd Of this quality is that of Auguries For though Cicero when he was Augur said somewhat on the behalf of them yet in his second Book of Divination he could not forbear discovering their absurdity and charging them with vanity and foolery And yet this Opinion was in such veneration among the Romans who were otherwise the most prudent of any Nation in the world that they sent yearly six Children Sons of the most eminent Senators into Tuscany to learn of the Inhabitants thereof who it seems were well skill'd in it the Science of foretelling things to come by the flight singing or chirping of Birds since generally known by the name of Augury Nay this veneration is the more remarkable in this respect that they would not undertake any thing of importance till they had first consulted the Colledg of Augurs which was first establish'd by Romulus who had also been instructed therein having order'd it to consist only of three persons according to the number of the Tribes But that number was afterwards increas'd to 24. who were consulted about what-ever concern'd that great Empire and they continu'd till the time of the Elder Theodosius when it was suppress'd having till then been so considerable by the nobility and merit of those whereof it consisted that they were the Arbitrators of all Counsels and Deliberations which were not taken till their judgements had been first had Nay they had this further advantage above all other Magistrates that they could not be put out of their places upon any account whatsoever but continu'd during their lives in that dignity as Fabius Maximus did who was Augur sixty two years Nor was it only requisite that that they should be free from crimes but also from all bodily imperfection the least defect of Body being accounted a lawful Cause to hinder an Augur from taking place among the rest it being as Plutarch affirms in his Problems an undecent thing for any one to present himself before the Gods and to treat of the Mysteries of Religion with anything of uncleanness or imperfection about him Nay they thought any thing of that kind so contrary to the said Ceremony that to be the more successful in the performance thereof it was requisite that the Birds and other Creatures whereof they made use in their Auguries should be as free from any defect as the Augurs themselves In the mean time they requir'd so much respect from the people that not thinking it enough to have the Lictors march before them with the Fasces as was done before the chiefest Magistrates they had for a further badge of their dignity a stick crooked at one end call'd Lituus which was that of Kings And indeed they assum'd to themselves so great authority that they confirm'd the Elections of Dictators Consuls and Roman Praetors whom they many times took occasion to depose under pretence that they had been elected contrary to the will of their Gods whereof they pretended to be the only Interpreters They took upon them also the knowledge and discovery of things to come by carefully observing certain extraordinary accidents which surpriz'd all others by their sudden and unexpected coming to pass and which by a certain Science and long Observation they affirm'd to be the significators of what was to come And this they derived principally from the Heavens and the different Apparitions of the Air especially from Thunder and Winds then from Prodigies and miraculous effects of Nature and afterwards from four-footed Beasts but especially from Birds from which comes the name to that kind of Divination called Auspicium Augurium wherein those Divinators fore-told things conceal'd and such as should come to pass by the singing and flight of Birds They also made the same Predictions by observing how the young ones being taken out of a cubb where they had been kept took the food laid before them For if these devour'd it with a certain greediness so as that some fell to the ground the Omen was fortunate and signifi'd all happiness to the Consulter whereas on the contrary it signifi'd ill-luck if they would not meddle with it at all And this Opinion was so strangely rooted in the Minds of some superstitious people that Titus Livius and Valerius Maximus attribute the Cause of two signal defeats of the Romans one under the Command of Publius Claudius in the first Punick War and the other under that of Flaminius in the second to their contempt of these Auguries The Second said That of all the several kinds of foretelling secret things he thought not any more rational than that which was done by the means of Birds called Ornithomantia the Nature of which Creatures being very ancient and in a manner celestial they seem to be more susceptible of the impressions of the Heavens whereof they are the Inhabitants and which are the true Causes of what-ever happens here below than any other Animals which have their abode either in the Earth or Waters Thence it comes that the Eagle which soars up higher than any other of the Volatile Common-wealth hath been the most esteem'd in the business of Auguries by the Professors of this Art who also give him the preheminence as to the constancy and vivacity of his Sight taking it for a signification of good luck when he began his flight on the right side and that especially if it were so violent that the noise of his wings might be heard Thus Aristander having seen an Eagle flying from the Camp of Alexander the Great towards that of his Enemies deriv'd thence an Augury of his Victory as Tarquinius Priscus did the like of his coming as he afterwards did to the Crown from this accident that an Eagle came and took his Cap off his Head and set it on again after he had kept it a good while in the Air. But Tarquinius Superbus had for an Augury of his exile and the loss of his Kingdom the
one time than at another but only seem to be such to our Senses which though they should be destitute of all qualities are then endu'd therewith so that the same Well-water which seems to be hot in Winter by reason of the coldness that is in the Touching seems cold in Summer by reason of the heat of the same Organ which judges of it comparatively For the contrary is seen in that Well-water in Summer being transported into a hot place is there nevertheless cold and the fumes and hot vapors which exhale from Springs and Wells in Winter do sufficiently demonstrate that during the said season the water is endu'd with a true and real heat too sensible to be accounted imaginary But this Antiperistasis is further more solidly confirm'd by Experience whereby we see that fire burns more violently and is more sparkling in great Frosts or in the shade than in hot weather or when it lyes expos'd to the beams of the Sun In like manner a little Water cast upon a great Fire makes it more violent than it was before and the Ventricles of our Bodies according to the Opinion of Hippocrates in his Aphorisms are hotter in Winter than in any other season of the year whence it comes that we are apt to feed more plentifully and Digestion is then better perform'd Nay if we but go down into our Cellars we shall find that the heat is more sensible there in Winter but in Summer when all things are scorch'd and burnt up on the surface of the Earth all Subterraneous Places are so much the colder the deeper they are and the nearer they approach to the Centre towards which Cold which is one of the natural qualities of the Earth gathers together and reunites it self thereto that so it may be secur'd from the heat whereby it is encompass'd of all sides And as it is to this that the generation of Metals in the entrails of the Earth is principally attributed so most of the Meteors which are fram'd in the two Regions of the Air owe theirs to this same Cold which coming to encompass and as it were to enclose the hot and dry Exhalation which makes the Winds Lightning Thunder and Thunder-bolts as also that which makes the Comets in the Middle Region of the Air these unctuous and easily-enflam'd vapors being encompass'd of all sides by the extream coldness of that Air which encloses them they in order to their Conservation re-unite and take fire after the same manner as the Rayes of the Sun darted against some Opake Body or reflected by Burning-glasses set on fire the most solid Bodies on which they are repercuss'd as it is related of Archimedes who by such an Artifice consum'd the Ships of Marcellus who besieg'd the City of Saragossa in Sicily Which instance serves as well to prove Antiperistasis as the manner whereby it is wrought to wit by the repercussion of the intentional Species of the Subject caus'd by its contrary Thus then it comes that the Water of Springs and Wells is cold in the Summer in regard the Species of the cold forc'd by the Water towards the heated Air which is all about it are darted back again by that opposite heat to the place whence they came whereupon being thrust closer together they there re-inforce and augment the Cold which happens not so in Winter when the Species of the coldness of the Water meeting with no Obstruction in the Air endu'd with the like quality insinuate themselves into it without any resistance and so not being reflected nor forc'd back towards the Water it is not then so cold as in Summer The Second said That the intentional Species being not design'd to act but only to make a discovery of the beings from which they flow as may be seen in those of all sensible Objects which these Species represent to the Organs that are to judge of them cannot contribute any thing to the vigor of the action observable in the Antiperistasis which he conceiv'd should rather be attributed to the simple form of the Subject which having an absolute sovereignty over the qualities employ'd thereby in order to Action renders them more or less active according to the need it stands in of them And as seething Water taken off the Fire becomes cold of it self without any other assistance than that of its proper substantial form which hath the property of re-instating it self in that degree of Cold which is naturally due unto it so ought it with greater reason to have an equal right of preserving that same quality when it is assaulted by its contrary Heat without having any recourse to those Emissions of Species which though we should grant the Tactile qualities what is much in dispute yet would not be able to cause an Antiperistasis inasmuch as being inseparable from them if the intentional Species of the coldness of Well-water were directed towards the warm'd Air it should take along with it the coldness and consequently it should be so far from acquiring any new degree of coldness thereby that it would lose much of that which it had before For since it is the Nature of these Intentional Species to be otherwise incapable by reason of their immateriality of producing any Corporeal and Material Effect such as is the augmentation of the degrees of any active quality as Heat and Cold are there being not any contrariety between the Species thereof no more than there is between those of â—ll other Bodies whereof they are the Images there is not any reason that obliges the Intentional Species of the Cold to retreat and close together when they come to meet with those of Heat or Heat it self no more than there is that the Species of this latter quality should make the other more vigorous by their reflection The Third said That it must be acknowledg'd that the Species of Cold and Heat and the other first Qualities were not contrary among themselves as being in their own Nature inalterable and incorruptible as the other Intentional Species are which come near the Condition of Spirits Yet does it not follow thence that these Species cannot be reflected inasmuch as the Visible Species Light and Voice which also have no contraries are not for that the less re-percuss'd by Mirrours and other solid Bodies or those hollow places which make Echoes The Fourth said That it is not sufficient in order to the giving of a reason of that effect to attribute it to the substantial form of every Agent but it is to be referr'd to a superiour cause such as is the Soul of the world whose function it being to preserve every thing in its intireness and to be assistant thereto when it comes into any danger as it happens when it is assaulted by its contrary then bent upon its destruction there lies a certain engagement on this first cause to relieve it in so great an extremity by supplying it with new forces to help it out of that oppression Thence
are utter'd as soon as thought and hence when we see those fine Discourses in Writing which ravish'd all the World in the Chair and at the Bar we are oftentimes asham'd of having admir'd them Which perhaps as much or more kept Cicero from letting his Orations be read in his youth as his pretended excuse of reserving to himself the liberty of contradicting himself Wherefore there being more to be learn'd in a well-digested and exact Piece Writing which is ordinarily such must also be more proper for Instruction Which is so true in the Mathematicks to which alone the name of Discipline belongs that none ever presum'd either to teach or learn them by Speech alone The Third said That a good Comparison must be of things alike and so if we compare Speech and Writing it must be in respect of two things equally perfect in their kind as an exact Discourse and an exact Writing You must also bring two capacities of the same pitch and they must have equal time to learn the same thing in which case the circumstances being the same there 's no doubt but Speech is more advantageous thereunto than Writing which is not absolutely necessary as the Voice is without which the latter is unserviceable he who reads being unable to understand any thing unless he hath already heard it spoken of Hence one naturally deaf is uncapable not only of the Sciences but also of the use of Reason yea of Speech too Whereas on the contrary some born blind and who consequently never read have nevertheless prov'd very learned And this prae-eminence of Speech above Writing appears especially in that the latter cannot be expressed without the former Whence some justly doubt whether dead Languages even such as are most familiar to us as Greek and Latine are not lost as to their best part their pronunciation So that the Greeks and Latines of Demosthenes and Cicero's time would possibly no more understand us speaking Greek and Latine than those of the present Age Whence 't would not be knowing of things to know them only by Books by which also none ever learn'd Languages but only by Speech The Fourth said That this Question admits not of an absolute determination in regard of the different capacities of Teachers and Learners as also of the Arts or Disciplines which are learn'd For nimble Heads and impatient of Labour such as the Cholerick and Sanguine commonly are suit better with Vocal Instructions than with Reading which on the contrary is more pleasing and profitable to the Melancholy and Phlegmatick who take more time for reflection and meditation upon what they read Again Such Disciplines as consist chiefly in Contemplation as Divinity Natural Philosophy the pure Mathematicks together with those which require great Memory as History and Law have more need of Reading But those that consist in Action are better learn'd by Speech which hath more affinity with action and sets it out better Such is Oratory the practical part of Physick and Law Mechanick Arts and Handicrafts which 't is impossible to learn by Books although one may be render'd more perfect therein by them CONFERENCE CXIIII I. Of the Milky-Way II. Which is most powerful Gold or Iron THis Tract of the Sky is call'd the Milky-way from its whiteness and having breadth is rather a Superficies than a Circle although commonly so term'd It passeth quite round the Heaven and so like the great Circles is divisible into 360 degrees but differs from them in that it passeth not precisely through the Center of the World but deviates something from it It cuts the Heaven into two Hemispheres to wit at this time making one of the Sections at the last degrees of Taurus and beginning of Gemini and the other opposite to it at the end of Scorpio and beginning of Sagittary at which place 't is narrower by about two degrees than at Gemini where it hath ten degrees of breadth wherein it differs in several places making such windings as Rivers have and contracting or enlarging and dividing it self in some places as particularly neer Cygnus beyond the Tropick of Cancer where it makes two Branches one of which ends neer the Aequator by the side of Serpentarius the other passing between Sagittary and Scorpio by the feet of the Centaure cross the Ship Argo where 't is broadest goes by the Unicorn over the head of Leo to the feet of Gemini from whence crossing Bootes Perseus and Cassiopaea it returns to Cygnus To speak nothing of the Poets Fables who say That when Juno suckled Hercules and discover'd who 't was she spilt her Milk here or That 't is the space of Heaven which the Sun's Chariot burnt by the ill driving of Phaeton That 't is the place where Apollo fought with the Giants or by which he return'd towards the East to avoid seeing the crime of Thyestes or else the Road of the Gods leading to Jupiter's Palace the Residence of Heroes the Mansion of the Virtues the High-way of Souls and such other Fables Such as have thought it the Light of the Stars whose Splendour the Sun cannot Eclipse by reason of the Earths interposition in the night-time were greatly mistaken For there are no Stars but what are enlightned by the Sun who being 166 times bigger than the Earth 't is demonstrated by the Opticks That when an opake Body is plac'd before a luminous Body greater than it the Rays of the luminous Body are united beyond the shadow which was made by the opake Body as the Sun's Rays meet again beyond the Earth's shadow which reacheth no further than the sphere of Mercury much less to the Starry Heaven to hinder the Sun's Light from passing thither this Sphere being distant 2081 Semidiameters each of which makes 860 German Leagues Those who say 'T is the place where the Element of Fire transpires and purges its fuliginosities or else a sort of Fire denser than the Elementary are as little credible as those others who think the Sun sometimes made his course in this Milky-way as he doth now in the Zodiack in which nevertheless he leaves no print of combustion or light Much less Theophrastus who said 'T was the conglutination and soader of the two Hemispheres and that at the place where they are united and soader'd together this brightness appears different from the rest of Heaven But I conceive it to be nothing else but a part of Heaven more dense and consequently more luminous than the others For Heaven having a radical Light the denser and closer its parts are they are the more luminous as appears by the Stars which are the denser parts of their Orb not visible in regard of its rarity and by Water part of which condens'd by cold reflects the Light and appears white the remainder of liquid Water abiding transparent The Second said He judg'd no Opinion more ridiculous than Aristotle's who held this Milky-way to be a Meteor shining not in Heaven but in the Air where