prooued from her manner of operation which is grounded in being ibid. § 10. Lastly it is prooued from the science of Morality the principles whereof would be destroied if the soule were mortall pag. 421 CHAP. X. Declaring what the soule of a man separated from his body is and of her knowledge and manner of working pag. 422 § 1. That the soule is one simple knowing act which is a pure substance and nothing but substance ibid. § 2. That a separated soule is in no place and yet is not absent from any place pag. 424 § 3. That a separated soule is not in time nor subiect to it ibid. § 4. That the soule is an actiue substance and all in it is actiuitie pag. 425 § 5. A description of the soule pag. 426 § 6. That a separated soule knoweth all that which she knew whilst she wâ—s in her bodie ibid. § 7. That the least knowledge which the soule acquireth in her bodie of anie one thing doth cause in her when she is separated from her bodie a compleat knowledge of all thinges whatsoeuer pag. 427 § 8. An answere to the obiections of some Peripatetikes who maintaine the soule to perish with the body pag. 429 § 9 The former Peripatetikes refuted out of Aristotle pag. 431 § 10. The operations of a separated soule compared to her operations in her bodie ibid. § 11. That a separated soule is in a state of pure being and consequently immortall pag. 432 CHAP. XI Shewing what effects the diuers manners of liuing in this world do cause in a soule after she is separated from her body p. 433 § 1. That a soule in this life is subiect to mutation and may be perfected in knowledge ibid. § 2. That the knowledges which a soule getteth in this life will make her knowledge in the next life more perfect and firme pag. 434 § 3. That the soules of men addicted to science whilst they liued here are more perfect in the next world then the soules of vnlearned men pag. 435 § 4. That those soules which embrace vertue in this world will be most perfect in the next and those which embrace vice most miserable ibid. § 5. The state of a vitious soule in the next life pag. 437 § 6. The fundamentall reason why as well happinesse as misery is so excessiue in the next life pag. 439 § 7. The reason why mans soule requireth to be in a body and to liue for some space of time ioyned with it pag. 441 § 8. That the misery of the soule in the next world proceedeth out of inequality and not out of falsity of her iudgements pag. 442 CHAP. XII Of the perseuerance of a soule in the state she findeth herselfe in at her first separation from her body pag. 443 § 1. The explication and proofe of that maxime that if the cause be in act the effect must also be ibid. § 2. The effects of all such agents as worke instantaneously are complete in the first instant that the agents are putt ibid. § 3. All pure spirits do worke instantaneously pag. 444 § 4. That a soule separated from her body can not suffer any change after the first instant of her separation ibid. § 5. That temporall sinnes are iustly punished with eternall paines pag. 445 The Conclusion pag. 446 THE PREFACE THIS writing was designed to haue seene the light vnder the name of one treatise But after it was drawne in paper as I cast a view ouer it I found the prooemiall part which is that which treateth of Bodies so ample in respect of the other which was the end of it and for whose sake I meddled with it that I readily apprehended my reader would thinke I had gone much astray from my text when proposing to speake of the immortality of Mans Soule three parts of foure of the whole discourse should not so much as in one word mention that soule whose nature and proprieties I aymed at the discouery of To auoyde this incongruity occasioned mee to change the name and vnity of the worke and to make the suruay of bodies a body by it selfe though subordinate to the treatise of the soule Which notwithstanding it be lesse in bulke then the other yet I dare promise my Reader that if he bestow the paines requisite to perfect him selfe in it he will find as much time well spent in the due reading of it as in the reading of the former treatise though farre more large But I discerne an obiection obuious to be made or rather a question why I should spend so much time in the consideration of bodies whereas none that hath formerly written of this subiect hath in any measure done the like I might answere that they had vpon other occasions first written of the nature of bodies as I may instance in Aristotle and sundry others who either haue themselues professedly treated the science of bodies or haue supposed that part sufficiently performed by other pennes But truly I was by an vnauoydable necessity hereunto obliged which is a current of doctrine that at this day much raigneth in the Christian Schooles where bodies and their operations are explicated after the manner of spirituall thinges For wee hauing very slender knowledge of spirituall substances can reach no further into their nature then to know that they haue certaine powers or qualities but can seldome penetrate so deepe as to descend to the particulars of such Qualities or Powers Now our moderne Philosophers haue introduced such a course of learning into the schooles that vnto all questions concerning the proper natures of bodies and their operations it is held sufficient to answere they haue a quality or a power to doe such a thing And afterwards they dispute whether this Quality or Power be an Entity distinct from its subiect or no and how it is seperable or vnseperable from it and the like Conformable to this who will looke into the bookes which are in vogue in these schooles shall find such answers and such controuersies euery where and few others As of the sensible qualities aske what it is to be white or red what to be sweete or sower what to be odoriferous or stincking what to be cold or hott And you are presently paid with that it is a sensible quality which hath the power to make a wall white or red to make a meate agreeable or disagreeable to the tast to make a gratefull or vngratefull smell to the nose etc Likewise they make the same questions and resolutions of Grauity and Leuity as whether they be qualities that is entities distinct from their subiect and whether they be actiue or passiue which when they haue disputed slightly and in common with logicall arguments they rest there without any further searching into the physicall causes or effects of them The like you shall find of all strange effects of them The loadestone and Electricall bodies are produced for miraculous and not vnderstandable thinges and in which it must be
in discourse and of the vast extent of it Dialo de mundo 4 Of humane actions and of those that concerne ourselues 5 Of humane actions as they concerne our neighbours 6 Of Logike 7 Of Grammar 8 Of Rhetorike 9 Of Poetry 10 Of the Power of speaking 11 Of arts that concerne dumbe and insensible creatutes 12 Of Arithmetike 13 Of Prudence 14 Obseruations vpon what hath beene said in this Chapter 1 That humane actions proceed from two seuerall principles vnderstanding and sense 2 How our generall and inbred maximes doe concurre to humane actioÌ„ 3 That the rules and maximes of arts doe worke positiuely in vs though we thinke not of them 4 How the vndestaÌ„ding doth cast about when it wanteth sufficient grounds for action 5 How reason doth rule ouer sense and passion 6 How we recall our thoughts from distractions 7 How reason is sometimes ouercome by sense and passion 1 The coÌ„nection of the subsequent Chapters with the precedent 2 The inexisteÌ„ce of corporeall thinges in the soule by the power of apprehension doth proue her to be immateriall 3 The notion of being which is innate in the soule doth proue the same 4 The same is proued by the notion of respects 5 That corporeall thinges are spiritualized in the vnderstanding by meanes of the soules working in and by respects 6 That the abstracting of notions from all particular and indiuiduall accidents doth proue the immaterialitie of the soule 7 That the vniuersalitie of abstracted notions doth proue the same 8 That collectiue apprehensions do proue the same 9 The operations of the soule drawing allways from multitude to vnitie do proue the same 10 The difference betwixt the notion of a thing in our vnderstanding and the impression that correspondeth to the same thing in our fansie doth proue the same 11 The apprehensioÌ„ of negatioÌ„s and priuations do proue the same 1 The manner of iudging or deeming by apprehending two thinges to be identified doth proue the soule to be immateriall 2 The same is proued by the manner of apprehending opposition in a negatiue iudgement 3 That thinges in themselues opposite to one an other hauing no opposition in the soule doth proue the same 4 That the first truthes are identified to the soule 5 That the soule hath an infinite capacitie and consequently is immateriall 6 That the opposition of contradictory propositions in the Soule doth proue her immaterialitie 7 How propositions of eternall truth do proue the immaterialitie of the soule 1 That in discoursing the soule coÌ„taineth more in it at the same time then is in the fantasie which prooueth her to be immateriall 2 That the nature of discourse doth prooue the soule to be ordered to infinite knowledge and consequeÌ„tly to be immateriall 3 That the most naturall obiects of the soule are immateriall and consequently the soule her selfe in such 1 That the soules being a power to order thinges proueth her to be immateriall 2 That the soules being able to mooue without being mooued doth prooue her to be immateriall 3 That the soules proceeding to action with an vniuersality and indifferency doth prooue the same 4 That the quiet proceeding of reason doth prooue the same 5 A conclusion of what hath beene said hetherto in this second Treatise 1 That Mans Soule is a substance 2 That man is compounded of some other substance besides his body 3 That the soule doth subsist of it selfe independently of the body 4 Two other arguments to prooue the same one positiue the other negatiue 5 The same is prooued because the soule can not be obnoxious to the cause of mortality 6 The same is prooued because the soule hath no contrary 7 The same is prooued from the end for which the soule was created 8 The same is prooued because she can mooue without being mooued 9 The same is prooued from her manner of operation which is grounded in being 10 Lastly it is prooued from the science of Morality the principles whereof would be destroied if the soule were mortall 1 That the soule is one simple knowing act which is a pure substance and nothing but substance 2 That a seperated soule is in no place and yet is not abseÌ„t from any place Boetius 3 That a seperated soule is not in time nor subiect to it 4 That the soule is an actiue substance and all in it is actiuitie 5 A description of the soule 6 That a seperated soule knoweth all that which she knew whilst she was in her bodie 7 That the least knowledge which the soule acquireth in her bodie of anie one thing doth cause in her when she is seperated from her bodie a compleat knowledge of all thingâ— whatsoeuer 8 An answere to the obiections of some Peripatetikes who maintaine the soule to perish with the body 9 The former Peripateâ—ickeâ— refuted out of Aristotle 10 The operations of a seperated soule compared to her operations in her bodie 11 That a separated soule is in a state of pure being and consequently immortall 1 That a soule in this life is subiect to mutation and may be perfected in knowledge 2 That the knowledges which a soâ—le getteth in this life will make her knowledge in the next life more perfect and firme 3 That the soules of meÌ„ addicted to science whilst they liued here are more perfect in the next world then the soules of vnlearned men 4 That those soules which embrace vertue in this world will be most perfect in the next and those which embrace vice most miserable 5 The state of a vicious soule in the next life 6 The fundamentall reason why as well happinesse as miserie is so excessiue in the next life 7 The reason why mans soule requireth to be in a body and to liue for some space of time ioyned with it 8 That the misery of the soule in the next world proceedeth out of inequality and not out of falsity of her iudgements 1 The explication and proofe of that maxime that if the cause be iâ— act the effect must also bâ— 2 The effects of all such ageÌ„ts as worke instantaneously arâ— complete in the first instant that the agents are putt 3 All pure spirits do worke instantaneously 4 That a soule separated from her body can not suffer any change after the first instant of her separation 5 That temporall sinnes are iustly punished with eternall painâ—s
practise of them as in like manner to vnderstand the other kind of plaine language we must obserue how the wordes that compose it are apprehended vsed and applyed by mankind in generall and not receiue into this examination the wrested or Metaphoricall senses of any learned men who seeke oftentimes beyond any ground in nature to frame a generall notion that may comprehend all the particular ones which in any sense proper or improper may arise out of the vse of one word And this is the cause of greate errors in discourse soe greate and important as I cannot too much inculcate the caution requisite to the auoyding of this rocke Which that it may be the better apprehended I will instance in one example of a most plaine and easie conception wherein all mankind naturally agreeth how the wresting it from its proper genuine and originall signification leadeth one into strange absurdities and yet they passe for subtile speculations The notion of being in a place is naturally the same in all men liuing aske any simple artisan Where such a man such a howse such a tree or such a thing is and he will answere you in the very same manner as the learnedest Philosopher would doe he will tell you the man you aske for is in such a church sitting in such a piew and in such a corner of it that the howse you enquire after is in such a streete and next to such two buildinges on each side of it that the tree you would find out is in such a forest vpon such a hill neere such a fountaine and by such a bush that the wine you would drinke of is in such a cellar in such a part of it and in such a caske In conclusion no man liuing that speaketh naturally and freely out of the notion hee findeth clearely in his vnderstanding will giue you other answere to the question of where a thing is then such a one as plainely expresseth his conceit of being in place to be no other then a bodies being enuironed and enclosed by some one or seuerall others that are immediate vnto it as the place of a liquor is the vessell that containeth it and the place of the vessell is such a part of the chamber or house that it resteth vpon together with the ambient ayre which hath a share in making vp the places of most thinges And this being the answere that euery man whatsoeuer will readily giue to this question and euery asker being fully satisfied with it we may safely conclude that all theire notions and conceptions of being in a place are the same and consequently that it is the naturall and true one But then some others considering that such conditions as these will not agree vnto other thinges which they likewise conceite to be in a place for they receiue it as an Axiome from theire sense that whatsoeuer is must be somewhere and whatsoeuer is no where is not att all they fall to casting about how they may frame some common notion to comprehend all the seuerall kindes of being in place which they imagine in the thinges they discourse of If there were nothing but bodies to be ranked by them in the Predicament of place then that description I haue already sett downe would be allowed by them as sufficient But since that spirits and spirituall thinges as Angels rationall soules verities sciencies arts and the like haue a being in nature and yet will not be comprised in such a kind of place as a body is contained in they racke theire thoughts to speculate out some common notion of being in place which may be common to these as well as to bodies like a common accident agreeing to diuerse subiects And so in the end they pitch vpon an Entity which they call an Vbi and they conceite the nature and formall reason of that to be the ranking of any thing in a place when that Entity is therevnto affixed And then they haue no further difficulty in settling an Angell or any pure spirit or immateriall essence in a place as properly and as completely as if it were a corporeall substance It is but assigning an Vbi to such a spirit and he is presently riueted to what place you please and by multiplying the Vbies any indiuiduall body vnto which they are assigned is at the same instant in as many distant places as they allott it different Vbies and if they assigne the same Vbi to seuerall bodies so many seuerall ones as they assigne it vnto will be in one and the same place and not onely many bodies in one place but euen a whole bodie in an indiuisible by a kind of Vbi that hath a power to resume all the extended partes and enclose them in a point of place All which prodigious conceits and impossibilities in nature doe spring out of theire mistake in framing Metaphysicall and abstracted conceptions insteed of contenting themselues with those plaine easy and primary notions which nature stampeth a like in all men of common sense and vnderstanding As who desireth to bee further instructed in this particular may perceiue if he take the paines to looke ouer what M. White hath discoursed of Place in the first of his Dialogues De Mundo Vnto which booke I shall from time to time according as I shall haue occasion referre my Reader in those subiects the Author taketh vppon him to prooue being confident that his Metaphysicall demonstrations there are as firme as any Mathematicall ones for Metaphysicall demonstrations haue in themselues as much firmenesse certainty and euidency as they and so will appeare as euident as they vnto whosoeuer shall vnderstand them throughly and shall frame right conceptions of them which how plaine soeuer they seeme to bee is not the worke of euery pretender to learning THE SECOND CHAPTER Of Quantity AMONG those primary affections which occurre in the perusall of a body Quantity as I haue obserued in the precedent chapter is one and in a manner the first and the roote of all the rest Therefore according to the caution we haue beene so prolixe in giuing because it is of so maine importance if we ayme at right vnderstanding the true nature of it we must examine what apprehension all kindes of people that is mankind in generall maketh of it By which proceeding we doe not make the ignorant multitude iudge of that learning which groweth out of the consideration of Quantity but onely of the naturall notion which serueth learned men for a basis and foundation to build scientificall super-structures vpon For although sciencies be the workes and structures of the vnderstanding gouerned and leuelled by the wary and strict rules of most ingenious artificers yet the ground vpon which they are raised are such plaine notions of thinges as naturally and without any art doe present themselues to euery mans apprehension without which for matter to worke vpon those artificiall reflections would leaue the vnderstanding as vnsatisfied as a cooke
them duely which must be done by serious and continued reflection and not by cursary reading or by interrupted attempts yet since we haue still a whole field of proofes vntouched and that in so important a matter no euidence can be too cleare nor any paines be accounted lost that may redouble the light although it shine already bright enough to discerne what we seeke we will make vp the concert of vnanimous testimonies to this already established truth by adding those arguments we shall collect out of the manner of our soules proceeding to action vnto the others we haue drawne from our obseruations vpon her apprehensions her iudgements and her discourses Looking then into this matter the first consideration we meete withall is that our vnderstanding is in his owne nature an orderer and that his proper worke is to ranke and putt thinges in order for if we reflect vpon the workes and artes of men as a good life a common-wealth an army a house a garden all artefactes what are thâ—y but compositions of well ordered partes And in euery kind we see that he is the Master and the Architect and is a accouÌ„ted the wisest and to haue the best vnderstanding who can best or most or further then his fellowes sett thinges in order If then to this we ioyne that quantity is a thing whose nature consisteth in a capacity of hauing partes and multitude and consequently is the subiect of ordering and ranking doth it not euidently follow that our soule compared to the whole masse of bodies and to the very nature of corporeity or quantity is as a proper agent to its proper matter to worke vpon Which if it be it must necessarily be of a nobler straine and of a different and higher nature then it and consequently can not be a body or be composed of Quantity for had matter in it selfe what it expecteth and requireth from the agent it would not neede the agents helpe but of it selfe it were fitt to be an Agent Wherefore if the nature of corporeity or of body in its full latitude be to be ordered it followeth that the thing whose nature is to be an orderer must as it is such be not a body but of a superiour nature and exceeding a Body which we expresse by calling it a spirituall thing Well then if the soule be an orderer two thinges belong necessarily vnto her the one is that she haue this order within her selfe the other is that she haue power to communicate it vnto such thinges as are to be ordered The first she hath by science of which enough already hath beene said towardes proouing our intent Next that her nature is communicatiue of this order is euident out of her action and manner of working But whether of her selfe she be thus communicatiue or be so by her coniunction to the body she informeth appeareth not from thence But where experieÌ„ce falleth short reason supplyeth and sheweth vs that of her owne nature she is communicatiue of order for seeing that her action is an ordering and that in this line there are but two sortes of thinges in the world namely such as do order and such as are to be ordered it is manifest that the action must by nature and in the vniuersall consideration of it beginne from the orderer in whom order hath its life and subsistence and not from that which is to receiue it then sithence ordering is motion it followeth euidently that the soule is a moouer and a beginner of motion But since we may conceiue two sortes of moouers the one when the agent is mooued to mooue the other when of it selfe it beginneth â—he motion without being mooued we are to enquire vnto which of these two the soule belongeth But to apprehend the question rightly we will illustrate it by an example lett vs suppose that some action is fitt to beginne at tenne of the clocke now we may imagine an agent to beginne this action in two different manners the one that the clocke striking tenne breedeth or stirreth somewhat in him from whence this action followeth the other manner is that the agent may of his owne nature haue such an actuall comprehension or decurrence of time within himselfe as that without receiuing any warning from abroad but as though he moued and ordered the clocke as well as his owne instruments he may of himselfe be fitt and ready iust at that houre to beginne that action not as if the clocke told him what houre it is but as if he by gouerning the clocke made that houre to be as well as he causeth the action to beginne at that houre In the first of these manners the agent is mooued to mooue but in the second he mooueth of himselfe without being mooued by any thing else And in this second way our soule of her owne nature communicateth her selfe to quantitatiue thinges and giueth them motion which followeth out of what we haue already prooued that a soule in her owne nature is the subiect of an infinite knowledge and therefore is capable of hauing such a generall comprehension as well of time and of the course of all other thinges as of the particular action he is to doe and consequently standeth not in neede of a Monitor without her to direct her when to beginne If then it be an impreuaricable law with all bodies that none whatsoeuer can mooue vnlesse it be mooued by an other it followeth that the soule which mooueth without being stirred or excitated by any thing else is of a higher race then they and consequently is immateriall and voyde of Quantity But lett me not be mistaken in what I come from saying as though my meaning were that the soule exerciseth this way of mouing her selfe and of ordering her actions whiles she is in the body for how can she seeing she is neuer endewed with complete knowledge requisite for any action neuer fully comprehending all the circumstances of it But what I intend is that the nature of the soule considered in it selfe is such as hath a capacity and may reach to this manner of working whence I inferre that she is not a body but a spirit without determining whether she worke thus in the body or out of it that enquiry belongeth not to this place it will follow by and by But for the present hauing considered vnto what kind of working the nature of the soule in abstract is capable of attaining we will conclude this Chapter with reflecting vpon those actions of hers which fall dayly vnder our remarke as being exercised in the body In all of them we may obserue that she proceedeth with a certaine vniuersality and indifferency beyond the practise of all other creatures whatsoeuer for example if a man be spoken to or asked of a hundred seuerall thinges that he neuer thought of before in all his life he will immediately shape pertinent replyes to all that is said and returne fitting answeres to euery question as Whither such
to require bodies and instruments in the next life that the soule may there be that which they acnowledge she is in her body without any such helpes And as for that axiome or experience that the soule doth not vnderstand vnlesse she speculate phantasmes as on the one side I yield to it and confesse the experience after the best and seriousest tryall I could make of it so on the other side when I examine the matter to the bottome I find that it cometh not home to our aduersaries intention For as when we looke vpon a thing we conceiue we worke vpon that thing whereas in truth we do but sett our selues in such a position that the thing seene may worke vpon vs in like manner our looking vpon the phantasmes in our braine is not our soules action vpon them but it is our letting them beate at our common sense that is our letting them worke vpon our soule The effect whereof is that eyther oursoule is bettered in her selfe as when we study and contemplate or else that she bettereth something without vs as when by this thinking we order any action But if they will haue this Axiome auayle them they should shew that the soule is not of her selfe a knowledge which if they be able to do euen then when to our thinking she seemeth not so much as to thinke we will yield they haue reason but that will be impossible to them to do for she is alwayes of her selfe a knowledge though in the body shâ—â—euâ—â— expresseth so much but when she is putt to it Or else they should shâ—w that this knowledge which the soule is of her selfe will not by changing the manner of her Existence become an actuall knowledge insteed of the habituall knowledge which now appeareth in her But as these Aristotelians embrace and sticke to one Axiome of their Patrone so they forgoe and preuaricate against an other for as it is Aristotles doctrine that a substance is for its operation and were in vaine and superfluous if it could not practise it so likewise is it his confessed doctrine that Matter is for its forme and not the forme for the 〈◊〉 And yet these men pretend that the soule serueth for nothing 〈…〉 gouerning of the body whereas contrawise both all 〈…〉 doctrine and common sense conuinceth that the body must 〈…〉 soule Which if it be nothing can be more consentaneous to 〈◊〉 then to conceiue that the durance which the soule hath in the 〈…〉 assigned her to worke and moulde in her the future state which 〈…〉 haue after this life and that no more operations are to be expected from her after this life but insteed of them a settled state of Being seeing that euen in this life according to Aristotles doctrine the proper operations of the soule are but certaine Beings so that we may conclude 〈◊〉 a soule were growne to the perfection which her nature is capable of the would be nothing else but a constant Being neuer changing from the happenesse of the best Being And although the texts of Aristotle which remaine vnto vs be vncertaine peraduenture not so much because they were originally such in themselues as through the mingling of some comments into the body of the text yet if we had his booke which he wrote of the soule vpon the death of his frend Eudemus it is very likely we should there see his euident assertion of her Immortality since it had beene very impertinent to take occasion vpon a frends death to write of the soule if he intended to conclude that of a dead man there were no soule Out of this discourse it appeareth how those actions which we exercise in this life are to be vnderstood when we heare them attributed to the next for to think that they are to be taken in their direct plaine meaning and in that way in which they are performed in this world were a great simplicity and were to imagine a likenesse betweene bodies and spirits We must therefore eleuate our mindes when we would penetrate into the true meaning of such expressions and consider how all the actions of our soule are eminently comprehended in the vniuersality of knowledge we haue already explicated And so the Apprehensions iudgements discourses reflections talkings together and all other such actions of ours when they are attributed to separated soules are but inadaequate names and representations of their instantaneall sight of all thinges for in that they can not choose but see others mindes which is that we call talking and likewise their owne which we call reflexion the rest are plaine partes and are plainely contained in knowledge discourse being but the falling into it iudgement the principles of it and single apprehensions the coÌ„ponents of iudgements then for such actions as are the beginning of operatioÌ„ there can be no doubt but that they are likewise to be found and are resumed in the same Vniuersality as loue of good consultation resolution prudentiall election and the first motion for who knoweth all thinges can not choose but know what is good and that good is to be prosecuted and who seeth completely all the meanes of effecting and attaining to his intended good hath already consulted and resolued of the best and who vnderstandeth perfectly the matter he is to worke vpon hath already made his prudentiall election so that there remaineth nothing more to be done but to giue the first impulse And thus you see that this vniuersality of knowledge in the soule comprehendeth all is all performeth all and no imaginable good or happinesse is out of her reach A noble creature and not to be cast away vpon such trash as most men employ their thoughts in Vpon whom it is now time to reflect and to consider what effects the diuers manners of liuing in this world do worke vpon her in the next if first we acquitt ourselues of a promise we made at the end of the last Chapter For it being now amply declared that the state of a soule exempted from her body is a state of pure being it followeth manifestly that there is neyther Action nor Passion in that state which being so it is beyond all opposition that the soule can not dye for it is euident that all corruption must come from the action of an other thing vpon that which is corrupted and therefore that thing must be capable of being made better and of being made worse Now then if a separated soule be in a finall state where she can neyther be bettered or worsened as she must be if she be such a thing as we haue declared it followeth that she can not possibly loose the Being which she hath and sithence her passage out of the body doth not change her nature but only her state it is cleare that she is of the same nature euen in the body though in this her durance she be subiect to be forged as it were by the hammers of corporeall obiects beating
the rest euery one of which perfecteth the vnderstanding of that thing and of all that dependeth vpon the knowledge of it and maketh it become more vigorous and strong euen the often throwing of a boule at the same marke begetteth still more and more strength and iustnesse in the arme that deliuereth it for it can not be denyed but that the same cause which maketh any thing must of necessity perfect and strengthen it by repeating its force and stroakes We may then conclude that the knowledge of our soule which is indeed her selfe will be in the next life more perfect and strong or more slacke and weake according as in this life she hath often and vigorously or faintly and seldome busied her selfe about those thinges which begett such knowledge Now those thinges which men bestow their paines to know we see are of two kindes for some thirst after the knowledge of nature and of the variety of thinges which eyther their senses or their discourse tell them of but others looke no higher then to haue an insight into humane action or to gaine skill in some art whereby they may acquire meanes to liue These later curiosities are but of particulars that is of some one or few species or kindes whose common that comprehendeth them falleth within the reach of euery vulgar capacity and consequently the thinges which depend vpon them are low meane and contemptible whereas the beauty vastnesse and excellency of the others is so much beyond them as they can be brought into no proportion to one an other Now then if we consider what aduantage the one sort of these men will in the next world haue ouer the other we shall find that they who spend their life here in the study and contemplation of the first noble obiects will in the next haue their vniuersall knowledge that is their soule strong and perfect whiles the others that played away their thoughts and time vpon trifles and seldome raysed their mindes aboue the pitch of sense will be fainte through their former laizinesse like bodies benummed with the palsey and sickely through their ill dyett as when a well shaped virgin that hauing fed vpon trash insteed of nourishing meates languisheth vnder a wearisome burthen of the greene sickenesse To make this point yet more cleare we may consider how the thinges which we gaine knowledge of do affect vs vnder the title of good and conuenient in two seuerall manners The one is when the appearance of good in the abstracted nature of it and after examination of all circumstances carryeth our hart to the desire of the thing that appeareth so vnto vs the other is when the semblance of good to our owne particular persons without casting any further or questioning whether any other regard may not make it preiudiciall doth cause in vs a longing for the thing wherein such semblance shineth Now for the most part the knowledges which spring out of the later obiects are more cultiuated by vs then those which arise out of the other partly by reason of their frequēt occurring eyther through necessity or through iudgement and partly by the addition which passion giueth to the impressions they make vpon vs for passion multiplyeth the thoughts of such thinges more then of any others if reason do not crosse and suppresse her tumultuary motions which in most men she doth not The soules then of such persons as giuing way to their passion do in this life busie themselues about such thinges as appeare good to their owne persons and cast no further must needes decede from their bodies vnequally builded if that expression may be permitted me and will be like a lame vnwieldy body in which the principall limbes are not able to gouerne and moue the others because those principall ones are fainte through want of spirits and exercise and the others are ouergrowne with hidropicall and nociue humours The reason whereof is that in such soules their iudgements will be disproportioned to one an other one of them being vnduely stronger then the other What effect this worketh in regard of knowledge we haue already declared and no lesse will it haue in respect of action for suppose two iudgements to be vnequall and such as in the action one contradicteth the other for example lett one of my iudgements be that it is good for me to eate because I am hungry and lett the other be that it is good for me to study because I am shortly to giue an account of my selfe if the one iudgement be stronger then the other as if that of eating be stronger then that of studying it importeth not that there be more reason all circumstances considered for studying because reasons do moue to action according to the measure in which the resolution that is taken vpon them is strong or weake and therefore my action will follow the strongest iudgement and I shall leaue my booke to goe to my dinner Now to apply this to the state of a separated soule we are to remember how the spirituall iudgements which she collected in the body do remaine in her after she is diuested of it and likewise we are to consider how all her proceeding in that state is built not vpon passion or any bodily causes or dispositions but meerely vpon the quality and force of those spirituall iudgements and then it euidently followeth that if there were any such action in the next life the pure soule would apply it selfe therevnto according to the proportion of her iudgements and as they are graduated and qualifyed It is true there is no such action remaining in the next life yet neuerthelesse there remaineth in the soule a disposition and a promptitude to such action and if we will frame a right apprehension of a separated soule we must conceite her to be of such a nature for then all is nature with her as hereafter we shall discourse as if she were a thing made for action in that proportion and efficacity which the quartering of her by this variety of iudgements doth afford that is that she is so much the more fitt for one action then for an other were she to proceed to action as the iudgement of the goodnesse of one of these actions is stronger in her then the iudgement of the others goodnesse which is in effect by how much the one is more cultiuated then the other And out of this we may conclude that what motions do follow in a man out of discourse the like will in a separated soule follow out of her spirituall iudgements So that as he is ioyed if he do possesse his desired good and is discontented and displeased if he misse of it and seizeth greedily vpon it when it is present to him and then cleaueth fast vnto it and whiles he wanteth it no other good affecteth him but he is still longing after that Masterwish of his heart the like in euery regard but much more vehemently befalleth vnto a separated soule So
any further working among them but they will alwayes remayne immutable in the same state they were in at the very first instant of their being putt for whatsoeuer A can doe in the first instant is in that first instant actually done because he worketh indiuisibly and what can be done precisely by A and by his action ioyned to B doth precisely follow out of A and his action and out of B and his action if B haue any action independent of A and because all these are in the same instant whatsoeuer followeth precisely out of these and out of any thing else that is in the same instant and that worketh indiuisibly as they do is necessarily done in that very instant but all the actions of C and D and of whatsoeuer by reflection from them may be done by A and B being all of them indiuisible and following precisely out of some of the forenamed actions they do follow out of thinges being in this instant and because they are indiuisible they may be in this instant and therefore all is done in this instant Now supposing all to be done that can be done by them in this instant and that nothing can follow from them vnlesse it follow precisely out of what is in this instant and that it is all indiuisible it followeth clearely that whatsoeuer concerning them is not in this instant can neuer be These two conclusions being thus demonstrated lett vs in the next place determine how all actions of pure spirits which haue no respect to bodies must of necessity be indiuisible that is must include no continuate succession by which I meane such a succession as may be deuided into partes without end for if we looke well into it we shall find that a continuate succession can not be a thing which hath in it selfe a Being and the reason is because the essence of such a succession consisteth in hauing some of its partes already passed and others of them yet to come but on the other side it is euident that no such thing can be whose essentiall ingredients are not it selfe and therefore it followeth euidently that such a thing as we call succession can haue no being in it selfe seeing that one essentiall part of it neuer is with the other therefore such a succession must haue its being in some permanent thing which must be diuisible for that is essentially required in succession but permanent diuisibility is that which we call Biggenesse or Quantity from which pure spirits are free and therefore it is most euident that all their actions in respect of themselues are absolutely indiuisible Now to make vse of this doctrine to our intent we say that since our soule when it is separated from our body is a pure spiritt or vnderstanding and that all her actions are indiuisible and that all actiōs of other spirits vpō her must likewise be such and by cōsequence that there can be no continuate succession of action among them we must of necessity conclude that according to the priuate nature of the soule and according to the common notion of spirituall thinges there can be no change made in her after the first instant of her parting from her body but what happinesse or misery betideth her in that instant continueth with her for all eternity Yet is it not my mind to say that by the course of the vniuersall resolutions from which she is not wholy exempt and from supernaturall administration of corporeall thinges there may not result some change in her But the consideration of that matter I remitt to those treatises vnto which it belongeth as not depending nor ensuing from the particular nature of the soule and therefore not falling vnder our discussion in this place This same conclusion may be proued by an other argument besides this which we haue now vsed and it is this Whatsoeuer worketh purely by vnderstanding and minde can not be changed in its operations vnlesse its vnderstanding or minde be altered but this can not happen vnlesse eyther it learne somewhat it knew not before or forgetting a foreknowne truth it beginne afterwardes to thinke a falsity This second part is impossible as we haue already shewed when we proued that falsehood could haue no admittance into a separated soule and the former is as impossible it being likewise proued that at her first instant of her separation she knoweth all thinges wherefore we may hence confidently conclude that no change of minde that is no change at all can happen to an abstracted soule And thus by discourse we may arriue to quitt ourselues easily of that famous obiection so much pestering Christian Religion how God can in iustice impose eternall paines vpon a soule for one sinne acted in a short space of time For we see it followeth by the necessary course of nature that if a man dye in a disorderly affection to any thing as to his chiefe good he eternally remaineth by the necessity of his owne nature in the same affection and there is no imparity that to eternall sinne there should be imposed eternall punishment THE CONCLVSION AND now I hope I may confidently say I haue beene as good as my word and I doubt not but my Reader will finde it so if he spend but halfe as much time in perusing these two treatises as the composing them hath cost me They are too nice and indeede vnreasonable who expect to attaine without paines vnto that which hath cost others yeares of toyle Lett them remember the wordes of holy Iob that wisedome is not found in the land of those that liue at their ease Lett them cast their eyes on every side round about them and then tell me if they meete with any employment that may be compared to the attaining vnto these and such like principles whereby a man is enabled to gouerne himselfe vnderstandingly and knowingly towards the happinesse both of the next life and of this and to comprehend the wisemans theme what is good for a man in the dayes of his vanity whiles he playeth the stranger vnder the sunne Lett vs feare Gods Iudgements Lett vs carefully pursue the hidden bounties he hath treasured vp for vs. Lett vs thanke him for the knowledge he hath giuen vs and admire the excellency of Christian Religion which so plainely teacheth vs that vnto which it is so extreme hard to arriue by natural meanes Lett vs blesse him that we are borne vnto it And lett vs sing to him That it is he who preacheth his doctrine to Iacob and giueth his lawes to Israël He hath not done the like to all nations nor hath he manifested his secret truthes vnto them BVT before I cutt of this thridde which hath cost me so much paines to spinne out to this Length I must craue my Readers leaue to make some vse of it for my owne behoofe Hitherto my discourse hath beene directed to him now I shall entreate his patience that I may reflect it in a word
shelter of a thicke body doth not hinder the descent of that which is vnder it pag. 91. § 6. The reason why some bodies sinke others swimme pag. 92. § 7. The fifth obiection answered concerning the descending of heauy bodies in streames pag. 93. § 8. The sixt obiection answered and that all heauy elements do weigh in their owne spheres pag. 95. § 9. The seuenth obiection answered and the reason why we do not feele the course of the ayre and atomes that beate continually vpon vs. ibidem § 10. How in the same body grauity may be greater then density and density then grauity though they be the same thing pag. 96. § 11. The opinion of grauities being an intrinsecall inclination of a body to the center refuted by reason pag 97. § 12. The same opinion refuted by seuerall experiences pag. 98. CHAP. XII Of Violent Motion pag. 100. § 1. The state of the question touching the cause of violent motion ibid. § 2. That the medium is the onely cause which continueth violent motion ibidem § 3. A further explication of the former doctrine pag. 101. § 4. That the ayre hath strength enough to continue violent motion in a moueable pag. 102. § 5. An answere to the first obiection that ayre is not apt to conserue motion And how violent motion cometh to cease pag 103. § 6. An answere to the second obiection that the ayre hath no power ouer heauy bodies pag. 104. § 7. An answere to the third obiection that an arrow should fly faster broadwayes then long wayes pag. 105. CHAP. XIII Of three sortes of violent motion Reflexion Vndulation and Refraction pag. 106. § 1. That reflexion is a kind of violent motion ibid. § 2. Reflection is made at equall angles ibid. § 3. The causes and properties of vndulation pag. 107. § 4. Refraction at the entrance into the reflectent body is towardes the perpendicular at the going out it is from it when the second superficies is parallel to the first pag. 108. § 5. A refutation of Monsieur Des Cartes his explication of refraction pag. 109. § 6. An answere to the arguments brought in fauour of Monsieur Des Cartes his opinion pag. 111. § 7. The true cause of refraction of light both at its entrance and at its going out from the reflecting body pag. 112. § 8. A generall rule to know the nature of reflection and refractions in all sortes of surfaces pag. 113. § 9. A body of greater partes and greater pores maketh a greater refraction then one of lesser partes and lesser pores pag. 114. § 10. A confirmation of the former doctrine out of the nature of bodies that refract light pag. 115. CHAP. XIV Of the composition qualities and generation of Mixed bodies pag. 116. § 1. The connexion of this chapter with the rest and the Authors intent in it ibid. § 2. That there is a least cise of bodies and that this least cise is found in fire pag. 117. § 3. The first coniunction of partes is in bodies of least cise and it is made by the force of Quantity ibid. § 4. The second sort of coniunction is compactednesse in simple Elements and it procedeth from density pag. 118. § 5. The third coniunction is of parres of different Elements and it proceedeth from quantity and density together ibid. § 6. The reason why liquide bodies do easily ioyne together and dry ones difficultly pag. 119. § 7. That no two hard bodies can touch one an other immediately ibid. § 8. How mixed bodies are framed in generall pag. 121. § 9. The cause of the seuerall degrees of solidity in mixed bodies ibid. § 10. The rule where vnto are reduced all the seuerall combinations of Elements in compounding of mixed bodies pag. 122. § 11. Earth and water are the basis of all permanent mixed bodies pag. 123. § 12. What kind of bodies those are where water is the basis and earth the predominant Element ouer the other two ibid. § 13. Of those bodies where water being the basis ayre is the predominant Element ibid. § 14. What kind of bodies result where water is the basis and fire the predominant Element pag. 124. § 15. Of those bodies where water is in excesse it alone being both the basis and the predominant Element pag. 125. § 16. Of those bodies where Earth alone is the basis and also the predominant in excesse ouer the other three Elements ibid. § 17. Of those bodies where Earth is the basis and water the predominant Element ouer the other two ibid. § 18. Of those bodies where earth being the basis ayre is the predominant ibid. § 19. Of those bodies where Earth being the basis fire is the predominant pag. 126. § 20. All the secōd qualities of mixed bodies arise from seuerall combinations of the first qualities and are att last resolued into seuerall degrees of rarity and density ibid. § 21. That in the planets and starres there is a like variety of mixed bodies cause by light as here vpon Earth pag. 127. § 22. In what manner the Elements do worke vpon one an other in the composition of mixed bodies and in particular fire which is the most actiue ibid. § 23. A particular declaration touching the generation of mettalls pag. 128. CHAP. XV. Of the dissolution of Mixed bodies pag. 130. § 1. Why some bodies are brittle and others tough or apt to withstand outward violence the first instrument to dissolue mixed bodies ibid. § 2. How outward violence doth worke vpon the most compacted bodies pag. 131. § 3. The seueral effects of fire the second and chiefest instrument to dissolue all compounded bodies ibid. § 4. The reason why some bodies are not dissolued by fire pag. 132. § 5. The reason why fire melteth gold but can not consume it ibid. § 6. Why leade is easily consumed and calcined by fire pag. 133. § 7. Why and how some bodies are diuided by fire into spirits waters oyles saltes and earth And what those partes are ibid. § 8. How water the third instrument to dissolue bodies dissolueth calx into salt and so into Terra damnata pag. 135. § 9. How water mingled with salt becometh a most powerfull Agent to dissolue other bodies pag. 136. § 10. How putrefaction is caused ibid. CHAP. XVI An explication of certaine Maximes touching the operations and qualities of bodies and whether the Elements be found pure in any part of the world pag. 137. § 1. What is the sphere of actiuity in corporeall Agents ibid. § 2. The reason why no body can worke in distance pag. 138. § 3. An obiection answered against the manner of explicating the former axiome pag. 139 § 4. Of reaction and first in pure locall motion that each Agent must suffer in acting and acte in suffering ibid. § 5. The former doctrine applyed to other locall motions designed by particular names And that Suisseths argument is of no force against this way of doctrine pag. 141. § 6. Why some notions do admitt
the body it selfe pag. 272 § 4. That all the sensible qualities are reall bodies resulting out of seuerall mixtures of rarity and density pag. 273 § 5. Why the senses are only fiue in number with a conclusion of all the former doctrine concerning them pag. 274 CHAP. XXXII Of sensation or the motion whereby sense is properly exercised 275 § 1. Monsieur des Cartes his opinion touching sensation ibid. § 2. The Authors opinion touching sensation pag. 276 § 3. Reasons to persuade the Authors opinion pag. 277 § 4. That vitall spiritts are the immediate instruments of sensation by conueying sensible qualities to the braine pag. 278 § 5. How sound is conueyed to the braine by vitall spirits pag. 279 § 6. How colours are conueyed to the braine by vitall spirits pag. 280 § 7. Reasons against Monsieur des Cartes his opinion ibid. § 8. That the symptomes of the palsie do no way confirme Monsieur des Cartes his opinion pag. 282 § 9. That Monsieur des Cartes his opinion can not giue a good account how thinges are conserued in the memory ibid. CHAP. XXXIII Of Memory pag. 284 § 1. How thinges are conserued in the memory ibid. § 2. How thinges conserued in the memory are brought backe into the fantasie pag. 285 § 3. A Confirmation of the former doctrine pag. 286 § 4. How thinges renewed in the fantasie returne with the same circumstances that they had at first pag. 286 § 5. How the memory of thinges past is lost or confounded and how it is repaired againe pag. 287 CHAP. XXXIV Of voluntary motion Naturall faculties and passions pag. 288 § 1. Of what matter the braine is composed ibid. § 2. What is voluntary motion pag. 289 § 3. What those powers are which are called naturall faculties ibid. § 4. How the attractiue and secretiue faculties worke pag. 290 § 5. Concerning the concoctiue faculty pag. 291 § 6. Concerning the retentiue and expulsiue faculties ibid. § 7. Concerning expulsion made by Physicke pag. 292 § 8. How the braine is moued to worke voluntary motion pag. 292 § 9. Why pleasing obiects doe dilate the spirits and displeasing ones contract them pag. 294 § 10. Concerning the fiue senses for what vse and end they are ibid. CHAP. XXXV Of the materiall instrument of Knowledge and Passion of the seuerall effects of Passions of Paine and Pleasure and how the vitall spirits are sent from the braine into the intented partes of the body without mistaking their way pag. 296 § 1. That Septum Lucidum is the seat of the fansie ibid. § 2. What causeth vs to remember not only the obiect it selfe but also that we haue thought of it before pag. 297 § 3. How the motions of the fantasie are deriued to the hart ibid. § 4. Of paine and pleasure pag. 298 § 5. Of Passion ibid. § 6. Of seuerall pulses caused by passions pag. 299 § 7. Of seuerall other effects caused naturally in the body by passions p. 300 § 8. Of the diaphragma pag. 302 § 9. Concerning paine and pleasure caused by the memory of thinges past pag. 303 § 10. How so small bodies as atomes are can cause so great motions in the hart pag. 304 § 11. How the vital spirits sent from the braine do runne to the intended part of the body without mistake ibid. § 12. How men are blinded by Passion pag. 305 CHAP. XXXVI Of some actions of beastes that seeme to be formall actes of reason as doubting resoluing inuenting pag. 306 § 1. The order and connexion of the subsequent Chapters ibid. § 2. From whence proceedeth the doubting of beastes pag. 307 § 3. Concerning the inuention of Foxes and other beastes ibid. § 4. Of foxes that catch hennes by lying vnder their roost and by gazing vpon them pag. 309 § 5. From whence proceedeth the foxes inuention to ridde himselfe of fleas pag. 311 § 6. An explication of two other inuentions of foxes pag. 312 § 7. Concerning Mountagues argument to prooue that dogges make syllogismes ibid. § 8. A declaration how some tricks are performed by foxes which seeme to argue discourse pag. 313 § 9. Of the Iaccatrays inuention in calling beastes to himselfe pag. 314 § 10. Of the Iaccalls designe in seruing the lyon ibid. § 11. Of seuerall inuentions of fisshes ibid. § 12. A discouery of diuers thinges done by hares which seeme to argue discourse pag. 315 § 13. Of a foxe reported to haue weighed a goose before he would venture with it ouer a riuer and of fabulous stories in common pag. 316 § 14. Of the seuerall cryings and tones of beastes with a refutation of those authours who maintaine them to haue compleat languages pag. 317 CHAP. XXXVII Of the docility of some irrationall animals and of certaine continuate actions of a long tract of time so orderly performed by them that they seeme to argue knowledge in them pag. 319 § 1. How hawkes and other creatures are taught to doe what they are browght vp to ibid. § 2. Of the Baboone that played on a guitarre 320 § 3. Of the teaching of Elephantes and other beastes to doe diuers tricks 321 § 4. Of the orderly traine of actions performed by beastes in breeding their young ones pag. 322 CHAP. XXXVIII Of prescience of future euentes prouidencies the knowing of thinges neuer seene before and such other actions obserued in some liuing creatures which seeme to be euen aboue the reason that is in man himselfe pag. 327 § 1. Why beastes are affraide of men ibid. § 2. How some qualities caused at first by chance in beastes may passe by generation to the whole offspring pag. 328 § 3. How the parents fantasie doth oftentimes worke strange effects in their issue pag. 329 § 4. Of Antipathies pag. 330 § 5. Of Sympathies pag. 333 § 6. That the Antipathy of beastes towards one an other may be taken away by assuefaction pag. 334 § 7. Of longing markes seene in children pag. 335 § 8. Why diuers men hate some certaine meates and particularly cheese 336 § 9. Corcerning the prouidence of Aunts in laying vp in store for winter 337 § 10. Concerning the foreknowing of beastes pag. 338 The Conclusion of the first Treatise pag. 340 A TABLE OF THE CHAPTERS AND MATTERS HANDLED IN THE SECOND TREATISE CONCERNING MAN'S SOVLE THE Preface pag. 349 CHAP. 1. Of simple Apprehensions pag. 355 § 1. What is a right apprehension of a thing ibid. § 2. The very thing it selfe is truly in his vnderstanding who rightly apprehendeth it pag. 356 § 3. The Apprehension of thinges comming vnto vs by our senses are resoluable into other more simple apprehensions pag. 358 § 4. The apprehension of a Being is the most simple and Basis of all the rest ibid. § 5. The apprehension of a thing is in next degree to that of Being and it is the Basis of all the subsequent ones ibid. § 6. The apprehension of thinges knowne to vs by our senses doth consist in certaine respects betwixt two
acknowledged that they worke by hidden qualities that mans witt cannot reach vnto And ascending to liuing bodies they giue it for a Maxime that life is the action of the same Entity vpon it selfe that sense is likewise a worke of an intrinsecall power in the part we call sense vpon it selfe Which our predecessors held the greatest absurdities that could be spoken in Philosophy Euen some Physitians that take vpon them to teach the curing of our bodies do often pay vs with such termes among them you haue long discourses of a retentiue of an expulsiue of a purging of a consolidating faculty and so of euery thing that eyther passeth in our body or is applied for remedy And the meaner sort of Physitians know no more but that such faculties are though indeed they that are truly Physitians know also in what they consist without which knowledge it is much to be feared Physitians will do more harme then good But to returne to our subiect this course of doctrine in the schooles hath forced me to a greate deale of paines in seeking to discouer the nature of all such actions or of the maine part of them as were famed for incomprehensible for what hope could I haue out of the actions of the soule to conuince the nature of it to be incorporeall if I could giue no other account of bodies operations then that they were performed by qualities occult specificall or incomprehensible Would not my aduersary presently answere that any operation out of which I should presse the soules being spirituall was performed by a corporeall occult quality and that as he must acknowledge it to be incomprehensible so must I likewise acknowledge other qualities of bodies to be as incomprehensible and therefore could not with reason presse him to shew how a body was able to doe such an operation as I should inferre must of necessity proceede from a spiritt since that neyther could I giue account how the loadestone drew iron or looked to the north how a stone and other heauy thinges were carried downewardes how sight or fantasie was made how digestion or purging were effected and many other such questions which are so slightly resolued in the schooles Besides this reason the very desire of knowledge in my selfe and a willingnesse to be auaylable vnto others att the least so farre as to sett them on seeking for it without hauing a preiudice of impossibity in attaining it was vnto me a sufficient motiue to enlarge my discourse to the bulke it is risen vnto For what a misery is it that the flower and best wittes of Christendome which flocke to the Vniuersities vnder pretence and vpon hope of gaining knowledge should be there deluded and after many yeares of toyle and expence be sent home againe with nothing acquired more then a faculty and readynesse to talke like parrats of many thinges but not to vnderstand so much as anyone and withall with a persuasion that in truth nothing can be knowne For setting knowledge aside what can it auayle a man to be able to talke of any thing What are those wranglinges where the discouery of truth is neyther sought nor hoped for but meerely vanity and ostentation Doth not all tend to make him seeme and appeare that which indeed he is not Nor lett any body take it ill at my handes that I speake thus of the moderne schooles for indeed it is rather themselues then I that say it Excepting Mathematikes lett all the other schooles pronounce their owne mindes and say ingenuously whether they themselues beleeue they haue so much as any one demonstration from the beginning to the ending of the whole course of their learning And if all or the most part will agree that any one position is demonstrated perfectly and as it ought to be and as thousands of conclusions are demonstrated in Mathematikes I am ready to vndergoe the blame of hauing calumniated them and will as readily make them amendes But if they neither will nor can then their owne verdict cleareth me and it is not so much I as they that make this profession of the shallownesse of their doctrine And to this purpose I haue often hard the lamentations of diuers as greate wittes as any that conuerse in the schooles complaining of this defect But in so greate an euidence of the effect proofes are superfluous Wherefore I will leaue this subiect to declare what I haue here designed and gone about towardes the remedy of this inconuenience Which is that whereas in the schooles there is a loose methode or rather none but that it is lawfull by the liberty of a commentator to handle any question in any place which is the cause of the slightnesse of their doctrine and can neuer be the way to any science or certitude I haue taken my beginninges from the commonest thinges that are in nature namely from the notions of Quantity and its first differences which are the most simple and radicall notions that are and in which all the rest are to be grounded From them I endeauour by immediate composition of them and deriuation from them to bring downe my discourse to the Elements which are the primary and most simple bodies in nature From these I proceed to compounded bodies first to those that are called mixed and then to liuing bodies declaring in common the proprieties and operations that belong vnto them And by occasion as I passe along I light here and there on those operations which seeme most admirable in nature to shew how they are performed or att the least how they may be performed that though I misse in particular of the industry of nature yet I may neuerthelesse hitt my intent which is to trace out a way how these and such like operations may be effected by an exact disposition and ordering though intricate of quantitatiue and corporeall partes and to shew that they oblige vs not to recurre vnto hidden and vnexplicable qualities And if I haue declared so many of these as may begett a probable persuasion in my reader that the rest which I haue not touched may likewise be displayed and shewed to spring out of the same groundes if curious and constant searchers into nature will make their taske to penetrate into them I haue therein obtained my desire and intent which is onely to shew from what principles all kindes of corporeall operations do proceed and what kind of operations all these must be which may issue out of these principles to the end that I may from thence make a steppe to raise my discourse to the contemplation of the soule and shew that her operations are such as cannot proceed from those principles which being adequate and common to all bodies we may rest assured that what cannot issue from them cannot haue a body for its source I will therefore end this preface with entreating my reader to consider that in a discourse proceeding in such order as I haue declared he must not expect to vnderstand
vnresistable force to pierce and shatter not onely the ayre but euen the hardest bodies that are Peraduenture some may thinke it reasonable to grant the consequence in due circumstances since experience teacheth vs that the congregation of a litle light by a glasse will sett very solide bodies on fire and will melt mettals in a very short space which sheweth a great actiuity and the great actiuity sheweth a great percussion burning being effected by a kind of attrition of the thing burned And the great force which fire sheweth in gunnes and in mines being but a multiplication of the same doth euidently conuince that of its owne nature it maketh a strong percussion when all due circumstances concurre Whereas it hath but litle effect if the due circumstances be wanting as we may obserue in the insensible burning of so rarifyed a body as pure spiritt of wine conuerted into flame But we must examine the matter more particularly and must seeke the cause why a violent effect doth not alwayes appeare wheresoeuer light striketh for the which wee are to note that three thinges do concurre to make a percussion great The bignesse the density and the celerity of the body mooued Of which three there is only one in light to witt celerity for it hath the greatest rarity and the rayes of it are the smallest parcels of all naturall bodies And therefore since only celerity is considerable in the account of lights percussions we must examine what celerity is necessary to make the stroke of a ray sensible first then we see that all the motes of the ayre nay euen feathers and strawes do make no sensible percussion when they fall vpon vs therefore we must in light haue att the least a celerity that may be to the celerity of the straw falling vpon our hand for example as the density of the straw is to the density of light that the percussion of light may be in the least degree sensible But let vs take a corne of gunnepowder insteede of a straw betweene which there can not be much difference and then putting that the density of fire is to the density of gunnepowder as 1. to 125000 and that the density of the light we haue here in the earth is to the density of that part of fire which is in the sunnes body as the body of the sunne is to that body which is called Orbis magnus whose semidiameter is the distance betweene the sunne and the earth which must be in subtriple proportion of the diameter of the sunne to the diameter of the great orbe it followeth that 125000. being multiplyed by the proportion of the great orbe vnto the sunne which Galileo telleth vs is as 106000000. vnto one will giue a scantling of what degree of celerity light must haue more then a corne of gunnepouder to recompence the excesse of weight which is in a corne of gunnepouder aboue that which is in a ray of light as bigge as a corne of gunnepouder Which will amount to be much greater then the proportion of the semidiater of Orbis magnus to the semidiater of the corne of gunnepouder for if you reckon 5. graines of gunnepouder to a barley cornes breadth and 12. of them in an inch and 12. inches in a foote and 3. feete in a pace and 1000. paces in a mile and 3500. miles in the semidiameter of the earth and 1208. semidiameters of the earth in the semidiameter of the Orbis magnus there will be in it but 9132480000000. graines of gunnepouder whereas the other calculation maketh light to be 13250000000000. times raver then gunnepouder which is almost tenne times a greater proportion then the other And yet this celerity supplyeth but one of the two conditions wanting in light to make its percussions sensible namely density Now because the same velocity in a body of a lesser bulke doth not make so great a percussion as it doth in a bigger body and that the littlenesse of the least partes of bodies followeth the proportion of their rarity this vast proportion of celerity must againe be drawne into it selfe to supply for the excesse in bignesse that a corne of gunnepouder hath ouer an atome of light and the product of this multiplication will be the celerity required to supply for both defects Which euidently sheweth it is impossible that a ray of light should make any sensible percussion though it be a body Especially considering that sense neuer taketh notice of what is perpetually done in a moderate degree And therefore after this minute looking into all circumstances we neede not haue difficulty in allowing vnto light the greatest celerity imaginable and a percussion proportionate to such a celerity in so rare a body and yett not feare any violent effect from its blowes vnlesse it be condensed and many partes of it be brought together to worke as if they were but one As concerning the last obiection that if light were a body it would be fanned by the wind wee must first consider what is the cause of a thinges appearing to be mooued and then examine what force that cause hath in light As for the first part we see that when a body is discerned now in one place now in an other then it appeareth te be mooued And this we see happeneth also in light as when the sunne or a candle is carried or mooueth the light thereof in the body of the candle or sunne seemeth to be mooued along with it And the likes is in a shining cloud or comete But to apply this to our purpose wee must note that the intention of the obiection is that the light which goeth from the fire to an opacous body farre distant without interruption of its continuity should seeme to be iogged or putt out of its way by the wind that crosseth it Wherein the first fayling is that the obiectour conceiueth light to send species vnto our eye from the middest of its line whereas with a litle consideration he may perceiue that not light is seene by vs but that which is reflected from an opacous body to our eye so that the light he meaneth in his obiection is neuer seene att all Secondly it is manifest that the light which stricketh our eye doth strike it in a straight line and seemeth to be att the end of that straight line wheresoeur that is and so can neuer appeare to be in an other place but the light which wee see in an other place wee conceiue to be an other light Which maketh it againe euident that the light can neuer appeare to shake though wee should suppose that light may be seene from the middle of its line for no part of wind or ayre can come into any sensible place in that middle of the line with such speede that new light from the source doth not illuminate it sooner then it can be seene by vs wherefore it will appeare to vs illuminated as being in that place and therefore the light can neuer
fro And taking a body of concaue surfaces we shall according to this doctrine of ours find the causes of refraction iust contrary and accordingly experience likewise sheweth vs the effects to be so too And therefore since experience agreeth exactly with our rules we can not doubt but that the principles vpon which we goe are well layd But because crooked surfaces may haue many irregularities it will not be amisse to giue a rule by which all of them may be brought vnto a certainety And this it is that reflexions from crooked superficieses are equall to the reflexions that are made from such plaine superficieses as are tangents to the crooked ones in that point from whence the reflexions are made Which principall the Masters of Optikes do take out of a Mathematicall supposition of the vnity of the reflecting point in both the surfaces the crooked and the plaine But we take it out of the insensibility of the difference of so litle a part in the two different surfaces as serueth to reflect a ray of light for where the difference is insensible in the causes there likewise the difference is so litle in the effects as sense can not iudge of them which is as much as is requisite to our purpose Now seeing that in the Mathematicall supposition the point where the reflexion is made is indifferent to both the surfaces it followeth that it importeth not whether superficies you take to know the quality of reflexion by This principle then being settled that the reflexion must follow the nature of the tangent surfaces and it being prooued that in plaine surfaces it will happen in such sort as we haue explicated it followeth that in any crooked superficies of what figure soeuer the same also will happen Now seeing we haue formerly declared that refractions are but a certaine kind of reflexions what we haue said here of reflexions may be applyed to refractions But there remaineth yet vntouched one affection more of refractions which is that some diaphanous bodies do in their inward partes reflect more then others which is that which we call refraction as experience sheweth vs. Concerning which effect we are to consider that diaphanous bodies may in their composition haue two differences for some are composed of greater partes and greater pores others of lesser partes and lesser pores It is true there may be other combinations of pores and partes yet by these two the rest may be esteemed As for the first combination we see that because the pores are greater a greater multitude of partes of light may passe together through one pore and because the partes are greater likewise a greater multitude of rayes may reflect from the same part and may find the same passage quite throughout the diaphanous body On the contrary side in the second combination where both the pores and the partes of the diaphanous body are litle the light must be but litle that findeth the same passage Now that refraction is greater or lesser happeneth two wayes for it is eyther when one diaphanous body reflecteth light att more angles then an other and by consequence in a greater extent of the superficies or else when one body reflecteth light from the same point of incidence in a shorter line and in a greater angle then an other doth In both these wayes it is apparant that a body composed of greater partes and greater pores exceedeth bodies of the opposite kind for by reason that in the first kind more light may beate against one part a body in which that happeneth will make an appearance from a further part of its superficies whereas in a body of the other sort the light that beateth against one of the litle partes of it will be so litle as it will presently vanish Againe because in the first the part att the incidence is greater the surface from which the reflexion is made inwardes hath more of a plaine and straight superficies and consequently doth reflect att a greater angle then that whose superficies hath more of inclining But we must not passe from this question without looking a litle into the nature of those bodies in which refraction is made for if they as well as the immediate causes of refraction do likewise fauour vs it will not a litle aduance the certainety of our determination To this purpose we may call to mind how experience sheweth vs that great refractions are made in smoake and in mistes and in glasses and in thicke bodied waters and Monsieur Des Cartes addeth certaine oyles and spirits or strong waters Now most of these we see are composed of litle consistent bodies swimming in an other liquide body As is plaine in smoake and mistes for the litle bubbles which rise in the water before they gett out of it and that are smoake when they gett into the ayre do assure vs that smoake is nothing else but a company of litle round bodies swimming in the ayre and the round consistence of water vpon herbes leafes and twigges in a rynde or dew giueth vs also to vnderstand that a mist is likewise a company of litle round bodies that sometimes stand sometimes floate in the ayre as the wind driueth them Our very eyes beare wittnesse to vs that the thicker sort of waters are full of litle bodies which is the cause of their not being cleare As for glasse the blowing of it conuinceth that the litle dartes of fire which pierce it euery way do naturally in the melting of it conuert it into litle round hollow bodies which in their cooling must settle into partes of the like figure Then for crystall and other transparent stones which are found in cold places it can not be otherwise but that the nature of cold piercing into the maine body and contracting euery litle part in it selfe this contraction must needes leaue vacant pores betweene part and part And that such transparent stones as are made by heate haue the like effect and property may be iudged out of what we see in brickes and tiles which are left full of holes by the operation of the fire And I haue seene in bones that haue layne a long time in the sunne a multitude of sensible litle pores close to one an other as if they had beene formerly stucke all ouer with subtile sharpe needles as close as they could be thrust in by one other The Chymicall oyles and spirits which Monsieur Des Cartes speaketh of are likely to be of the same composition since that such vse to be extracted by violent fires for a violent fire is made by the coniunction of many rayes together and that must needes cause great pores in the body it worketh vpon and the sticking nature of these spirits is capable of conseruing them Out of all these obseruations it followeth that the bodies in which greatest refractions do happen are compounded as we haue said of great partes and great pores And therefore by onely taking light to be
other can be imagined vnlesse it were variety of figure But that can not be admitted to belong in any constant manner to those least particles where of bodies are framed as though determinate figures were in euery degree of quantity due to the natures of Elements and therefore the Elements would conserue themselues in those figures as well in their least atomes as in massye bulke for seeing how these litle partes are shuffled together without any order and that all liquids easily ioyne and take the figures which the dense ones giue them and that they againe iustling one an other do crush themselues into new shapes which their mixture with the liquide ones maketh them yield the more easily vnto it is impossible that the Elements should haue any other naturall figure in these their least partes then such as chance giueth them But that one part must be bigger then an other is euident for the nature of rarity and density giueth it the first of them causing diuisibility into litle partes and the latter hindering it Hauing then settled in what manner the Elements may be varied in the composition of bodies lett vs now beginne our mixture In which our ground to worke vpon must be earth and water for onely these two are the basis of permanent bodies that suffer our senses to take hold of them and that submitt themselues to tryall whereas if we should make the predominant Element to be ayre or fire and bring in the other two solide ones vnder their iurisdiction to make vp the mixture the compound resulting out of them would be eyther in continuall consumption as ordinary fire is or else imperceptible to our eyes or touch and therefore not a fitt subiect for vs to discourse of since the other two afford vs enough to speculate vpon Peraduenture our smell migh take some cognisance of a body so composed or the effect of it taken in by respiration might in time shew it selfe vpon our health but it concerneth not vs now to look so farre our designe requireth more maniable substances Of which lett water be the first and with it we will mingle the other three Elements in excesse ouer one an other by turnes but still all of them ouerswayed by a predominant quantity of water and then lett vs see what kind of bodies will result out of such proportions First if earth preuayle aboue fire and ayre and arriue next in proportion to the water a body of such a composition must needes prooue hardly liquide and not easy to lett its partes runne a sunder by reason of the great proportion of so dense a body as earth that holdeth it together Yet some inclination it will haue to fluidnesse by reason the water is predominant ouer all which also will make it be easily diuisible and giue very litle resistance to any hard thing that shall be applyed to make way through it In a word this mixture maketh the constitution of mudde durt honey butter and such like thinges where the maine partes are great ones And such are the partes of earth and water in themselues Lett the next proportion of excesse in a watry compound be of ayre which when it preuayleth it incorporateth it selfe chiefely with Earth for the other Elements would not so well retaine it Now because its partes are subtile by reason of the rarity it hath and sticking because of its humidity it driueth the Earth and water likewise into lesser partes The result of such a mixture is that the partes of a boby compounded by it are close catching flowing slowly glibbe and generally it will burne and be easily conuerted into flame Of this kind are those which we call oyly or vnctuous bodies whose great partes are easily separated that is they are easily diuisible in bulke but the small ones very hardly Next the smallnesse and well working of the partes by meanes of the ayres penetrating euery dense one and sticking close to euery one of them and consequently ioyning them without any vneuennesse causeth that there can be no ruggednesse in it and therefore it is glibbe in like manner as we see plaster or starch become smooth when they are well wrought Then the humidity of it causeth it to be catcking and the shortenesse of euery part maketh that where it sticketh it is not easily parted thence Now the rarity of ayre next vnto fire admitteth it to be of all the other Elements most easily brought to the height of fire by the operation of fire vpon it And therefore oyles are the proper foode of that Element And accordingly we see that if a droppe of oyle be spilled vpon a sheete of paper and the paper be sett on fire att a corner as the fire cometh neere the oyle the oyle will disperse and spread it selfe vpon the paper to a broader compasse then it had which is because the heat rarifyeth it and so in oyle it selfe the fire rarifying the ayre maketh it penetrate the earthy partes adioyned vnto it more then it did and so subtiliseth them till they be reduced to such a height as they are within the power of fire to communicate his owne nature vnto them and thus he turneth them into fire and carrieth them vp in his flame But if fire be predominant ouer earth and ayre in a watry compound it maketh the body so proportioned to be subtile rare penetratiue hoat in operation light in weight and subiect to burne Of this kind are all sortes of wines and distilled spirits commonly called strong waters or Aquauites in latine Aquae ardentes These will loose their vertues meerely by remaining vncouered in the ayre for fire doth not incorporate strongly with water but if it find meanes rayseth it selfe into the ayre as we see in the smoake of boyling water which is nothing else but litle bodies of fire that entring into the water do rarify some partes of it but haue no inclination to stay there and therefore as fast as they can gett out they fly away but the humide partes of the water which they haue rarifyed being of a sticking nature do ioyne themselues vnto them and ascend in the ayre as high as the fiery atomes haue strength to carry them which when it faileth them that smoake falleth downe in a dew and so becometh water againe as it was All which one may easily discerne in a glasse vessell of water sett ouer the fire in which one may obserue the fire come in att the bottome and presently swimme vp to the toppe like a litle bubble and immediately rise from thence in smoake and that will att last conuert it selfe into droppes and settle vpon some solide substance thereabouts Of these fyry spirits some are so subtile as of themselues they will vanish and leaue no residue of a body behind them and Alchymistes profâ—sse to make them so etheriall and volatile that being poured out of a glasse from some reasonable height they shall neuer reach the ground but
and which it afterwardes drew along with it the body that resulteth out of them is diuersifyed In confirmation of all which they that deale in mines tell vs they vse to find mettalls oftentimes mingled with stones as also coagulated iuices with both and earths of diuers natures with all three and they with it and one with an other among themselues And that sometimes they find the mines not yet consolidated and digested throughly into mettall when by their experience knowing after how many yeares they will be ripe they shutt them vp againe till then Now if the hollow place wherein the body stayed which att the first was liquid and rouling be not att once filled by it but it taketh vp onely part of it and the same liquor continueth afterwardes to flow thither then this body is augmented and groweth bigger and bigger And although the liquors should come att seuerall times yet they become not therefore two seuerall bodies but both liquors do grow into one body for the wett parts of the aduentitious liquor do mollify the sides of the body already baked and both of them being of a like temper and cognation they easily sticke and grow together Out of this discours it followeth euidently that in all sortes of compounded bodies whatsoeuer there must of necessity be actually comprised sundry partes of diuers natures for otherwise they would be but so many pure degrees of rarity and density that is they would be but so many pure Elements and each of them haue but one determinate vertue or operation THE FIFTEENTH CHAPTER Of the dissolution of Mixed bodies THus much for composition of bodies Their dissolution is made three wayes eyther by fire or by water or by some outward violence We will beginne with examining how this last is done To which end we may consider that the vnity of any body consisting in the connexion of its partes it is euident that the force of motion if it be exercised vpon them must of necessity separate them as we see in breaking cutting filing drawing a sunder and the like All these motions because they are done by grosse bodies do require great partes to worke vpon and are easily discerned how they worke so that it is not difficult to find the reason why some hard bodies breake easily and others with much adoe The first of which are called brittle the others tough For if you marke it all breaking requireth that beÌ„ding hould precede which on the one side compresseth the partes of the bended body and condenseth them into a lesser roome then they possessed before and on the otherside stretcheth them out and maketh them take vp more place This requireth some fluide or moueable substance to be within the body else it could not be done for without such helpe the partes could not remoue Therefore such hard bodies as haue most fluide partes in them are most flexible that is are toughest And those which haue fewest though they become thereby hardest to haue impression made vpon them yet if the force be able to do it they rather yield to breake then to bend and thence are called brittle Out of this we may inferre that some bodies may be so soddainely bent as that thereby they breake asunder whereas if they were leisurely and gently dealed withall they would take what ply one desireth And likewise that there is no body be it neuer so brittle and hard but that it will bend a litle and indeed more then one would expect if it be wrought vpon with time and dexterity for there is none but coÌ„taineth in it some liquide partes more or lesse euen glasse and bricke Vpon which occasion I remember how once in a great storme of wind I saw the high slender bricke chimnyes of the Kinges house att St Iames one winter when the ourt lay there bend from the wind like bowes and sharke exceedingly and totter And at other times I haue seen some very high and pointy spire steeples do the like And I haue beene assured the like of the whole pile of a high castle standing in a gullett in the course of the wind namely the castle of Wardour by those who haue often seene it shake notably in a fierce wind The reason of all which may be deduced out of what we haue said aboue for seeing that the bending of a body maketh the spirits or humors that are within it to sally forth it is cleare that if the violence which forceth it be not so soddaine nor the motion it receiueth be not so quicke but that the moisture may oose gently out the body will bend still more and more as their absence glueth it leaue But if the motion that is wrought in it be too quicke then the spirits not hauing time allowed them to goe leisurely and gently out do force their prison and breake out with a violence and so the body is snapped into two Here peraduenture some remembring what we haue said in an other place namely that it is the shortenesse and littlenesse of the humide partes in a body which maketh it sticke together and that this shortenesse may be in so high a degree as nothing can come betweene the partes they glew together to diuide them may aske how a very dense body of such a straine can be broken or diuided But the difficulty is not great for seeing that the humide partes in whatsoeuer degree of shortenesse they be must necessarily haue still some latitude it can not be doubted but there may be some force assigned greater then their resistance can be All the question is how to apply it to worke its effect vpon so close a compacted body in which peraduenture the continuity of the humide partes that bind the others together may be so small as no other body whatsoeuer no not fire can goe betweene them in such sort as to separate part from part Att the worst it can not be doubted but that the force may be so applyed att the outside of that body as to make the partes of it presse and fight one against an other and att the length by multiplication of the force constraine it to yield and suffer diuision And this I conceiue to be the condition of gold and of some pretious stones in which the Elements are vnited by such little partes as nothing but a ciuill warre within themselues stirred vp by some subtile outward enemy whereby they are made to teare their owne bowels could bring to passe their destruction But this way of dissoluing such bodies more properly belongeth to the next way of working vpon them by fire yet the same is done when some exterior violence pressing vpon those partes it toucheth maketh them cuâ—t a way betweene their next neighbours and so continuing the force diuide the whole body As when the chisell or euen the hammer with beating breaketh gold a sunder for it is neyther the chisell nor the hammer that doth that effect immediately but they make
those partes they touch cutt the others that they are forced vpon In such sort as I remember happened to a gentleman that stood by me in a sea fight I was in with a coate of maile vpon his body when a bullett coming against a bony part in him made a great wound and shattered all the bones neere where it strucke and yet the coate of maile was whole it seemeth the little linkes of the maile yielding to the bullets force made their way into the flesh and to the bone But now it is time to come to the other two instruments of separation of bodies fire and water and to examine how they dissolue compounds Of these two the way of working of fire is the easiest and most apparant to be discerned We may readily obserue how it proceedeth if we but sett a piece of wood on fire in which it maketh little holes as if with bodkins it pierced it So that the manner of its operation in common being plaine wee neede but reflect a little vpon the seuerall particular degrees of it Some bodies it seemeth not to touch as clothes made of Asbestus which are onely purifyed by it Others it melteth but consumeth not as gold Others it turneth into pouder suddainely dissoluing their body as lead and such mettalls as are calcined by pure fire Others againe it seperateth into a greater number of differing partes as into spirits waters oyles salts earth and glasse of which ranke are all vegetables And lastly others it conuerteth into pure fire as strong waters or Aquauites called aquae ardentes and some pure oyles for the smoake that is made by their setting on fire and peraduenture their salt is so little as is scarce discernable These are in summe the diuisions which fire maketh vpon bodies according to the nature of them and to the due application of it vnto them for by the helppe and mediation of other thinges it may peraduenture worke other effects Now to examine a little in particular how the same fire in differing subiects produceth such defferent effects Limus vt hic durescit haec vt cera liquescit Vno eodemque igni We will consider the nature of euery one of the subiects apart by it selfe First for the Asbestus it is cleare that it is of a very dry substance so that to looke vpon it when it is broken into very little pieces they seeme to be little bundles of short haires the liquidity within being so little as it affordeth the partes neyther length nor breadth and therefore fire meeteth with litle there that it can dilate But what it can not dilate it can not separate nor carry away any thing of it but what is accidentally adhereÌ„t vnto the outsides of it And so it seemeth onely to passe through the pores and to cleaÌ„se the litle thriddes of it but bringeth no detriment att all to the substance of it In this I speake onely of an ordinary fire for I doubt not but such a one it might be as would perfectly calcine it The next body we spoke of is gold This aboundeth so much in liquidity that it sticketh to the fire if duely applyed but its humidity is so well vnited to its earthy partes and is so perfectly incorporated with theÌ„ as it can not carry away one without likewise carrying away both but both are too heauy a weight for the litle agile partes of fire to remoue Thus it is able to make gold swell as we see in melting it in which the gold receiueth the fire into its bowels and retaineth it a loÌ„g time with it but at its departure it permitteth the fire to carry nothing away vpon its winges as is apparant by the goldes no whitt decay of weight after neuer so long fusion And therefore to haue fire make any separation in gold requireth the assistance of some other moyst body that an the one side may sticke closely to the gold when the fire driueth it into it and on the other side may be capable of dilatation by the action of the fire vpon it As in some sort we see in strong waters made of saltes which are a proper subiect for the fire to dilate who by the assistance of fire mingling themselues closely with litle partes of the gold do pull them away from their whole substaÌ„ce and do force them to beare them coÌ„pany in their iourny vpwardes in which multitudes of litle partes of fire do concurre to presse theÌ„ on and hasteÌ„ theÌ„ and so the weight of gold being att leÌ„gth ouercome by these two powerfull Agents whereof one supplyeth what the other wanteth the whole substance of the metall is in litle atomes diffused through the whole body of the water But this is not truly a dissolution or a separation of the substantiall partes of gold one from an other it is onely a corrosion which bringeth it into a subtile pouder when the water and saltes are seperated from it much like what filing though farre smaller or grinding of leafe gold vpon a porphyre stone may reduce it into for neyther the partes of the water nor of the fire that make themselues a way into the body of the gold are small and subtile enough to gett betweene the partes that compose the essence of it and therefore all they can attaine vnto is to diuide it onely in his quantity or bulke not in the composition of its nature Yet I intend not to deny but that this is possible to be arriued vnto eyther by pure fire duly applyed or by some other assistance as peraduenture by some kind of Mercury which being of a neerer cognation vnto mettalls then any other liquor is may happily haue a more powerfull ingression into gold then any other body whatsoeuer and being withall very subiect to rarefaction it may after it is entered so perfectly penetrate the gold as it may seperate euery least part of it and so reduce it into an absolute calx But in this place I explicate no more then what ordinarily passeth leauing the mysteries of this art to those who professe it To goe on then with what we haue in hand lead hath aboundance of water ouermingled with its earth as appeareth by its easy yielding to be bend any wâ—y and by its quiet standing bent in the same position that the force which bowed it leaueth it in And therefore the liquide partes of lead are easily separated from its dry and earthy ones and when it is melted the very shaking of it causeth the grosse partes to descend and many liquid ones to fly away with the fire so that suddainely it is thus conuerted into pouder But this pouder is grosse in respect of other mettalls vnlesse this operation be often reiterated or the fire more powerfully applyed then what is iust enough to bring the body of the lead into pouder The next consideration of bodies that fire worketh vpon is of such as it diuideth into spirits saltes oyles waters or
phlegmes and earth Now these are not pure and simple partes of the dissolued body but new coÌ„pounded bodies made of the first by the operation of heat As smoake is not pure water but water and fire together and therefore becometh not water but by cooling that is by the fire flying away from it So likewise those spirits salts oyles and the rest are but degrees of thinges which fire maketh of diuers partes of the dissolued body by seperating them one from an other and incorporating it selfe with them And so they are all of them compounded of the foure Elements and are further resoluable into them Yet I intend not to say that there are not originally in the body before its dissolution some loose partes which haue the properties of these bodies that are made by the fire in the dissoluing of it for seeing that nature worketh by the like instruments as art vseth she must needes in her excesses and defects produce like bodies to what art doth in dissolution which operation of art is but a kind of excesse in the progresse of nature but my meaning is that in such dissolution there are more of these partes made by the working of fire then were in the body before Now because this is the naturall and most ordinary dissolution of thinges lett vs see in particular how it is done suppose then that fire were in a conuenient manner applyed to a body that hath all sortes of partes in it and our owne discourse will tell vs that the first effect it worketh will be that as the subtile partes of fire do diuide and passe through that body they will adhere to the most subtile partes in it which being most agile and least bound and incorporated to the bowels of the body and lying as it were loosely scattered in it the fire will carry them away with it Thâ—se will be the first that are seperated from the maine body which being retained in a fitt receiuer will by the coldenesse of the circumdant ayre grow outwardly coole themselues and become first a dew vpon the sides of the glasse and then still as they grow cooler condense more and more till att the length they fall downe congealed into a palpable liquor which is composed as you see of the hoatest partes of the body mingled with the fire that carried them out and therefore this liquor is very inflammable and easily turned into actuall fire as you see all spirits and Aquae ardentes of vegetables are The hoat and loose partes being extracted and the fire continuing and encreasing those that will follow next are such as though they be not of themselues loose yet are easyest to be made so and are therefore most separable These must be humide and those little dry partes which are incorporated with the ouerflowing humide ones in them for no partes that we can arriue vnto are of one pure simple nature but all are mixed and composed of the 4 Elements in some proportion must be held together with such grosse glew as the fire may easily penetrate and separate them And then the humide partes diuided into little atomes do sticke to the lesser ones of the fire which by their multitude of number and velocity of motion supplying what they want of them in bulke do carry them away with them And thus these phlegmaticke partes fly vp with the fire and are afterwardes congealed into an insipide water which if it haue any sauour is because the first ardent spirits are not totally separated from it but some few of them remaine in it and giue some little life to the whole body of that otherwise flatt liquor Now those partes which the fire separateth next from the remaining body after the firy and watry ones are carryed away must be such as it can worke vpon and therefore must abound in humidity But since they stirre not till the watry ones are gone it is euident that they are composed of many dry partes strongly incorporated and very subtilely mixed with the moist ones and that both of them are exceeding small and are so closely and finely knitt together that the fire hath much adoe to gett betweene them and cutt the thriddes that tye them together and therefore they require a very great force of fire to cary them vp Now the composition of these sheweth them to be aeriall and together with the fire that is mingled with them they congeale into that consistence which we call oyle Lastly it can not be otherwise but that the fire in all this while of continuall application to the body it thus anatomiseth hath hardned and as it were rosted some partes into such greatnesse and drynesse as they will not fly nor can be carried vp with any moderate heate But greate quantity of fire being mingled with the subtiler partes of his baked earth maketh them very pungent and acrimonious in tast so that they are of the nature of ordinary salt and are so called and by the helpe of water may easily be separated from the more grosse partes which then remaine a dead and vselesse earth By this discourse it is apparant that fire hath been the instrument which hath wrought all these partes of an entire body into the formes they are in for whiles it carryed away the fiery partes it swelled the watry ones and whiles it lifted vp them it digested the aeriall partes and whiles it droue vp the oyles it baked the earth and salt Againe all these retaining for the most part the proper nature of the substance from whence they are extracted it is euident that the substance is not dissolued for so the nature of the whole would be dissolued and quite destroyed and extinguished in euery part but that onely some partes containing the whole substance or rather the nature of the whole substance in them are separated from other partes that haue likewise the same nature in them The third instrument for the separation and dissolution of bodies is water Whose proper matter to worke vpon is salt And it serueth to supply what the fire could not performe which is the separation of the salt from the earth in calcined bodies All the other partes fire was able to seuer But in these he hath so baked the little humidity he hath left in them with their much earth as he can not diuide them any further And so though he incorporateth him selfe with them yet he can carry nothing away with him If then pure water be putt vpon that chalke the subtilest dry partes of it do easily ioyne to the superuenient moysture and sticking close to it do draw it downe to them but because they are the lighter it happeneth to them as when a man in a boate pulleth the land to him that cometh not to him but he remoueth himselfe and his boate to it so these ascend in the water as they dissolue And the water more and more penetrating them and by addition of its partes making the humidity which
vnto whom I intend this worke But to make these operations of nature not incredible lett vs remember how we haue determined that euery body whatsoeuer doth yield some steame or vent a kind of vapour from it selfe and consider how they must needes do so most of all that are hoat and moyst as blood and milke are and as all woundes and sores generally are We see that the foote of a hare or deere leaueth such an impression where the beast hath passed as a dog can discerne it a long time after and a foxe breatheth out so strong a vapour that the hunters themselues can wind it a great way of and a good while after he is parted from the place Now ioyning this to the experiences we haue already allowed of concerning the attraction of heate wee may conclude that if any of these vapours do light vpon a solide warme body which hath the nature of a source vnto them they will naturally congregate and incorporate there and if those vapors be ioyned with any medicatiue quality or body they will apply that medicament better then any surgeon can apply it Then if the steame of blood and spirits do carry with it from the weapon or cloth the balsamike qualities of the salue or pouder and with them do settle vpon the wound what can follow but a bettering in it Likewise if the steame of the corruption that is vpon the clodde do carry the drying quality of the wind which sweepeth ouer it when it hangeth high in the ayre vnto the sore part of the cowes foote why is it not possible that it should dry the corruption there as well as it dryeth it vpon the hedge And if the steame of burned milke caÌ„ hurt by carrying fire to the dugge why should not salt cast vpon it be a preseruatiue against it Or rather why should not salt hinder the fire from being carryed thither Since the nature of salt alwayes hindereth and suppresseth the actiuity of fire as we see by experience when we throw salt into the fire below to hinder the flaming of soute in the toppe of a chimney which presently ceaseth when new fire from beneath doth not continue it And thus we might proceed in sundry other effects to declare the reason and the possibility of them were we certaine of the truth of them therefore we remitt this whole question to the autority of the testimonies THE NINETEENTH CHAPTER Of three other motions belonging to particular bodies Filtration Restitution and Electricall attraction AFter these lett vs cast our eye vpon an other motion very familiar among Alchymistes which they call Filtration It is effected by putting one end of a tongue or labell of flannen or of cotton or of flaxe into a vessell of water and letting the other end hang ouer the brimme of it And it will by little and little draw all the water out of that vessell so that the end which hangeth out be lower then the superficies of the water and will make it all come ouer into any lower vessell you will reserue it in The end of this operation is when any water is mingled with grosse and muddy partes not dissolued in the water to separate the pure and light ones from the impure By which we are taught that the lighter partes of the water are those which most easily do catch And if we will examine in particular how it is likely this businesse passeth wee may conceiue that the body or linguet by which â—hâ— water ascendeth being a dry one some lighter partes of the water whose chance it is to be neere the clymbing body of flaxe do beginne to sticke fast vnto it and then they require nothing neere so great force nor so much pressing to make them clymbe vp along the flaxe as they would do to make them mount in the pure ayre As you may see if you hold a sticke in running water sheluing against the streame the water will runne vp along the sticke much higher then it could be forced vp in the open ayre without any support though the Agent were much stronger then the current of the streame And a ball will vpon a rebound runne much higher vp a sheluing board then it would if nothing touched it And I haue beene told that if an eggeshell filled with dew bee sett att â—he foote of a hollow sticke the sunne will draw it to the toppe of the sheluing sticke whereas without a proppe it will not stirre it With much more reason then we may conceiue that water finding as it were little steppes in the cotton to facilitate its iourney vpwardes must ascend more easily then those other thinges do so as it once receiue any impulse to driue it vpwardes for the grauity both of that water which is vpon the cotton as also of so many of the confining partes of water as can reach the cotton is exceedingly allayed eyther by sticking vnto the cotton and so weighing in one bulke with â—hat dry body or else by not tending downe straight to the center but resting as it were vpon a steepe plaine according to what we said of the arme of a syphon that hangeth very sloaping out of the water and therefore draweth not after it a lesse proportion of water in the other arme that is more in a direct line to the center by which meanes the water as soone as it beginneth to clymbe cometh to stand in a kind of cone nether breaking from the water below its bulke being bigge enough to reach vnto it nor yet falling downe vnto it But our chiefe labour must be to find a cause that may make the water beginne to ascend To which purpose consider how water of its owne nature compresseth it selfe together to exclude any other body lighter then it is Now in respect of the whole masse of the water those partes which sticke to the cotton are to be accounted much lighter then water not because in their owne nature they are so but for the circumstances which accompany them and do giue them a greater disposition to receiue a motion vpwardes then much lighter bodies whiles they are destitute of such helpes Wherefore as the bulke of water weighing and striuing downewardes it followeth that if there were any ayre mingled with it it would to possesse a lesser place driue out the ayre so here in this case the water that is att the foote of the ladder of cotton ready to clymbe with a very small impulse may be after some sort compared in respect of the water to ayre by reason of the lightnesse of it and consequently is forced vp by the compressing of the rest of the water round about it Which no faster getteth vp but other partes att the foote of the ladder do follow the first and driue them still vpwardes along the towe and new ones driue the second and others the third and so forth So that with ease they clymbe vp to the toppe of the filter still driuing one
rather starke aboundeth more in them then in the others that stand as they are bent att the least in proportion to their natures but I conceiue this is not the cause of the effect we enquire about but that it is a subtile spirit which hath a great proportion of fire in it For as in rarefaction we found that fire which was eyther within or without the body to be rarifyed did cause the rarefaction eyther by entering into it or by working within it so seeing here the question is for a body to goe out of a lesser superficies into a greater which is the progresse of rarefaction and happeneth in the motion of restitution the worke must needes be done by the force of heate And because this effect proceedeth euidently out of the nature of the thing in which it is wrought and not from any outward cause we may conclude it hath its origine from a heate that is within the thing it selfe or else that was in it and may be pressed to the outward partes of it and would sinke into it againe As for example when a yong tree is bended both euery mans conceite is and the nature of the thing maketh vs beleeue that the force which bringeth the tree backe againe to its figure cometh from the inner side that is bent which is compressed together as being shrunke into a circular figure from a straight one for when solide bodies that were plaine on both sides are bent so as on each side to make a portion of a circle the conuexe superficies will be longer then it was before when it was plaine but the concaue will be shorter And therefore we may conceiue that the spirits which are in the contracted part being there squeezed into lesse roome then their nature well brooketh do worke themselues into a greater space or else that the spirits which are crushed out of the conuexe side by the extension of it but do remaine besieging it and do striue to gett in againe in such manner as we haue declared when we spoke of attraction wherein we shewed how the emitted spirits of any body will moue to their owne source and settle againe in it if they be within a conuenient compasse and accordingly do bring backe the extended partes to their former situation or rather that both these causes do in their kindes concurre to driue the tree into its naturall figure But as we see when a sticke is broken it is very hard to replace all the splinters euery one in its proper situation so it must of necessity fall out in this bending that certaine insensible partes both inward and outward are thereby displaced and can hardly be perfectly reioynted Whence it followeth that as you see the splinters of a halfe broken sticke meeting with one an other do hold the sticke somewhat crooked so these inuisible partes do the like in such bodies as after bending stand a little that way But because they are very little ones the tree or the branch that hath beene neuer so much bended may so nothing be broken in it be sett straight againe by paines without any notable detriment of its strength And thus you see the reason of some bodies returning in part to their naturall figure after the force leaueth them that did bend them Out of which you may proceed to those bodies that restore themselues entirely whereof steele is the most eminent And of it we know that there is a fiery spirit in it which may be extracted out of it not only by the long operations of calcining digesting and distilling it but euen by grosse heating it and then extinguishing it in wine and other conuenient liquors as Physitians vse to do Which is also confirmed by the burning of steele dust in the flame of a candle before it hath beene thus wrought vpon which afterwardes it will not do whereby we are taught that originally there are store of spirits in steele till they are sucked out Being then assured that in steele there is such aboundance of spirits and knowing that it is the nature of spirits to giue a quicke motion and seeing that duller spirits in trees do make this motion of Restitution we neede seeke no further what it is that doeth it in steele or in any other thinges that haue the like nature which through the multitude of spirits that abound in them especially steele do returne backe with so strong a ierke that their whole body will tremble a great while after by the force of its owne motion By what is said the nature of those bodies which do shrinke and stretch may easily be vnderstood for they are generally composed of stringy partes vnto which if humidity happen to arriue they grow thereby thicker and shorter As we see that droppes of water getting into a new roape of a welle or into a new cable will swell it much thicker and by consequence make it shorter Galileus noteth such wetting to be of so great efficacy that it will shrinke a new cable and shorten it notably notwithstanding the violence of a tempest and the weight and ierkes of a loaden shippe do straine it what is possible for them to stretch it Of this nature leather seemeth to be and parchment and diuers other thinges which if they be proportionably moystned and no exterior force be applyed to extend them will shrinke vp but if they be ouerwetted they will become flaccide Againe if they be soddainely dryed they will shriuell vp but if they be fairely dryed after moderate wetting they will extend themselues againe to their first length The way hauing been opened by what we haue discoursed before we came to the motion of Restitution towardes the discouery of the manner how heauy bodies may be forced vpwardes contrary to their naturall motion by very small meanes in outward appearance lett vs now examine vpon the same groundes if like motions to this of water may not be done in some other bodies in a subtiler manner In which more or lesse needeth not trouble vs since we know that neyther quantity nor the operations of it do consist in an indiuisible or are limited to determined periodes they may not passe It is enough for vs to find a ground for the possibility of the operation and then the perfecting of it and the reducing it to such a height as att the first might seeme impossible and incredibile we may leaue to the oeconomy of wise nature He that learneth to read write or to play on the lute is in the beginning ready to loose hart att euery steppe when he considereth with what labour difficulty and slownesse he ioyneth the letters spelleth syllabes formeth characters fitteth and breaketh his fingers as though they were vpon the racke to stoppe the right frettes and to touch the right stringes And yet you see how strange a dexterity is gained in all these by industry and practise and a readinesse beyond what we could imagine possible if we saw
not dayly the effects If then we can but arriue to decypher the first characters of the hidden Alphabet we are now taking in hand and can but spellingly reade the first syllabes of it we neede not doubt but that the wise Author of nature in the masterpiece of the creature which was to expresse the excellency of the workeman would with excellent cunning and art dispose all circumstances so aptly as to speake readily a complete language rising from those Elements and that should haue as large an extent in practise and expression beyond those first principles which we like children onely lispe out as the vast discourses of wisest and most learned men are beyond the spellinges of infantes and yet those discourses spring from the same roote as the others spellinges doe and are but a raysing of them to a greater height as the admired musike of the best player of a lute or harpe that euer was is deriued from the harsh twanges of course bowestringes which are composed together and refined till att length they arriue to that wonderfull perfection And so without scruple we may in the businesse we are next falling vpon conclude that the admirable and almost miraculous effects we see are but the eleuating to a wonderfull height those very actions and motions which we shall produce as causes and principles of them Letr vs then suppose that there is a solide hard body of an vnctuous nature whose partes are so subtile and fiery that with a little agitation they are much rarifyed and do breath out in steames though they be too subtile for our eyes to discerne like vnto the steame that issueth from sweating men or horses or like the steame that flyeth from a candle when it is putt out but that these steames as soone as they come into the cold ayre are by that cold soddainely condensed againe and by being condensed do shorten themselues and by little and little do retire till they settle themselues vpon the body from whence they sprung in such manner as you may obserue the little tender hornes of snailes vse to shrinke backe if any thing touch them till they settle in little lumpes vpon their heades If I say these stringes of bituminous vapour should in their way outwardes meete with any light and spungie body they would pierce into it and settle in it and if it were of a competent biggenesse for them to wield they would carry it with them which way soeuer they goe so that if they shrinke backe againe to the fountaine from whence they came they must needes carry backe with them the light spungy body they haue fixed their dartes in Consider then that how much heate rarifyeth so much cold cōdenseth and therefore such partes as by agitatiō were spūne out into a subtile thridde of an inch long for exāple as they coole do grow bigger and bigger and consequently shorter and shorter till att length they gather thēselues backe into their maine body and there they settle againe in cold bitumen as they were att the first and the light body that they sticke vnto is drawne backe with them and consequently sticketh to the superficies of the bitumen As if something were tyed att one end of a lutestring extended to its vtmost capacity and the other end were fastened to some pinne as the string shrinketh vp so that which is tyed att it must needes moue neerer and neerer the pinne which artifice of nature iugglers do imitate when by meanes of an vnseene haire they draw light bodies to them Now if all this operation be done without your seeing the little thriddes which cause it the matter appeareth wonderfull and strange But when you consider this progresse that we haue sett downe you will iudge it possible And this seemeth to be the case of those bodies which we call Electricall as yellow amber iett and the like All which are of a bituminous vnctuous nature as appeareth by their easy combustibility and smell when they are burned And if some do not so apparently shew this vnctuous nature it is because eyther they are too hard or else they haue a high degree of aqueous humidiry ioyned with their vnctuosity and in them the operation will be duller in that proportion for as we see that vnctuous substances are more odoriferous then others and do send their steames further off and more efficaciously so we can not doubt but that such bodies as consist in a moist nature do accordingly send forth their emanations in a feebler proportion Yet that proportion will not be so feeble but that they may haue an Electricall effect as well as the more efficacious Electricall bodies which may be perceptible if exact experience be made by an instrument like the mariners needle as our learned countryman Doctor Gilbert teacheth But that in those eminent agents the spirits whereby they attract are vnctuous is plaine because the fire consumeth them and so if the agents be ouerheated they can not worke but moderate heate euen of fire encreaseth their operation Againe they are clogged by mysty ayre or by wetting and likewise are pierced through and cutt asunder by spiritt of wine or aquae ardentes but oyle doth not hurt them Likewise they yield more spirits in the sunne then in the shade and they continue longer when the ayre is cleared by North or by Easterne windes They require to be polished eyther because the rubbing which polisheth them doth take off from their surfaces the former emanations which returning backe do sticke vpon them and so do hinder the passage of those that are within or else because their outsides may be foule or lastly because the pores may be dilated by that smoothing Now that hardnesse and solidity is required doth argue that these spirits must be quicke ones that they may returne smartly and not be lost through their languishing in the ayre Likewise that all bodies which are not eyther exceeding rare or else sett on fire may be drawne by these vnctuous thriddes concludeth that the quality by which they do it is a common one that hath no particular contrarieties such a one as we see is in grease or in pitch to sticke to any thing from which in like manner nothing is exempted but fire and ayre And lastly that they worke most efficaciously when they are heated by rubbing rather then by fire sheweth that their spirits are excitated by motion and are thereby made to flye abroad in such manner as we see in pomanders and in other perfumes which must be heated if you will haue them communicate their sent and alike effect as in them agitation doth in iett yellow amber and such other Electricall bodies for if vpon rubbing them you putt them presently to your nose you will discerne a strong bituminous smell in them all which circumstances do shew that this Electricall vertue consisteth in a certaine degree of rarity or density of the bodies vnctuous emanations Now if these refined and viscous
haue formerly declared in the making of salt by force of fire This button thus dilated and brought to this passe we call the fruite of the plant whose harder part encloseth oftentimes an other not so hard as dry The reason whereof is because the outward hardenesse permitteth no moysture to soake in any aboundance through it and then that which is enclosed in it must needes be much dryed though not so much but that it still retaineth the common nature of the plant This drought maketh these inner partes to be like a kind of dult or att the least such as may be easily dryed into dust when they are brused out of the huske that encloseth them And in euery parcell of this dust the nature of the whole resideth as it were contracted into a small quantity for the iuice which was first in the button and had passed from the roote through the manifold varieties of the diuers partes of the plant and had suffered much concoction partly from the sunne and partly from the inward heate imprisoned in that harder part of the fruite is by these passages strainings and concoctions become att the length to be like a tincture extracted out of the whole plant and is att the last dryed vp into a kind of magistery This we call the seede which is of a fitt nature by being buried in the earth and dissolued with humour to renew and reciprocate the operation we haue thus described And thus you haue the formation of a Plant. But a sensiue creature being compared to a plant as a plant is to a mixed body you can not but conceiue that he must be compounded as it were of many plantes in like sort as a plant is of many mixed bodies But so that all the plants which concurre to make one animal are of one kind of nature and cognation and besides the matter of which such diuersity is to be made must of necessity be more humid and figurable then that of an ordinary plant and the artificer which worketh and mouldeth it must be more actiue Wherefore we must suppose that the masse of which an animal is to be made must be actually liquid and the fire that worketh vpon it must be so powerfull that of its owne nature it may be able to conuert this liquide matter into such breathes and steames as we see do vse to rise from water when the sunne or fire worketh vpon it Yet if the masse were altogether as liquide as water it would vanish away by heate boyling it and be dryed vp therefore it must be of such a conuenient temper that although in some of its partes it be fluide and apt to runne yet by others it must be held together as we see that vnctuous thinges for the most part are which will swell by heate but not flye away So then if we imagine a great heate to be imprisoned in such a liquour and that it seeketh by boyling to breake out but that the solidenesse and viscousnesse of the substance will not permitt it to euaporate it can not choose but comport it selfe in some such sort as we see butter or oyle in a frying panne ouer the fire when it riseth in bubbles but much more efficaciously for their body is not strong enough to keepe in the heate and therefore those bubbles fall againe whereas if it were those bubbles would rise higher and higher and stretch themselues longer and longer as when the soape boylers do boyle a strong vnctuous lye into soape and euery one of them would be as it were a litle brooke whereof the channell would be the enclosing substance and the inward smoake that extendeth it might be compared to the water of it as when a glasse is blowne out by fire and ayre into a long figure Now we may remember how we haue said where we treated of the production and resolution of mixed bodies that there are two sortes of liquide substantiall partes which by the operation of fire are sent out of the body it worketh vpon the watry and the oyly partes For though there appeare some times some very subtile and aethereall partes of a third kind which are the aquae ardentes or burning spirits yet in such a close distilling of circulation as this is they are not seuered by themselues but do accompagny the rest and especially the watry partes which are of a nature that the rising Ethereall spirits easily mingle with and extend themselues in it whereby the water becometh more efficacious and the spirits lesse fugitiue Of these liquide partes which the fire sendeth away the watry ones are the first as being the easiest to be raysed the oyly partes rise more difficultly and therefore do come last And in the same manner it happeneth in this emission of brookes the watry and oyly steames will each of them flye into different reserues and if there arriue vnto them aboundance of their owne quality each of them must make a substance of its owne nature by settling in a conuenient place and by due concoction Which substance after it is made and confirmed if more humidity and heate do presse it will againe break forth into other litle channels But when the watry and oyly partes are boyled away there remaine yet behind other more solide and fixed partes and more strongly incorporated with fire then eyther of these which yet can not drye vp into a fiery salt because a continuall accessiō of humour keepeth them alwayes flowing and so they become like a couldron of boyling fire Which must propagate it selfe as wide as eyther of the others since the actiuity of it must needes be greater then theirs as being the source of motion vnto them and that there wanteth not humidity for it to extend it selfe by And thus you see three rootes of three diuers plants all in the same plant proceeding by naturall resolution from one primitiue source Whereof that which is most watry is fittest to fabricate the body and common outside of the triformed plant since water is the most figurable principle that is in nature and the most susceptible of multiplication and by its cold is easyest to be hardened and therefore fittest to resist the iniuries of enemy bodies that may infest it The oyly partes are fittest for the continuance and solidity of the plant for we see that viscosity and oylinesse hold together the partes where they abound and they are slowly wasted by fire but do conserue and are an aliment to the fire that consumeth them The partes of the third kind are fittest for the conseruation of heate which though in them it be too violent yet it is necessary for working vpon other partes and for mainetaining a due temper in them And thus we haue armed our plant with three sortes of riuers or brookes to runne through him with as many different streames the one of a gentle balsamike oyle an other of streaming fire and the third of a connaturall and cooler water to irrigate
wombe we haue by the relation of that learned and exact searcher into nature Doctor Haruey that the seede of the male after his accoupling with the female doth not remaine in her wombe in any sensible bulke but as it seemeth euaporateth and incorporateth it selfe eyther into the body of the wombe or rather into some more interior part as into the seminary vessells Which being a solide substance much resembling the nature of the females seede is likely to sucke vp by the mediation of the females seede the male seede incorporated with it and by incorporation turned as it were into a vapour in such sort as we haue formerly explicated how the body of a scorpion or viper draweth the poyson out of a wound And after a certaine time Doctor Haruey noted the space of sixe weekes or two months in does or hindes these seedes distill againe into the wombe and by litle and litle do clarify in the middest and a litle red specke appeareth in the center of the bright clearnesse as we said before of the egge But we should be too blame to leaue our Reader without clearing that difficulty which can not choose but haue sprung vp in his thoughts by occasion of the relations we made att the entrance into this point concerning the catte whose kittlinges were halfe with tayles and halfe without and the womans daughters att Argires that had as well as their mother excrescences vpon their left thumbes imitating an other lesser thumbe and the like effects whensouer they happen which they do frequently enough Lett him therefore remember how we haue determined that generation is made of the bloud which being dispersed into all the partes of the body to irrigate euery one of them and to conuey fitting spirits into them frō their source or shoppe where they are forged so much of it as is superaboundant to the nourishing of those partes is sent backe againe to the hart to recouer the warmeth and spirits it hath lost by so long a iourney By which perpetuall course of a continued circulation it is euident that the bloud in running thus through all the partes of the body must needes receiue some particular concoction or impression from euery one of them And by consequence if there be any specificall vertue in one part which is not in an other then the bloud returning from thence must be endewed with the vertue of that part And the purest part of this bloud being extracted like a quintessence out of the whole masse is reserued in conuenient receptacles or vessels till there be vse of it and is the matter or seede of which a new animal is to be made in whom will appeare the effect of all the specificall vertues drawne by the bloud in its iterated courses by its circular motion through all the seuerall partes of the parents body Whence it followeth that if any part be wanting in the body whereof this seede is made or be superaboundant in it whose vertue is not in the rest of the body or whose superaboundance is not allayed by the rest of the body the vertue of that part can not be in the bloud or will be too strong in the blood and by consequence it can not be at all or it will be too much in the seede And the effect proceeding from the seede that is the yong animal will come into the world sauouring of that origine vnlesse the mothers seede do supply or temper what the fathers was defectiue or superaboundant in or contrariwise the fathers do correct the errors of the mothers But peraduenture the Reader will tell vs that such a specificall vertue can not be gotten by concoction of the bloud or by any pretended impression in it vnlesse some litle particles of the nourished part do remaine in the bloud and returne backe with it according to that maxime of Geber Quod non ingreditur non immutat no body can change an other vnlesse it enter into it and mixing it selfe with it do become one with it And that so in effect by this explication we fall backe into the opinion which we reiected To this I answere that the difference is very great betweene that opinion and ours as will appeare euidently if you obserue the two following assertions of theirs First they affirme that a liuing creature is made meerely by the assembling together of similar partes which were hidden in those bodies from whence they are extracted in generation whereas we say that bloud coming to a part to irrigate it is by its passage through it and some litle stay in it and by its frequent returnes thither att the length transmuted into the nature of that part and thereby the specificall vertues of euery part do grow greater and are more diffused and extended Secondly they say that the embroyn is actually formed in the seede though in such litle partes as it can not be discerned vntill each part haue enlarged and encreased it selfe by drawing vnto it from the circumstant bodies more substance of their owne nature But we say that there is one homogeneall substance made of the bloud which hath beene in all partes of the body and this is the seede which containeth not in it any figure of the animal from which it is refined or of the animal into which it hath a capacity to be turned by the addition of other substances though it haue in it the vertues of all the partes it hath often runne through By which terme of specifike vertues I hope we haue said enough in sundry places of this discourse to keepe men from conceiuing that we do meane any such vnconceiueable quality as moderne Philosophers too frequently talke of when they know not what they say or think nor can giue any account of But that it is such degrees and such numbers of rare and dense partes mingled together as constitute a mixed body of such a temper and nature which degrees and proportions of rare and dense partes and their mixture together and in corporating into one homogeneall substance is the effect resulting from the operations of the exteriour agent that cutteth imbibeth kneadeth and boyleth it to such a temper which exteriour agent in this case is each seuerall part of the animals body that this iuice or bloud runneth through and that hath a particular temper belonging to it resulting out of such a proportion of rate and dense partes as we haue euen now spoken of and can no more be withheld from communicating its temper to the bloud that first soaketh into it and soone after drayneth away againe from it according as other succeeding partes of bloud driue it on then a minerall channell can choose but communicate its vertue vnto a streame of water that runneth through it and is continually grating of some of the substance of the minerall earth and dissoluing it into it selfe But to goe on with our intended discourse The seede thus imbued with the specificall vertues of all
as they partake more or lesse of this heate which is the Architect that mouldeth and frameth them all Vndoubtedly this can be none other but the hart whose motion and manner of working euidently appeareth in the twinckling of the first red spotte which is the first change in the egge and in the first matter of other liuing creatures Yet I do not intend to say that the hart is perfectly framed and completely made vp with all its partes and instruments before any other part be begunne to be made but only the most vertuous part and as it were the marrow of it which serueth as a shoppe or a hoat forge to mould spirits in from whence they are dispersed abroad to forme and nourish other partes that stand in neede of them to that effect The shootings or litle red stringes that streame out from it must surely be arteries through which the bloud issuing from the hart and there made and imbued with the nature of the seede doth runne till encountring with fitt matter it engrosseth it selfe into braine liuer lightes c. From the braine cheifely groweth the marrow and by consequent the bones containing it which seeme to be originally but the outward part of the marrow baked and hardened into a strong cruste by the great heate that is kept in as also the sinnewes which are the next principall bodies of strength after the bones The marrow being very hoat dryeth the bones and yet with its actuall moysture it humecteth and nourisheth them too in some sort The spirits that are sent from the braine do the like to the sinewes And lastly the arteries and veines by their bloud to cherish and bedew the flesh And thus the whole liuing creature is begunne framed and made vp THE FIVE AND TWENTIETH CHAPTER How a Plant or Animal cometh to that figure it hath BVt before we goe any further and search into the operations of this animall a wonderfull effect calleth our consideration vnto it which is how a plant or animal cometh by the figure it hath both in the whole and in euery part of it Aristotle after he had beaten his thoughts as farre as he could vpon this question pronunced that this effect could not possibly be wrought by the vertue of the first qualites but that it sprung from a more diuine origine And most of the contemplators of nature since him do seeme to agree that no cause can be rendered of it but that it is to be referred meerely to the specificall nature of the thing Neyther do we intend to derogate from eyther of these causes since that both diuine prouidence is eminently shewne in contriuing all circumstances necessary for this worke and likewise the first temperament that is in the seede must needes be the principall immediate cause of this admirable effect This latter then being supposed our labour and endeauour will be to vnfold as farre as so weake and dimme eyes can reach the excellency and exactnesse of Gods prouidence which can not be enough adored when it is reflected vpon and marked in the apt laying of adequate causes to produce such a figure out of such a mixture first layed From them so artificially ranged we shall see this miracle of nature to proceed and not from an immediate working of God or nature without conuenient and ordinary instruments to mediate and effect this configuration through the force and vertue of their owne particular natures Such a necessity to interest the cheife workeman att euery turne in particular effects would argue him of want of skill and prouidence in the first laying of the foundations of his designed machine he were an improuident clockemaker that should haue cast his worke so as when it were wound vp and going it would require the masters hand att euery houre to make the hammer strike vpon the bell Lett vs not then too familiarly and irreuerently ingage the Almighty Architect his immediate handy worke in euery particular effect of nature Tali non est dignus vindice nodus But lett vs take principles within our owne kenning and consider how a body hath of its owne nature three dimensions as Mathematicians vse to demonstrate and that the variety which we see of figures in bodies proceedeth out of the defect of some of these dimensions in proportion to the rest As for example that a thing be in the forme of a square tablette is for that the cause which gaue it length and breadth could not also giue it thickenesse in the same proportion for had it beene able to giue profundity as well as the other two it had made a cube instead of a tablette In like manner the forme of a lamine or very long square is occasioned by some accident which hindereth the cause from giuing breadth and thickenesse proportionable to the length And so other figures are made by reason that their causes are somewayes bound to giue more of some dimension to one part then to an other As for example when water falleth out of the skye it hath all the litle corners or extancies of its body grated of by the ayre as it rouleth and tumbleth downe in it so that it becometh round and continueth in that forme vntill that settling vpon some flatt body as grasse or a leafe it receiueth a litle plainenesse to the proportion of its weight mastering the continuity of it And therefore if the droppe be great vpon that plaine body it seemeth to be halfe a sphere or some lesse portion of one but if it be a litle droppe then the flatt part of it which is that next vnto the grasse is very litle and vndiscernable because it hath not weight enough to presse it much and spread it broad vpon the grasse and so the whole seemeth in a manner to be a sphere but if the externe causes had pressed vpon this droppe only broadwayes and thickewayes as when a turner maketh a round pillar of a square one then it would haue proued a cylinder nothing working vpon it to grate off any of its length but only the corners of the breadth and thickenesse of it And thus you see how the fundamentall figures vpon which all the rest are grounded are contriued by nature not by the worke of any particular Agent that immediately imprinteth a determinate figure into a particular body as though it wrought it there att once according to a foreconceiued designe or intelligent ayme of producing such a figure in such a body but by the concurrence of seuerall accidentall causes that do all of them ioyne in bringing the body they file and worke vpon into such a shape Only we had like to haue forgotten the reason and cause of the concaue figure in some partes of plantes which in the ordinary course of nature we shall find to grow from hence that a round outside being filled with some liquor which maketh it grow higher and higher it happeneth that the succeeding causes do contract this liquor and do
when we open them the ayre must needes come in to fill that capacity which else would be empty and when we shutt them againe as in a paire of bellowes we putt it out This may suffice concerning the primary motion of rootes but in that of the hart we shall find the matter not altogether so plaine Monsieur des Cartes following herein the steppes of the learned and ingenious Haruey who hath inuented and teacheth that curious and excellent doctrine of the circulation of the bloud as indeede what secret of nature can be hidden from so sharpe a witt when he applyeth himselfe to penetrate into the bottome of it explicateth the matter much after this sort That the hart within in the substance of it is like a hollow cauerne in whose bottome were an hoat stone on which should droppe as much liquour as the fiery stone could blow into smoake and this smoake or steame should be more then the caue could containe wherefore it must breake out which to do it presseth on all sides to gett an issue or dore to lett it out it findeth of two sortes but only one kind of them will serue it for this purpose for the one sort of these dores openeth inwardes the other outwardes which is the cause that the more it striueth to gett out the faster it shutteth the doores of the first kinde but by the same meanes it beateth backe the other dores and so getteth out Now when it is gone quite out of this cauerne and consequently leaueth it to its naturall disposition whereas before it violently stretched it out and by doing so kept close the dores that open inwardes then all the partes of it beginne to slacken and those dores giue way vnto new liquour to droppe in anew which the heate in the bottome of the hart rarifyeth againe into smoake as before And thus he conceiueth the motion of the hart to be made taking the substance of it to be as I may say like vnto limber leather which vpon the filling of it with bloud and steame openeth and dilateth it selfe and att the going of it out it shrinketh together like a bladder But I doubt this explication will not go through the difficulty for first both Galen and Doctor Haruey do shâ—w that as soone as the bloud is come into the hart it contracteth it selfe which agreeth not with Monsieur des Cartes his supposition for in his doctrine there appeareth no cause why it should contract it selfe when it is full but contrariwise it should goe on dilating it selfe vntill enough of the bloud which droppeth into the hart were conuerted into steame to force the dores open that so it may gaine an issue thence and a passage into the body Next Monsieur des Cartes supposeth that the substance of the hart is like a bladder which hath no motion of it selfe but openeth and shutteth according as what is within it stretcheth it out or permitteth it to shrinke and fall together againe Whereas Doctor Haruey prooueth that when it is full it compresseth it selfe by a quicke and strong motion to expell that which is in it and that when it is empty it returneth to its naturall dilatation figure and situation by the ceasing of that agents working which caused its motion Whereby it appeareth to be of such a fibrous substance as hath a proper motion of its owne Thirdly I see not how this motion can be proportionall for the hart must needes open and be dilated much faster then it can be shutt and shrinke together there being no cause putt to shutt it and to bring it to its vtmost periode of shrinking other then the going out of the vapour whereby it becometh empty which vapour not being forced by any thing but by its owne inclination it may peraduenture att the first when there is aboundance of it swell and stretch the hart forcibly out but after the first impulse and breach of some part of it out of the cauerne that enclosed it there is nothing to driue out the rest which must therefore steame very leisurely out Fourthly what should hinder the bloud from coming in before the hart be quite empty and shrunke to its lowest pitch For as soone as the vapour yeildeth within new bloud may fall in from without and so keepe the hart continually dilated without euer suffering it to be perfectly and completely shutt Fifthly the hart of a viper layed vpon a plate in a warme place will beate 24 houres and much longer if it be carefully taken out of its body and the weather be warme and moyst and it is cleare that this is without successioÌ„ of bloud to cause the pulses of it Lâ—kewise the seuered meÌ„bers of liuing creatures will stirre for some time after they are parted from their bodies and in them we can suspect no such cause of motion Sixthly in Monsieur des Cartes his opinion the hart should be hardest when it is fullest and the eruption of the steame out of it should be strongest att the beginning whereas experience sheweth that it is softest when it is att the point of being full and hardest when it is att the point of being empty and the motion strongest towardes the end Seuenthly in Monsieur des Cartes his way there is no agent or force strong enough to make bloud gush out of the hart for if it be the steame only that openeth the dores nothing but it will goe out and the bloud will still remaine behind since it lyeth lower then the steame and further from the issue that letteth it out but Doctor Haruey findeth by experience and teacheth how to make this experience that when a wound is made in the hart bloud will gush out by spurtes att euery shooting of the hart And lastly if Monsieur des Cartes his supposition were true the arteries would receiue nothing but steames whereas it is euident that the chiefe filler of them is bloud Therefore we must enquire after an other cause of this primary motion of a sensitiue creature in the beatings of its hart Wherein we shall not be obliged to looke farre for seeing we find this motion and these pulsations in the hart when it is seperated from the body we may boldely and safely conclude that it must of necessity be caused by something that is within the hart it selfe And what can that be else but heate or spirits imprisoned in a tough viscous bloud which it can not so presently breake through to gett out and yet can stirre within it and lift it vp The like of which motion may be obserued in the heauing vp and sinking downe againe of loose moulde throwne into a pitte into which much ordure hath been emptied The same cause of heate in the earth maketh mountaines and sandes to be cast vp in the very sea so in frying when the panne is full of meate the bubbles rise and fall att the edges treacle and such strong compounded substances whiles they ferment do lift
in for a pretty while without any extreme preiudice But these difficulties are easily answered for whether beasts harts do lye directly horizontally or whether the basis be fastened some what higher then the tippe reacheth and so maketh their hart hang inclining downewardes still the motion of grauity hath its effect in them As wee may perceiue in the hart of a viper lying vpon a plate and in any other thing that of it selfe swelleth vp and straight againe sinketh downe in which we can not doubt but that the grauity fighting against the heate maketh the eleuated partes to fall as the heate maketh them rise And as for the latter it is euident that men can not stay long in that posture without violent accidents and in any litle while we see that the bloud cometh into their face and other partes which naturally are situated higher but by this position become lower then the hart and much time is not required to haue them quite disordered and suffocated the bloud passing through the hart with too much quickenesse and not receiuing due concoction there and falling thence in too great aboundance into places that can not with conueniency entertayne it But you will insist and aske whether in that posture the hart doth moue or no and how And to speake by guesse in a thing I haue not yet made experiences enough to be throughly informed in I conceiue without any great scrupule that it doth moue And that it happeneth thus that the hart hanging somwhat loose must needes tūble ouer and the tippe of it leane downewardes some way or other and so lye in part like the hart of a beast though not so conueniently accommodated and then the heate which maketh the viscous bloud that is in the substance of the hart to ferment will not faile of raising it vp wherevpon the weight of that side of the hart that is lifted vp will presently presse it downe againe And thus by the alternatiue operations of these causes the hart will be made to open and shutt it selfe as much as is necessary for admitting and thrusting out that litle and disorderly coming bloud which maketh its course through it for that litle space wherein the man continueth in that position Now from these effects wrought in the hart by the moystening of the fibers two other effects do proceed the one is that the bloud is pushed out of euery corner of the hart with an impetuousnesse or velocity The other is that by this motion the spirits which are in the ventricles of the hart and in the bloud that is euen then heated there are more and deeper pressed into the substance of the hart so that you see the hart imbibeth fresh vigour and is strengthned with new spirits whiles it seemeth to reiect that which should strengthen it Againe two other effects follow this violent eiection of the bloud out of the hart The one is that for the present the hart is entirely cleansed of all remainders of bloud none being permitted to fall backe to annoy it The other is that the hart finding it selfe dry the fibers do relent presently into their naturall positiō and extensiō and the valuulae that open inwardes fall flatt to the sides of the ventricles and consequently new bloud droppeth in So that in conclusiō we see the motion of the hart dependeth originally of its fibers irrigated by the bloud and not from the force of the vapour as Monsieur des Cartes supposeth This motion of the hart driueth the bloud which is warmed and spiritualised by being boyled in this furnace through due passages into the arteries which frō thē runneth into the veines and is a maine cause of making and nourishing other partes as the liuer the lūgs the braines and whatsoeuer else dependeth of those veines and arteries through which the bloud goeth Which being euer freshly heated and receiuing the tincture of the harts nature by passing through the hart wheresoeuer it stayeth and curdleth it groweth into a substance of a nature conformable to the hart though euery one of such substances be of exceeding different conditions in themselues the very grossest excrements not being excluded from some participation of that nature But if you desire to follow the bloud all along euery steppe in its progresse from the hart round about the body till it returne backe againe to its center Doctor Haruey who most acutely teacheth this doctrine must be your guide He will shew you how it issueth from the hart by the arteries from whence it goeth on warming the flesh vntill it arriue some of the extremities of the body and by then it is growne so coole by long absence from the fountaine of its heate and by euaporating its owne stocke of spirits without any new supply that it hath neede of being warmed a new it findeth it selfe returned backe againe to the heart and is there heated againe which returne is made by the veines as its going forwardes is performed only by the arteries And were it not for this continuall circulation of the bloud and this new heating it in its proper cauldron the hart it could not be auoyded but that the extreme partes of the body would soone grow cold and dye For flesh being of it selfe of a cold nature as is apparent in dead flesh and being kept warme meerely by the bloud that bedeweth it and the bloud likewise being of a nature that soone groweth cold and congealeath vnlesse it be preserued in due temper by actuall heate working vpon it how can we imagine that they two singly without any other assistance should keepe one an other warme especially in those partes that are farre distant from the hart by only being together Surely we must allow the bloud which is a substance fitt for motion to haue recourse backe to the hart where only it can be supplyed with new heate and spirits and from thence be driuen out againe by its pulses or stroakes which are his shuttinges And as fast as it flyeth out like a reeking thicke steame which riseth from perfumed water falling vpon a heated panne that which is next before it must fly yet further on to make way for it and new arteriall blould still issuing forth att euery pulse it must still driue on what issued thence the last precedent pulse and that part must presse on what is next before it And thus it fareth with the whole masse of blould which hauing no other course but in the body it must att length runne round and by new vessels which are the veines returne backe vnto the place from whence it issued first and by that time it cometh thither it is growne coole and thicke and needeth a vigorous restauration of spirits and a new rarifying that then it may warme the flesh it passeth againe through without which it would soddainely grow stone cold as is manifest if by tying or cutting the arteries you intercept the blould which is to nourish any part for then
that part groweth presently cold and benummed But referring the particulars of this doctrine vnto Doctor Haruey who hath both inuented and perfected it our taske in hand calleth vpon vs to declare in common the residue of motions that all liuing creatures agree in How generation is performed we haue determined in the past discourse Our next consideration then ought to be of Nutrition and Augmentation Betweene which there is very litle difference in the nature of their action and the difference of their names is grounded more vpon the different result in the periode of them then vpon the thing it selfe as will by and by appeare Thus then is the progresse of this matter as soone as a liuing creature is formed it endeauoureth straight to augment it selfe and employeth it selfe only about that the partes of it being yet too yong and tender to performe the other functions which nature hathâ— produced them for That is to say the liuing creature att its first production is in such a state and condition as it is able to do nothing else but by meanes of the greate heate that is in it to turne into its owne substance the aboundance of moysture that ouerfloweth it They who are curious in this matter do tell vs that the performance of this worke consisteth in fiue actions which they call Attraction Adhesion Concoction Assimilation and Vnition The nature of attraction we haue already declared when we explicated how the hart and the roote sendeth iuice into the other partes of the animal or plant for they abounding in themselues with inward heate and besides that much other circumstant heate working likewise vpon them it can not be otherwise but that they must needes sucke and draw into them the moysture that is about them As for adhesion the nature of that is likewise explicated when we shewed how such partes as are moyst but especially aereall or oyly ones such as are made by the operation of a soft and continuall heate are catching and do easily sticke vnto any body they happen to touch and how a litle part of moysture betweene two dry partes ioyneth them together Vpon which occasion it is to be noted that partes of the same kind do ioyne best together and therefore the pouder of glasse is vsed to cimeÌ„t broken glasse with all as we haue touched some where aboue and the pouder of marble to ciment marble with and so of other bodies in like manner Alchymistes find no better expedient to extract a small proportion of siluer mixed with a great one of gold then to putt more siluer to it nor any more effectuall way to gett out the hart or tincture or spirits of any thing they distill or make an extract of then to infuse its owne flegme upon it and to water it with that Now whether the reason of this be that continuity because it is an vnity must be firmest betweene parts that are most conformable to one an other and consequently are most one among thâ—mselues or whether it be for some other hidden cause belongeth not to this place to discourse but in fine so it is And the adhesion is strongest of such partes as are most conformable to that which needeth encrease and nourishment and that is made vp by the other three actions Of which concoction is nothing else but a thickening of that iuice which already sticketh to any part of the animals body by the good digestion that heate maketh in it And assimilation is the effect of concoction for this iuice being vsed in the same manner as the first iuice was that made the part wherevnto this is to be ioyned it can not choose but become like vnto it in substance And then there being no other substance betweene it is of it selfe vnited vnto it without any further helpe Hitherto this action belongeth to nutrition But if on the one side the heate and spirituality of the bloud and on the otherside the due temper and disposition of the part be such as the bloud is greedily sucked into the part which thereby swelleth to make roome for it and will not lett it go away but turneth it into a like substance as it selfe is and in greater quantity then what is consumed and decayeth continually by transpiration then this action is called likewise augmentation Which Galen explicateth by a sport the boyes of Ionia vsed who were accustomed to fill a bladder with wind and when they could force no more into it they would rubbe the bladder and after rubbing of it they found it capable of receiuing new breath and so they would proceed on vntill their bladder were as full as by vse they knew it could be made Now saith he nature doth the like by filling our flesh and other partes with bloud that is to say it stretcheth the fibers but she hath ouer and aboue a power which the boyes had not namely to make the fibers as strong after they are stretched to their vtmost extension as they were before they were extended whence it happeneth that she can extend them againe as well as att the first and this without end as farre as concerneth that part The reason whereof is because she extendeth them by meanes of a liquour which is of the same nature as that whereof they were made att the first and from thence it followeth that by concoction that liquour settleth in the partes of the fibers which haue most neede and so maketh those partes as great in the length they are extended vnto as they were in their shortnesse before they were drawne out Whereby the whole part of the animal wherein this happeneth groweth greater and the like being done in euery part as well as in any one single one the whole animal becometh bigger and is in such sort augmented Out of all which discourse we may collect that in the essentiall composition of liuing creatures there may peraduenture be a physicall possibility for them to continue alwayes without decay and so become immortall euen in their bodies if all hurtfull accidents coming from without might be preuented For seeing that a man besides the encrease which he maketh of himselfe can also impart vnto his children a vertue by which they are able to do the like and to giue againe vnto theirs as much as they receiued from their fathers it is cleare that what maketh him dye is no more the want of any radicall power in him to encrease or nourish himselfe then in fire it is the want of power to burne which maketh it goe out But it must be some accidentall want which Galen attributeth chiefely to the drynesse of our bones and sinewes c. as you may in him see more att large for drynesse with density alloweth not easy admittance vnto moysture and therefore it causeth the heate which is in the dry body eyther to euaporate or to be extinguished and want of heate is that from whence the failing of life proceedeth which he thinketh can
conuerse withall As for example he conceiueth light to be nothing else but a percussion made by the illuminant vpon the ayre or vpon the ethereall substance which he putteth to be mixed with and to runne through all bodies which being a continuate medium betweene the illuminant and our sense the percussion vpon that striketh also our sense which he calleth the nerue that reacheth from the place strucken to witt from the bottome of our eye vnto the braine Now by reason of the continuity of this string or nerue he conceiueth that the blow which is made vpon the outward end of it by the Ether is conueyed by the other end of it to the braine that end striking the braine in the same measure as the Ether strucke the other end of it like the iacke of a virginall which stricketh the sounding corde according as the musitians hand presseth vpon the stoppe The part of the braine which is thus struken he supposeth to be the fantasie where he deemeth the soule doth reside and thereby taketh notice of the motion and obiect that are without And what is said thus of sight is to be applyed proportionably to the rest of the senses This then is the summe of Monsieur des Cartes his opinion which he hath very finely expressed with all the aduantages that opposite examples significant wordes and cleare methode can giue vnto a witty discourse Which yet is but a part of the commendations he deserueth for what he hath done on this particular He is ouer and aboue all this the first that I haue euer mett with who hath published any conceptions of this nature whereby to make the operations of sense intelligible Certainely this prayse will euer belong vnto him that he hath giuen the first hinte of speaking groundedly and to the purpose vpon this subiect and whosoeuer shall carry it any further as what important mystery was euer borne and perfected at once must acknowledge to haue deriued his light from him For my part I shall so farre agree with him as to allow motion alone to be sufficient to worke sensation in vs and not only to allow it sufficient but also to professe that not only this but that no other effect whatsoeuer can be wrought in vs but motion and by meanes of motion Which is euident out of what we haue already deliuered speaking of bodies in generall that all action among them eyther is locall motion or else followeth it and no lesse euident out of what we haue declared in particular concerning the operations of the outward senses and the obiects that worke vpon them and therefore whosoeuer shall in this matter require any thing further then a difference of motion he must first seeke other instruments in obiects to cause it For examining from their very origine the natures of all the bodies we conuerse withall we can not find any ground to beleeue they haue power or meanes to worke any thing beyond motion But I shall craue leaue to differ from him in determining what is the subiect of this motion whereby the braine iudgeth of the nature of the thing that causeth it He will allow no locall change of any thing in a man further then certaine vibrations of stringes which he giueth the obiects to play vpon from the very sense vp to the braine and by their different manners of shaking the braine he will haue it know what kind of thing it is that striketh the outward sense without remouing any thing within our body from one place to an other But I shall goe the more common way and make the spirits to be the porters of all newes to the braine only adding therevnto that these newes which they carry thither are materiall participations of the bodies that worke vpon the outward organes of the senses and passing through them do mingle themselues with the spirits and so do goe whither they carry them that is to the braine vnto which from all partes of the body they haue immediate resorte and a perpetuall communication with it So that to exercise sense which the latines do call sentire but in English we haue no one word common to our seuerall particular notions of diuers perceptions by sense is Our braine to receiue an impression from the externe obiect by the operation or mediation of an organicall part made for that purpose and some one of those which we terme an externe sense from which impression vsually floweth some motion proper to the liuing creature And thus you see that the outward senses are not truly senses as if the power of sensation were in them but in an other meaning to witt so farre as they are instruments of qualifying or conueying the obiect to the braine Now that the spirits are the instruments of this cōueyance is euidēt by what we dayly see that if a mā be very attētiue to some one externe obiect as to the hearing or seeing of something that much delighteth or displeaseth him he neyther heareth or seeth any thing but what his mind is bent vpō though all that while his eyes and eares be open and seuerall of their obiects be present which at other times would affect him For what can be the reason of this but that the braine employing the greatest part of his store of spirits about that one obiect which so powerfully entertayneth him the others find very few free for them to imbue with their tincture And therefore they haue not strength enough to giue the braine a sufficient taste of themselues to make it be obserued nor to bring themselues into a place where they may be distinctly discerned but striuing to gett vnto it they loose themselues in the throng of the others who for that time do besiege the braine closely Whereas in Monsieur des Cartes his way in which no spirits are required the apprehension must of necessity be carried precisely according to the force of the motion of the externe obiect This argument I confesse is not so conuincing a one against his opinion but that the necessity of the consequence may be auoyded and an other reason be giuen for this effect in Monsieur des Cartes his doctrine for he may say that the affection being vehemently bent vpon some one obiect may cause the motion to be so violent by the addition of inward percussions that the other coming from the outward sense being weaker may be drowned by it as lesser soundes are by greater which do forcibly carry our eares their way and do fill them so entirely that the others can not gett in to be heard or as the drawing of one man that pulleth backewardes is not felt when a hundred draw forwardes Yet this is hard to conceiue considering the great eminency which the present obiect hath ouer an absent one to make it selfe be felt whence it followeth that the multiplication of motion must be extremely encreased within to ouertoppe and beare downe the motion caused by a present obiect
actually working without But that which indeed conuinceth me to beleeue I goe not wrong in this course which I haue sett downe for externe bodies working vpon our sense and knowledgde is first the conuenience and agreeablenesse to nature both in the obiects and in vs that it should be done in that manner and next a difficulty in Monsieur des Cartes his way which me thinketh maketh it impossible that his should be true And then his being absolutely the best of any I haue hitherto mett withall and mine supplying what his falleth short in and being sufficient to performe the effects we see I shall not thinke I do amisse in beleeuing my owne to be true till some body else shew a better Lett vs examine these considerations one after an other It is manifest by what wee haue already established that there is a perpetuall fluxe of litle partes or atomes out of all sensible bodies that are composed of the foure Elements and are here in the sphere of continuall motion by action and passion and such it is that in all probability these litle partes can not choose but gett in at the dores of our bodies and mingle themselues with the spirits that are in our nerues Which if they doe it is vnauoydable but that of necessity thâ—y must make some motion in the braine as by the explication we haue made of our outward senses is manifest and the braine being the source and origine of all such motion in the animal as is termed voluntary this stroke of the obiect will haue the power to cause some variation in its motions that are of that nature and by consequence must be a sensation for that change which being made in the braine by the obiect is cause of voluntary motion in the animal is that which we call sensation But we shall haue best satisfaction by considering how it fareth with euery sense in particular It is plaine that our touch or feeling is affected by the litle bodies of heate or cold or the like which are squeesed or euaporated from the obiect and do gett into our flesh and coÌ„sequently do mingle themselues with our spirits and accordingly our hand is heated with the floud of subtile fire which from a great one without streameth into it and is benummed with multitudes of litle bodies of cold that settle in it All which litle bodies of heate or of cold or of what kind soeuer they be when they are once gott in must needes mingle themselues with the spirits they meet with in the nerue and consequently must goe along with them vp to the braine for the channell of the nerue being so litle that the most acurate inspectours of nature can not distinguish any litle cauity or hole running along the substance of it and the spirits which ebbe and flowe in those channels being so infinitely subtile and in so small a quantity as such chaÌ„nels can containe it is euident that an atoâ—e of insensible biggenesse is sufficient to imbue the whole length and quantity of spirit that is in one nerue and that atome by reason of the subtility of the liquor it is immersed in is presently and as it were instantly diffused through the whole substance of it the source therefore of that liquor being in the braine it can not be doubted but that the force of the externe obiect must needes affect the braine according to the quality of the said atome that is giue a motion or knocke conformable to its owne nature As for our taste it is as plaine that the litle partes expressed out of the body which affecteth it do mingle themselues with the liquour that being in the tongue is continuate to the spirits and then by our former argument it is euideÌ„t they must reach vnto the braine And for our smelling there is nothing can hinder odours from hauing immediate passage vp to our braine when by our nose they are once gotten into our head In our hearing there is a litle more difficulty for sound being nothing but a motion of the ayre which striketh our eare it may seeme more then needeth to send any corporeall substance into the braine and that it is sufficient that the vibrations of the outward ayre shaking the drumme of the eare do giue a like motion to the ayre within the eare that on the inside toucheth the tympane and so this ayre thus moued shaketh and beateth vpon the braine But this I conceiue will not serue the turne for if there were no more but an actuall motion in the making of hearing I do not see how soundes could be conserued in the memory since of necessity motion must alwayes reside in some body which argument we shall presse anone against Monsieur des Cartes his opinion for the rest of the senses Out of this difficulty the very inspection of the partes within the eare seemeth to leade vs for had there been nothing necessary besides motion the very striking of the outward ayre against the tympanum would haue been sufficient without any other particular and extraordinary organization to haue produced soundes and to haue carried their motions vp to the braine as we see the head of a drumme bringeth the motions of the earth vnto our eare when we lay it therevnto as we haue formerly deliuered But Anatomistes find other tooles and instruments that seeme fitt to worke and forge bodies withall which we can not imagine nature made in vaine There is a hammer and an anuile whereof the hammer stricking vpon the anuile must of necessity beate off such litle partes of the brainy steames as flying about do light and sticke vpon the toppe of the anuile these by the trembling of the ayre following its course can not misse of being carried vp to that part of the braine wherevnto the ayre within the eare is driuen by the impulse of the sound and as soone as they haue giuen their knocke they rebound backe againe into the celles of the braine fitted for harbours to such winged messenger where they remaine lodged in quietnesse till they be called for againe to renew the effect which the sound did make at the first and the various blowes which the hammer striketh according to the various vibrations of the tympanum vnto which the hammer is fastened and therefore is gouerned by its motioÌ„s must needes make great differeÌ„ce of biggenesses and cause great variety of smartnesses of motion in the litle bodies which they forge The last sense is of seeing whose action we can not doubt is performed by the reflexion of light vnto our eye from the bodies which we see and this light cometh impregnated with a tincture drawne from the superficies of the obiect it is reflected from that is it bringeth along with it seuerall of the litle atomes which of themselues do streame and it cutteth from the body it strucke vpon and reboundeth from and they mingling themselues with the light do in company of it
gett into the eye whose fabrike is fitt to gather and vnite those species as you may see by the anatomy of it and from the eye their iourney is but a short one to the braine in which we can not suspect that they should loose their force considering how others that come from organes further off do conserue theirs and likewise considering the nature of the optike spirits which are conceiued to be the most refined of all that are in mans body Now that light is mingled with such litle atomes issuing out of the bodies from which it is reflected appeareth euidently enough out of what wee haue Sayed of the nature and operations of fire and light and it seemeth to be confirmed by what I haue often obserued in some chambers where people seldome come which hauing their windowes to the south so as the sunne lyeth vpon them a great part of the day in his greatest strength and their curtaines being continually drawne ouer them the glasse becometh dyed very deepe of the same colour the curtaine is of which can proceed from no other cause but that the beames which shoote through the glasse being reflected backe from the courtaine do take something along with them from the superficies of it which being of a more solide corpulence then they is left behind as it were in the strainer when they come to presse themselues through passages and pores too litle for it to accompany them in and so those atomes of colour do sticke vpon the glasse which they can not penetrate An other confirmation of it is that in certaine positions the sunne reflecting from strong colours will cast that very colour vpon some other place as I haue often experienced in liuely scarlet and cloth of other smart colours and this not in that gloating wise as it maketh colours of pure light but like a true reall dye and so as the colour will appeare the same to a man wheresoeuer he standeth Hauing thus shewed in all our senses the conueniency and agreeablenesse of our opinion with nature which hath been deduced out of the nature of the obiects the nature of our spirits the nature and situation of our nerues and lastly from the property of our braine our next consideration shall be of the difficulty that occurreth in Mr. des Cartes his opinion First we know not how to reconcile the repugnaÌ„cies appearing in his position of the motion of the Ether especially in light for that Ethereall substance being extreme rare must perforce by eyther extreme liquid or extreme brittle if the first it can not choose but bowe and be pressed into fouldes and bodies of vnequall motions swimming euery where in it and so it is impossible that it should bring vnto the eye any constant apparition of the first mouer But lett vs suppose there were no such generall interruptions euery where encountring and disturbing the conueyance of the first simple motion yet how can we conceiue that a push giuen so farre off in so liquid an element can continue its force so farre We see that the greatest thunders and concussions which at any time happen among vs can not driue and impart their impulse the ten thousandeth part of the vast distance which the sunne is remoued from our eye and can we imagine that a little touch of that luminous body shâ—uld make an impression vpon vs by mouing an other so extremely liquid and subtile as the Ether is supposed which like an immense Ocean tossed with all varieties of motion lyeth betweene it and vs. But admitt there were no difficulty nor repugnance in the medium to conuey vnto vs a stroke made vpon it by the sunnes motion lett vs at the least examine what kind of motions we must allow in the sunne to cause this effect Certainely it must needes be a motion towardes vs or else it can not stricke and driue the medium forward to make it striâ—ke vpon vs. And if it be so eyther the sunne must perpetually be coming neerer and neerer to vs or else it must euer and anone be receding backwardes as well as mouing forwardes Both which are too chymericall for so great a witt to conceite Now if the Ether be brittle it must needes reflect vpon euery rubbe in meeteth with in its way and must be broken and shiuered by euery body that moueth acrosse it and therefore must alwayes make an vncertaine and most disorderly percussion vpon the eye Then againe after it is arriued to the sense it is no wayes likely it should be conueyed from thence to the braine or that nature intended such a kind of instrument as a nerue to continue a precise determinate motion for if you consider how a lute string or any other such medium conueyeth a motion made in it you will find that to do it well and clearely it must be stretched throughout to its full extent wâ—â—h â— kind of stiffenesse whereas our nerues are not straight but lye crooked in our body and are very lither till vpon occasion spirits coming into them do swell them out Besides they are bound to flesh and to other partes of the body which being cessible must needes dull the stroake and not permitt it to be carried farre And lastly the nerues are subiect to be at euery turne contracted and dilated vpon their owne account without any relation to the stroakes beating vpon them from an externe agent which is by no meanes a conuenient disposition for a body thâ—t is to be the porter of any simple motion which should alwayes lye watching in great quietnesse to obserue scrupulously and exactly the arrant he is to carry so that for my part I can not conceiue nature intended any such effect by mediation of the sinnewes But Monsieur des Cartes endeauoureth to confirme his opinion by what vseth to fall out in palsies when a man looseth the strength of mouing his handes or other members and neuerthelesse retaineth his feeling which hâ— imputeth to the remaining intire of the stringes of the nerues whiles the spirits are someway defectiue To this we may answere by producing examples of the contrary in some men who haue had the motion of their limbes intire and no wayes preiudiced but haue had no feeling at all quite ouer their whole case of skinne and flesh as particularly a seruant in the colledge of Physitians in London whom the learned Haruey one of his Masters hath told me was exceeding strong to labour and very able to carry any necessary burthen and to remoue thinges dexterously according to the occasion and yet he was so voyde of feeling that he vsed to grind his handes against the walles and against course lumber when he was employed to rummage any in so much that they would runne with bloud through grating of the skinne without his feeling of what occasioned it In our way the reason of both these conditions of people the paralitike and the insensible is easy to be rendered for they proceed out
of the diuers disposition of the animal spirits in these partes which if they thicken too much and become very grosse they are not capable of transmitting the subtile messengers of the outward world vnto the tribunall of the braine to judge of them On the other side if they be too subtile they neyther haue nor giue power to swell the skinne and so to draw the muscles to their heades And surely Monsieur des Cartes taketh the wrong way in the reason he giueth of the palsie for it proceedeth out of aboundance of humors which clogging the nerues rendreth them washy and maketh them loose their drynesse and become lither and consequently vnfitt and vnable in his opinion for sensation which requireth stiffenesse as well as for motion Yet besides all these one difficulty more remayneth against this doctrine more insuperable if I mistake not then any thing or all together we haue yet said which is how the memory should conserue any thing in it and represent bodies to vs when our fansie calleth for them if nothing but motions do come into the braine For it is impossible that in so diuisible a subiect as the spirits motion should be conserued any long time as we see euidently in the ayre through which moue a flaming taper neuer so swiftly and as soone as you sett it downe almost in the very instant the flame of it leaueth being driuen or shaken on one side and goeth quietly and euenly vp its ordinary course thereby shewing that the motion of the ayre which for the time was violent is all of a soddaine quieted and at rest for otherwise the flame of the taper would blaze that way the ayre were moued Assuredly the bodies that haue power to conserue motion long must be dry and hard ones Nor yet can such conserue it very long after the cause which made it ceaseth from its operation How then can we imagine that such a multitude of pure motions as the memory must be stored withall for the vse and seruice of a man can be kept on foote in his braine without confusion and for so long a time as his memory is able to extend vnto Consiâ—er a lessen played vpon the lute or virginals and think with your selfe what power there is or can be in nature to conserue this lesson euer continually playing and reflect that if the impressions vpon the common sense are nothing else but such thinges then they must be actually conserued alwayes actually mouing in our head to the end they be immediately produced whensoeuer it pleaseth our will to call for them And if peraduenture it should be replyed that it is not necessary the motions themselues â—hould alwayes be conserued in actuall being but that it is sufficient there be certaine causes kâ—pt on foote in our heades which are apt to reduce these motions into act whensoeuer there is occasion of them all I shall say herevnto is that this is meerely a voluntary position and that there appeareth no ground for these motions to make and constitute such causes since we neyther meete with any instruments nor discouer any signes whereby we may be induced to beleeue or vnderstand any such operation It may be viged that diuers soundes are by diseases oftentimes made in out eares and appearances of colours in our fantasie But first these colours and soundes are not artificiall ones and disposed and ordered by choice and iudgement for no story hath mentioned that by a disease any man euer heard twenty verses of Virgil or an ode of Horace in his eares or that euer any man sâ—w fâ—ire pictures in his fansye by meanes of a blow giuen him vpon his eye And secondly such colours and soundes as are obiected are nothing else but in the first case the motion of humourâ— in a mans eye by a blow vpon it which humours haue the vertue of making light in such sort as we sâ—e sea wateâ— hath when it is clashâ—d together and in the second case a cold vapour in certaine partes of the braine which causeth beatinges or motion there whence proceedeth â—he imitation of soundes so that these examples do nothing aduantage that party thence to inferre that the similitudes of obiects may be made in the common sense without any reall bodies reserued for that end Yet I intend not to exclude motion from any commerce with â—he memory no more then I haue done from sensation For I will not only graunt that all our remembring is performed by the meanes of motion but I will also acknowledge that in men it is for the most part of nothing eâ—se but of motion For what are wordes but motion And wordes are the chiefest obiects of our remembrance It is true we can if we will remember thinges in their owne shapes as well as by thâ— wordes that expresse them but experience telleth vs that in our familiar conuersation and in the ordinary exercise of our memory we remember and make vse of the wordes rather then of the thinges themselues Besides the impressions which are made vpon all our other senses as well as vpon our hearing are likewise for the most part of thinges in motion as if we haue occasion to make a conception of a man or of a horse we ordinarily conceiue him walking or speaking or eating or vsing some motion in time and as these impressions are successiuely made vpon the outward organes so are they successiuely carried into the fantasie and by like succession are deliuered ouer into the memory from whence when they are called backe againe into the fantasie they moue likewise successiuely so that in truth all our memory will be of motion or at the least of bodies in motion yet it is not chiefly of motion but of the thinges that are moued vnlesse it be when we remember wordes and how those motions do frame bodies which moue in the braine we haue already touched THE THREE AND THERTIETH CHAPTER Of Memory BVt how are these thinges conserued in the braine And how do they reuiue in the fantasie the same motions by which they came in thither at the first Monsieur des Cartes hath putt vs in hope of an explication and were I so happy as to haue seene that worke of his which the world of learned men so much longeth for I assure my selfe I should herein receiue great helpe and furtherance by it Although withall I must professe I can not vnderstand how it is possible that any determinate motion should long be preserued vntaynted in the braine where there must be such a multitude of other motions in the way to mingle with it and bring all into confusion One day I hope this iewell will be exposed to publike view both to do the Author right and to instruct the world In the meane time lett vs see what our owne principles afford vs. We haue resolued that sensation is not a pure driuing of the animal spirits or of some penetrable body in which they swimme against that
part of the braine where knowledge resideth but that it is indeed the driuing thither of solide materiall bodies exceeding litle ones that come from the obiects theÌ„selues Which position if it be true it followeth that these bodies must rebound from thence vpon other partes of the braine where at the length they find some vacant cell in which they keepe their rankes and files in great quiett and order all such sticking together and keeping company with one an other that entered in together and there they lye still and are at rest vntill they be stirred vp eyther by the naturall appetite which is the ordinary course of beastes or by chance or by the will of the man in whom they are vpon the occasions he meeteth with of searching into them Any of these three causes rayseth them vp and giueth them the motion that is proper to them which is the same with that whereby they came in at the first for as Galilaeus teacheth vs euery body hath a particular motion peculiarly proper to it when nothing diuerteth it and then they slide successiuely through the fantasie in the same manner as when they presented themselues to it the first time After which if it require them no more they returne gently to their quiett habitation in some other part of the braine from whence they were called and summoned by the fantasies messengers the spirits but if it haue longer vse of them and would view them better then once passing through permitteth then they are turned backe againe and lead a new ouer their course as often as is requisite like a horse that a rider paceth sundry times along by him that he sheweth him to whiles he is attentiue to marke euery part and motion in him But lett vs examine a litle more particularly how the causes we haue assigned do raise these bodies that rest in the memory and do bring them to the fantasie The middlemost of them namely chance needeth no looking into because the principles that gouerne it are vncertaine ones But the first and the last which are the appetite and the will haue a power which we will explicate hereafter of mouing the braine and the nerues depending of it conueniently and agreably to their disposition Out of which it followeth that the litle similitudes which are in the caues of the braine wheeling and swimming about almost in such sort as you see in the washing of currantes or of rise by the winding about and circular turning of the cookes hand diuers sortes of bodies do go their courses for a pretty while so that the most ordinary obiects can not choose but present themselues quickely because there are many of them and are euery where scattered about but others that are fewer are longer ere they come in view much like as in a paire of beades that containing more litle ones then great ones if you plucke to you the string they all hang vpon you shall meete with many more of one sort then of the other Now as soone as the braine hath lighted on any of those it seeketh for it putteth as it were a stoppe vpon the motion of that or at the least it moueth it so that it goeth not farre away and is reuocable at will and seemeth like a baite to draw into the fantasie others belonging vnto the same thing eyther through similitude of nature or by their connexion in the impression and by this meanes hindereth other obiects not pertinent to the worke the fansie hath in hand from offering themselues vnseasonably in the multitudes that otherwise they would do But if the fansie should haue mistaken one obiect for an other by reason of some resemblance they haue betweene themselues then it shaketh againe the liquid medium they all floate in and rooseth euery species luâ—king in remotest corners and runneth ouer the whole beaderoule of them and continueth this inquisition and motion till eyther it be satisfyed with retriuing at length what it required or that it be growne weary with tossing about the multitude of litle inhabitants in its numerous empire and so giueth ouer the search vnwillingly and displeasedly Now that these thinges be as we haue declared will appeare out of the following considerations first we see that thinges of quite different natures if they come in together are remembred together vpon which principle the whole art of memory dependeth such thinges can not any way be comprised vnder certaine heades nor be linked together by order and consequence or by any resemblance to one an other and therefore all their connexion must be that as they came in together into the fantasie so they remaine together in the same place in the memory and their first coupling must proceed from the action that bound them together in driuing them in together Next we may obserue that when a man seeketh and tumbleth in his memory for any thing he would retriue he hath first some common and confused notion of it and sometimes he hath a kind of flasking or fadeing likenesse of it much what as when in striuing ro remember a name men vse to say it is at their tongues end and this sheweth that he attracteth those thinges he desireth and hath vse of by the likenesse of something belonging to them In like manner when hunger maketh one think of meat or thirst maketh one dreame of drinke or in other such occasions wherein the naturall appetite stirreth obiects in the memory and bringeth theÌ„ to the fantasie it is manifest that the spirits informing the braine of the defect and paine which seuerall partes of the body do endure for want of their due nourishment it giueth a motion to the hart which sendeth other spirits vp to supply the braine for what seruice it will order them by which the braine being fortifyed it followeth the pursuite of what the liuing creature is in want of vntill the distempered partes be reduced into their due state by a more solide enioying of it Now why obiects that are drawne out of the memory do vse to appeare in the fantasie with all the same circumstances which accompanyed them at the time when the sense did send them thither as when in the remembrance of a frend we consider him in some place and at a certaine time and doing some determinate action the reason is that the same body being in the same medium must necessarily haue the same kind of motion and so consequently must make the same impression vpon the same subiect The medium which these bodies moue in that is the memory is a liquid vaporous substance in which they floate and swimme at liberty Now in such a kind of medium all the bodies that are of one nature will easily gather together if nothing disturbe them for as when a tuned lute string is strucken that string by communicating a determinate species of vibration to the ayre round about it shaketh other stringes within the compasse of the moued ayre not all
which the contained substance should goe out as the moystening of the stringes and mouth of a purse almost shutteth it vntill in some for example the stomacke after a meale the humour being attenuated by little and little getteth out subtilely and so leauing lesse weight in the stomacke the bag which weighth downe lower then the neather orifice at which the digested meate issueth riseth a little and this rising of it is also furthered by the wrinkling vp and shortning of the vpper part of the stomacke which still returneth into its naturall corrugation as the masse of liquid meate leaueth soaking it which it doth by degrees still as more and more goeth out and so what remaineth filleth lesse place and reacheth not so high of the stomacke and thus at leÌ„gth the residue and thicker substance of the meate after the thinnest is gott out in steame and the middling part is boyled ouer in liquor cometh to presse and grauitate wholy vpoÌ„ the orifice of the stomacke which being then helped by the figure and lying of the rest of the stomacke and its stringes and mouth relaxing by hauing the iuice which swelled them squeezed out of them it openeth it selfe and giueth way vnto that which lay so heauy vpon it to tumble out In others for example in a woman with childe the enclosed substaÌ„ce retained first by such a course of nature as we haue sett downe breaketh it selfe a passage by force and openeth the orifice at which it is to goe out by violence when all circumstances are ripe according to natures institution But yet there is the expulsion which is made by physicke that requireth a little declaration It is of fiue kindes vomiting purging by stoole by vrine sweating and saliuation Euery one of which seemeth to consist of two partes namely the disposition of the thing to be purged and the motion of the nerues or fibers for the expulsion as for example when the Physitian giueth a purge it worketh two thinges the one is to make some certaine humour more liquid and purgeable theÌ„ the rest the other is to make the stomacke or belly sucke or vent this humour For the first the property of the purge must be to precipitate that humour out of the rest of the bloud or if it be thicke to dissolue it that it may runne easily For the second it ordinarily heateth the stomacke and by that meanes it causeth the stomacke to sucke out of the veines and so to draw from all partes of the body Besides this it ordinarily filleth the belly with winde which occasioneth those gripings men feele when they take physicke and is cause of the guttes discharging those humours which otherwise they would retaine The like of this happeneth in saliuation for the humours are by the same meanes brought to the stomacke and thence sublimed vp to be spitten out as we see in those who taking Mercury into their body eyther in substance or in smoake or by applicatioÌ„ do vent cold humours from any part the Mercury rising from all the body vp to the mouth of the patient as to the helme of a sublimatory and the like some say of Tobacco As for vomiting it is in a manner wholy the operation of the fibers prouoked by the feeling of some inconuenient body which maketh the stomacke wrincle it selfe and worke and striue to cast out what offendeth it Sweating seemeth to be caused by the heating of some introus body by the stomake which being of subtile partes is by heate dispersed from the middle to the circumference and carrieth with it light humours which turne into water as they come out into the ayre And thus you see in generall and as much as concerneth vs to declare what the naturall faculties are and this according to Galen his owne mind who affirmeth that these faculties do follow the complexion or the temper of the partes of a mans body Hauing explicated how voluntary motion proceedeth from the braine our next consideration ought to be to examine what it is that such an obiect as we brought by meanes of the senses into the braine from without doth contribute to make the braine apply it selfe to worke such voluntary motion To which purpose we will goe a steppe or two backe to meete the obiect at its entrance into the sense and from thence accompany it in all its iourney and motions onwardes The obiect which striketh at the senses dore and getting in mingleth it selfe with the spirits it findeth there is eyther coÌ„forme and agreeable to the nature and temper of those spirits or it is not that is to say in short it is eyther pleasing or displeasing to the liuing creature or it may be of a third kind which being neyther of these we may terme indifferent In which sort soeuer the obiect affect the sense the spirits carry it immediately to the braine vnlesse some distemper or strong thought or other accident hinder them Now if the obiect be of the third kind that is be indiffent as soone as it hath strucken the braine it reboundeth to the circle of the memory and there being speedily ioyned to others of its owne nature it findeth them annexed to some pleasing or displeasing thing or it doth not if not in beastes it serueth to little vse and in men it remayneth there vntill it be called for But if eyther in its owne nature it be pleasing or displeasing or afterwardes in the memory it became ioyned to some pleasing or annoying fellowshipp presently the hart is sensible of it for the hart being ioyned to the braine by straight and large nerues full of strong spirits which ascend from the hart it is impossible but that it must haue some communication with those motions which passe in the braine vpon which the hart or rather the spirits about it is eyther dilated or compressed And these motions may be eyther totally of one kind or moderated and allayed by the mixture of its contrary if of the former sort one of them we call ioy the other griefe which do continue about the hart and peraduenture do oppresse it if they be in the vtmost extremity without sending any due proportion of spirits to the braine vntill they settle a little and grow more moderate Now when these motions are moderate they immediately send vp some aboundance of spirits to the braine which if they be in a conuenient proportion they are by the braine thrust into such nerues as are fitt to receiue them and swelling them they giue motion to the muscles and tendons that are fastened to them and they do moue the whole body or what part of it is vnder command of those nerues that are thus filled and swelled with spirits by the braine If the obiect was conformable to the liuing creature then the braine sendeth spirits into such nerues as caâ—â—y the body to it but if otherwise it causeth a motioÌ„ of auersion or flight from it To the cause of this latter we giue
the name of Feare and the other that carrieth one to the pursuite of the obiect we call Hope Anger or Audaciâ—y is mixed of both these for it seeketh to auoyde an euill by embracing and ouercoming it and proceedeth out of aboundance of spirits Now if the proportion of spirits sent from the hart be too great for the braine it hindereth or peruerteth the due operation both in man and beast All which it will not be amisse to open a litle more particularly and first why painefull or displeasing obiects do contract the spirits and gratefull ones do contrary wise dilate them It is because the good of the hart consisteth in life that is in heate and moysture and it is the nature of heate to dilate it selfe in moysture whereas cold and drie thinges do contract the bodies they worke vpon and such are enemyes to the nature of men and beasts and accordingly experience as well as reason teacheth vs that all obiects which be naturally good are such as be hoat and moyst in the due proportion to the creature that is affected and pleased with them Now the liuing creature being composed of the same principles as the world round about him is and the hart being an abridgement of the whole sensible creature and being moreouer full of bloud and that very hoat it cometh to passe that if any of these little extracts of the outward world do arriue to the hoat bloud about the hart it worketh in this bloud such like an effect as we see a droppe of water falling into a glasse of wine which is presently dispersed into a competent compasse of the wine so that any little obiect must needes make a notable motion in the bloud about the hart This motion according to the nature of the obiect will be eyther conformable or contrary vnlesse it be so little a one as no effect will follow of it and then it is of that kind which aboue we called indifferent If the ensuing effect be connaturall to the hart there riseth a motion of a certaine fume about the hart which motion we call pleasure and it neuer fayleth of accompanying all those motions which are good as Ioy Loue Hope and the like but if the motion be displeasing there is likewise a common sense of a heauynesse about the hart which we call griefe and it is common to sorrow feare hate and the like Now it is manifest by experience that thâ—se motions are all of them different ones and do strike against diuers of those partes of our body which encompasse the hart out of which striking followeth that the spirits sent from the hart do affect the braine diuersly and are by it conueyed into diuers nerues and so do sett diuers members in action Whence followeth that certaine members are generally moued vpon the motion of such a passion in the hart especially in beaste â—ho haue a more determinate course of working then man hath and if â—ometimes we see variety euen in beasts vpon knowledge of the circumstances we may easily guesse at the causes of that variety the particularities of all which motions we remitt to Physitians and to Anatomistes aduertising only that the fume of pleasure and the heauinesse of griefe do plainely shew that the first motions do participate of dilatation and the latter of compression Thus you see how by the senses a liuing creature becometh iudge of what is good and of what is bad for him which operation is performed more perfectly in beasts and especially in those who liue in the free ayre remote from humane conuersation for their senses are fresh and vntaynted as nature made them then in men Yet without doubt nature hath beene as fauourable in this particular to men as vnto them were it not that with disorder and excesse we corrupt and oppresse our senses as appeareth euidently by the story we haue recorded of Iohn of Liege as also by the ordinary practise of some Hermites in the diserts who by their tast or smell would presently be informed whether the herbes and rootes and fruits thâ—y mett withall were good or hurtfull for them though they neuer before had had triall of them Of which excellency of the senses there remaineth in vs only some dimme sparkes in those qualities which we call sympathies and antipathies whereof the reasons are plaine out of our late discourse and are nothing elâ—e but a conformity or opposition of a liuing creature by some indiuiduall property of it vnto some body without it in such sort as its conformity or opposition vnto thinges by its specificall qualities is termed naturall or against nature But of this we shall discourse more at large hereafter Thus it appeareth how the senses are seated in vs principally for the end of mouing vs to or from obiects that are good for vs or hurtfull to vs. But though our Reader be content to allow this intent of nature in our three inferiour senses yet he may peraduenture not be satisfyed how the two more noble ones the hearing and the seeing do cause such motions to or from obiects as are requisite to be in liuing creatures for the preseruation of them for may he say how can a man by only seeing an obiect or by hearing the sound of it tell what qualities it is embued withall Or what motion of liking or disliking can be caused in his hart by his meere receiuing the visible species of an obiect at his eyes or by his eares hearing some noyse it maketh And if there be no such motion there what should occasion him to prosecute or auoyd that obiect When he tasteth or smelleth or toucheth a thing he findeth it sweet or bitter or stincking or hoat or cold and is therewith eyther pleased or displeased but when he only seeth or heareth it what liking or disliking can he haue of it in order to the preseruation of his nature The solution of this difficulty may in part appeare out of what we haue already said But for the most part the obiects of thâ—se two nobler senses dâ—â—moue vs by being ioyned in the memory with some other thing that did eyther please or displease some of the other three senses And from thence it is that the motion of going to embrace the obiect or â—uersion from it doth immediately proceed as when a dogg seeth a man that vseth to giue him meate the species of the man coming into his fansie calleth out of his memory the others which are of the same nature and are former participations of that man as well as this fâ—esh one is but these are ioyned with specieses of meate because at other times they did vse to come in together and therefore the meate being a good vnto him and causing him in the manner we haue said to moue towardes it it will follow that the dogg will presently moue towardes that man and expresse a contentednesse in being with him And this is the ground of all assuefaction in beasts and
they are Lett vs then in the next place consider what will follow in the rest of the body out of these varieties of passions once raysed in the hart and sent into the braine It is euidēt that according to the nature and quality of these motions the hart must needes in euery one of them voyde out of it selfe into the arteries a greater or lesser quantity of bloud and that in diuers fashions and the arteries which lye fittest to receiue these suddaine egestions of bloud are those which goe into the braine whose course being directly vpwardes we can not doubt but that it is the hoatest and subtilest part of the bloud and the fullest of spirits that flyeth that way These spirits then running a lōg and perplexed iourney vp and downe in the braine by various meanders and anfractuosities are there mingled with the humide steame of the braine it selfe and are therewith cooled and do come at the last to smoake at liberty in the hollow ventricles of the braine by reeking out of the little arteriall branches that do weaue the plexus choroides or nette we spoke of ere while and they being now growne heauy do fall by their naturall course into that part or processe of the braine which is called medulla spinalis or the marrow of the backe bone which being all besett by the nerues that runne through the body it can not happen otherwise but that these thickened and descending spirits must eyther fall themselues into those nerues or else presse into them other spirits which are before them that without such new force to driue them violently forwardes would haue slided downe more leisurely Now this motion being downewardes and meeting with no obstacle till it arriue vnto its vtmost periode that way the lowest nerues are those which naturally do feele the communication of these spirits first But it is true if the flowing tide of them be great and plentifull all the other nerues will also be so suddainely filled vpon the filling of the lowermost that the succession of their swellings will hardly be perceptible as a suddaine and violent inundation of water seemeth to rise on the sides of the channell as it doth at the milldamme though reason assureth vs it must beginne there because there it is first stopped On the contrary side if the spirits be few they may be in such a proportion as to fill only the lower nerues and to cōmunicate little of thēselues to any of the others And this is the case in the passion of feare which being stored with fewer spirits thē any other passiō that causeth a motiō in the body it moueth the legges most and so carryeth the animal that is affrayd with violence from the obiect that affrighteth him Although in truth it is a faint hope of escaping mingled with feare which begetteth this motion for when feare is single and at its height it stoppeth all motion by contracting the spirits and thence is called stupor as well as griefe for the same reason and accordingly we see extreme cowardes in the extremity of their feare haue not the courage to runne away no more then to defend or helpe themselues by any other motions But if there be more aboundance of spirits then the vpper partes are also moued as well as the legges whose motion contributeth to defense but the braine it selfe and the senses which are in the head being the first in the course of this flood of spirits that is sent from the hart to the head it is impossible but that some part of them should be pressed into the nerues of those senses and so will make the animal vigilant and attentiue to the cause of its feare or griefe But if the feare be so great that it contracteth all the spirits and quite hindereth their motion as in the case we touched aboue then it leaueth also the nerues of the senses destitute of spirits and so by too strong apprehension of a danger the animall neyther seeth nor apprehendeth it but as easily precipitateth it selfe into it as it happeneth to auoyde it being meerely gouerned by chance and may peraduenture seeme valiant through extremity of feare And thus you see in common how all the naturall operations of the body do follow by naturall consequence out of the passions of the mind without needing to attribute discourse or reason eyther to men or beastes to performe them Although at the first sight some of them may appeare vnto those that looke not into their principles and true causes to flow from a source of intelligence whereas it is euident by what wee haue layed open they all proceed from the due ranging and ordering of quantitatiue partes so or so proportioned by rarity and density And there is no doubt but who would follow this search deepely might certainly retriue the reasons of all those externall motions which wee see vse to accompany the seuerall passions in men and Beastes But for our intent wee haue said enough to shew by what kind or order and course of nature they may be effected without confining our selues ouer scrupulously to euery circumstance that we haue touched and to giue a hinte whereby others that will make this inquiry their taske may compile an intire and well grounded and intelligible doctrine of this matter Only we will adde one aduertissement more which is that these externall motions caused by passion are of two kindes for some of them are as it were the beginnings of the actions which nature intendeth to haue follow out of the passions that cause them but others are only bare signes of the passions that produce them and are made by the cōnexion of partes vnnecessary for the maine action that is to follow out of the passion with other partes that by the passion are necessarily moued as for example when an hungry mans mouth watereth at the sight of good meate it is a kind of beginning of eating or of preparation for eating for when we eate nature draweth a moysture into our mouth to humectate our meate and to conuey the tast of it into the nerues of the tongue which are to make report of it vnto the braine but when we laugh the motion of our face aymeth at no further end and followeth only by the connexion of those muscles which draw the face in such a sort vnto some inward partes that are moued by the passion out of which laughing proceedeth But we must not leaue this subiect without some mention of the diaphragma into which the other branch of those nerues that are called of the sixth coniugation doth come for the first branch we haue said goeth into the hart and carryeth thither the obiects that come into the braine and this we shall find carryeth backe to the braine the passion or motion which by the obiect is raysed in the hart Concerning this part of our body you are to note that it is a muscolous membrane which in the middle of it hath a
sinnewy circle wherevnto is fastened the case of the hart called the Pericardium This Diaphragma is very sensible receiuing its vertue of feeling from the aboue mentioned branch of the sixt couple of nerues and being of a trembling nature is by our respiration kept in continuall motion and flappeth vpon all occasions as a drumme head would do if it were slacke and moyst or as a sayle would do that were brought into the wind Out of this description of it it is obuious to conceiue that all the changes of motion in the hart must needes be expressed in the Diaphragma For the hart beating vpon the Pericardium and the Pericardium being ioyned to the Diaphragma such iogges and vibrations must needes be imprinted and ecchoed there as are formed in the hart which from thence can not choose but be carryed to the braine by the sixt couple of nerues And thus it cometh about that we feele and haue sensation of all the passions that are moued in our hart Which peraduenture is the reason why the Greekes do call this part 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and from it deriue the verbe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that in latine signifyeth Sapere with vs to sauour or to like for by this part of our body we haue a liking of any obiect or a motion of inclination towardes it from whence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is deriued by composition of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for a prudent man is he that liketh and is moued to compasse wholesome and good thinges Which Etymology of the word seemeth vnto me more naturall then from the phrenesy from whence some deriue it because a great distemper or inflammation in the Diaphragma often causeth that disease Now because the obiect is cōueyed frō the braine to the hart some part of its way by the same passage as the motion of the hart is reconueyed backe to the braine it must of necessity follow that who is more attētiue to outward sense doth lesse consider or reflect vpō his passion and who is more attentiue to obserue and be gouuerned by what passeth in his hart is lesse wrought vpon by externall thinges For if his fantasy draweth strongly vnto it the emanations from outward agents vpon the senses the streame of those emanations will descend so strongly from the ouerfilled fantasy into the hart that it will hinder the ascent of any fewer and weaker spirits by the same pipe But if the current do sett strongest vpwardes from the hart by the Diaphragma to the braine then it will so fill the pipe by which it ascendeth that little of a weaker tyde can make a contrary eddy water in the same channell And by this meanes nature effecteth a second pleasure or paine in a liuing creature which moueth it oftentimes very powerfully in absence of the primary obiect as we may obserue when thinking of any pleasing or displeasing action we find about our hart a motion which enticeth vs to it or auerteth vs from it for as the first pleasure was occasioned by the stroake which the obiect applyed to the outward sense made vpon the fantasy which can iudge of nothing without being strucken by it so the second pleasure springeth from the spirits moued in the hart by messengers from the braine which by the Diaphragma do rebound a stroake backe againe vpon the fantasy And from hence it proceedeth that memory delighteth or afflicteth vs and that we think of past thinges with sweetenesse or with remorse and thereby assuefaction is wrought in beastes as farre as the appetitiue part doth contribute therevnto to perfect what was begunne in their cognoscitiue part by the ingression of corporeall speciefes into their fantasy in order to the same effect as we haue touched before But now lett vs examine how so small a quantity of a body as cometh from an obiect into our sense can be the cause of so great a motion about our hart To which purpose we are to remember that this motion is performed in the most subtile and thinne substance that can be imagined they are the vitall spirits that do all this worke which are so subtile so agile and so hoat that they may in some sort be termed fire Now if we reflect how violent fire is we neede not wonder at the suddaine and great motion of these passions But we must further take notice that they are not in the greatest excesse but where the liuing creature hath beene long inured and exercised vnto them eyther directly or indirectly so that they arriue not to that pitch so much out of the power of the agent as out of the preparation and disposition of the patient as when cold water hath beene often heated by extinguishing red hoat irons in it after some repetitions a few quenchinges will reduce it from cold to boyling that at the first would scarce haue made it lukewarme and accordingly we see a hart that for a long time hath loued and vehemently hath desired enioying is transported in a high degree at the least sight and renuance of stroakes from its beloued obiect and is as much deiected vpon any the least depriuation of it for to such an obiect the liuing creature is hurried away by a force much resembling the grauity or celerity of a dense body that is sett on running downe a steepe hill vnto which the only taking away of a weake lett or the least stoppe giueth a precipitate course not out of the force of what is done to it but out of the force which was formerly in the thing though for the present it lay there vndiscouered and so likewise in these cases the obiect rather giueth the occasion of the violent motion then the force or power to it These thinges being thus determined some peraduenture may aske how it cometh to passe that the spirits which cause motion being sent on their arrant by the braine do alwayes hitt the right way and light duely into those very sinnewes which moue the liuing creature according as is requisite for its nature Since all the passages are open what is it that gouerneth them so as they neuer mistake and the animal is neuer driuen towardes harme insteed of flying from it Who is their guide in these obscure pathes But it were to impute ignorance to the maker to think that he framed all the passages alike and so euery one of them promiscuously apt to receiue into them all sorts of spirits howsoeuer they be moued and therefore we may assure our selues that since in these diuersities of occasions there are likewise diuers kinds of motions from the hart◠eyther there is proportionable vnto them diuers kindes of passages fitt to receiue and entertaine the spirits according to the condition they are in so as the passages which are aiusted to one kind of spirits will not admitt any of an other nature or else the first motions of liking or disliking in the hart which as we haue said
do cause a swelling or a contraction of it against this or that part doth stoppe and hinder the the entrance of the spirits into some sinewes and doth open others and driueth the spirits into them so as in the end by a result of a chaine of swellinges and contractions of seuerall partes successiuely one against an other the due motions of prosecution or auersion are brought about As for example an obiect that affecteth the hart with liking by dilating the spirits about the hart sendeth some into the optâ—ke nerues and maketh the liuing creature turne his eye towardes it and keepe it steady vpon what he desireth as contrariwise if he dislike and feare it he naturally turneth his eye and head from it Now of this motion of the eye and head may depend the running to the thing in one case and the running from it in the other for the turning of the necke one way may open a passage for the spirits into those sinewes which carry the rest of the body towardes the obiect and the turning of it to the other side may open other sinewes which shall worke a contrary effect and carry the animal from the obiect and the mouing of those sinewes which at the first do turne the necke doth proceed from the quality and number of the spirits that ascend from the hart and from the region of the hart from whence they are sent according to the variety whereof there are diuers sinewes fitted to receiue them To make vp which discourse we may call to mind what we haue said a litle aboue concerning the motions caused in the externall partes of the body by passion mouing within as when feare mingled with hope giueth a motion to the legges anger to the armes and handes and all the rest of the body as well as to the legges and all of them an attention in the outward senses which neuerthelesse peruerteth euery one of their functions if the passion be in extremity And then surely we may satisfy our selues that eyther this or some way like it which I leaue vnto the curious in Anatomy to settle with exactenesse for it is enough for my intent to shew in grosse how these operations may be done without calling in some incomprehensible qualities to our ayde is the course of nature in motions where no other cause interueneth besides the obiect working vpon the sense which all the while it doth it is the office of the eye of fantasy or of common sense to lye euer open still watching to obserue what warninges the outward senses do send vnto him that accordingly he may direct and change the motions of the hart and of the whole body But if the obiect do make violent impressions vpon the sense and the hart being then vehemently moued do there vpon send abouÌ„dance of spirits vp to the braine this multitude of spirits thronging vpon the common sense oppresseth it as we haue already said in such sort that the notice which the sense giueth of particular circumstances can not preuayle to any effect in the braine and thus by the misguidance of the hart the worke of nature is disordered which when it happeneth we expresse in short by saying that passion blindeth the creature in whom such violent and disorderly motions haue course for passion is nothing else but a motion of the bloud and spirits about the hart and is the preparation or beginning of the animals working as we haue aboue particularly displayed And thus you see in common how the circuite is made from the obiect to the sense and from it by the common sense and fantasy to the hart and from the hart backe againe to the braine which then setteth on worke those organes or partes the animal is to make vse of in that occasion and they eyther bring him to or carry him from the obiect that at the first caused all this motion and in the end becometh the periode of it THE SIX AND THERTIETH CHAPTER Of some actions of beastes that seeme to be formall actes of reason as doubting resoluing inuenting IN the last Chapter the foundations are layed and the way is opened for the discouering how all operations which proceed from nature and passion are performed among liuing creatures and therefore I conceiue I haue thereby sufficiently complyed with the obligation of my intention which is but to expresse and shew in common how all the actions of sensible bodies may be reduced to locall motion and to materiall application of one boy vnto an other in a like manner though in a different degree as those motions which we see in liueliest bodies Yet because among such animals as passe for irrationall there happen some operations of so admirable a straine as resemble very much the highest effects which proceed from a man I thinke it not amisse to giue some further light by extending my discourse to some more particulars then hitherto I haue done whereby the course and way how they are performed may be more clearely and easily looked into and the rather because I haue mette with some men who eyther wanting patience to bestow on thoughts of this kind so much time as is necessary for the due scanning of them or else through a promptitude of nature passing swiftly from the effect they looke vpon in grosse to the most obuious seeming cause do suddainely and strongly resolue that beastes vse discourse vpon occasions and are endewed with reason This I intend not to doe quite in particular for that were to write the history of euery particular animal but will content my selfe with touching the causes in common yet in such sort that the indifferent Reader may be satisfyed of a possibility that these effects may proceed from materiall causes and that I haue poynted out the way to those who are more curious and haue the patience and leisure to obserue diligently what passeth among beastes how they may trace these effects from steppe to steppe vntill at length they discouer their true causes To beginne then I conceiue we may reduce all those actions of beastes which seeme admirable and aboue the reach of an irrationall animal vnto three or foure seuerall heades The first may be of such as seeme to be the very practise of reason as doubting resoluing inuenting and the like The next shall be of such as by docility or practise beastes do oftentimes arriue vnto In the third place we will consider certaine continuate actions of a long tract of time so orderly performed by them as that discourse and rationall knowledge seeme clearely to shine through them And lastly we will cast our eye vpon some others which seeme to be euen aboue the reason that is in man himselfe as the knowing of thinges which the sense neuer had impression of before a prescience of future euents prouidences and the like As for the first the doubting of beasts and their long wauering sometimes betweene obiects that draw them seuerall wayes and at the
and by materiall impressions vpon them without being constrained to resort vnto an immateriall principle which must furnish birdes with reason and discourse in which it is not necessary for my purpose to determine precisely euery steppe by which these actions are performed and to settle the rigorous of them but leauing that vnto those who shall take paines to deliuer the history of their nature I will content my selfe with the possibility and probability of my coÌ„iectures The first of which qualities I am obliged to make plaine but the later concerneth this treatise no more then it would do a man to enquire anxiously into the particulars of what it is that a beast is doing whiles looking vpon it at a great distance he perceiueth plainely that it moueth it seâ—fe and his arrant is but to be assured whether it be aliue or dead which the mouing of it selfe in common doth sufficiently demonstrate without descending into a particular search of what his motions are But lett vs come to the matter first I conceiue no man will make any difficulty in allowing that it is the temper of the bloud and spirits in birdes brought therevnto by the quality of their foode and by the season of the yeare which maketh them accouple with one an other and not any ayme or desire of hauing yong ones that occasioneth this action in theÌ„ Then it followeth that the hennes egges will encrease in her belly and wheÌ„ they grow bigge they can not choose but be troublesome vnto her and therefore must of necessity breede in her an inclination to rest in some soft place and to be ridde of them And as we see a dogg or a catt pressed by nature searcheth about to find a conuenient place to disburthen themselues in not only of their yong ones but euen of their excrements so do birdes whose egges within them making them heauy and vnfitt to flye they beginne to sitt much and are pleased in a soft and warme place and therevpon they are delighted with strawes and mosse and other gentle substances and so carry them to their sitting place which that they do not by designe is euident by the manner of it for when they haue mette with a straw or other fitt materiall they fly not with it directly to their nest but first to a bough of some tree or to the toppe of a house and there they hoppe and dance a while with it in their beakes and from thence skippe to an other place where they entertaine themselues in like manner and at the last they gett to their nest where if the strawes should lye confusedly their endes would pricke and hurt them and therefore they turne and alter their positions till they lye smooth which we that looke vpon the effect and compare them with our performing of like actions if we had occasion may call a iuditious ordering of them whereas in them it is nothing but remouing such thinges as presse vpon their sense vntill they cause them no more paine or vnquietnesse Their plastering of their nestes may be attributed to the great heat raigning in them at that time which maketh them still be dabbling in moist clay and in water and in grauell without which all birdes will soone grow sicke blind and at length dye which for the coolenesse of it they bring home to their nestes in their beakes and vpon their feete and when it groweth dry and consequently troublesome to them they wipe it off and rubbe their durty partes vpon the place where they vse to sitt and then flye for more refresh themselues withall Out of all which actions sett on foote by the wise orderer of nature to compasse a remote end quite different from the immediate end that euery one of them is done for there resulteth a fitt and conuenient place for these litle builders that know not whay they do whiles they build themselues houses to lye in and to lay their egges in Which the next yeare when the like occasion occurreth they build againe peraduenture then as much through memory of the former as vpon their temper and other circumstances mouing their fantasy in such sort as we haue sett downe In like manner that whiles the Halcyon layeth and hatcheth her egges the sea is calme needeth no more be attributed to the wisedome and prouidence of that bird in choosing a fitt season then to any good nature or discourse in that rouling and mercilesse Element as though it had a pious care of preseruing the egges committed to his trust no such supplements are requisite to be added vnto the distributions of nature who hath sett materiall causes on foote to produce a coniuncture of both those effects at the same periode of time for the propagation of this animals species In fine both the time and the place of the Halcyons breeding and the manner and order and season of all birdes making their nestes proceedeth from secret motions which do require great obseruing and attention to vnderstand them and do serue for directions vnto euery bird according to her kind to make her neste fittest for her vse Which secret motions we can not doubt but are materiall ones and do arise out of the constitution and temper of their bodies and spirits which in like circumstances are alike in them all for all the birdes of one kind do make their nestes exactly alike which they would not do if this worke proceeded from reason in them and were gouerned by their owne election and designe as we see it happen amoÌ„g men vpon all occasions eyther of building houses or of making clothes or of what action soeuer is guided by their reason gouerning their fantasy in all which we see so great variety and inconstancy And therefore this in variability in the birdes operations must proceed from a higher intellect that hath determinately and precisely ordered a complexe or assembly of sundry causes to meete infaillibly and by necessity for the production of an effect that he hath designed and so the birdes are but materiall instruments to performe without their knowledge or reflection a superiour reasons counselles euen as in a clocke that is composed of seuerall pieces and wheeles all the partes of it do conspire to giue notice of the seuerall effluxes and periodes of time which the maker hath ordered it for And although this be a worke of reason and discourse in him that dâ—d sett it together yet the instrumentall performance of it dependeth meerely of locall motion and of the reuolutions of bodies so orderly proportioned to one an other that their effects can not faile when once the engine is wound vp in like manner then the bird is the engine of the Artificer infinitely more perfect and knowing and dexterous then a poore clockemaker and the plummets which do make it goe are the rowe and order of causes chained together which by the designe of the supreme workeman do bring to passe such effects as we see in the building of their
our Reader without a hinte which way to driue his inquisition we will note thus much that Aristotele and other naturall Philosophers and Physitians do affirme that in some persons the passioÌ„ is so great in the time of their accoupling that for the present it quite bereaueth them of the vse of reason and that they are for the while in a kind of short fitt of an epylepsie By which it is manifest that aboundance of animal spirits do then part from the head and descend into those partes which are the instruments of generation Wherefore if there be aboundance of specieses of any one kind of obiect then strong in thâ— imagination it must of necessity be carryed downe together with the spirits into the seede and by consequence when the seede infected with this nature beginneth to seperate and distribute it selfe to the forming of the seuerall partes of the Embryon the spirits which do resort into the braine of the child as to their proper Element and from thence do finish all the outward cast of its body in such sort as we haue aboue described do sometimes happen to fill certaine places of the childes body with the infection and tincture of this obiect and that according to the impression with which they were in the mothers faÌ„tasy for so we haue said that thinges which come together into the fantasy do naturally sticke together in the animall spirits The hairynesse therefore will be occasioned in those partes where the mother fansyed it to be the colour likewise and such extancies or defects as may any way proceed from such a cause will happen to be in those partes in which they were fansyed And this is as farre as is fitt to wade into this point for so generall a discourse as ours is and more theÌ„ was necessary for our turne to the seruing whereof the verity of the fact only and not the knowledge of the cause was required for we were to shew no more but that the apprehensions of the parents may descend to the children Out of this discourse the reason appeareth why beastes haue an auersion from those who vse to do them harme and why this auersion descendeth from the old ones to their broode though it should neuer haue happened that they had formerly encountred with what at the first sight they flye from and auoyde But yet the reason appeareth not why for example a sheepe in EnglaÌ„d where there are no wolues bred nor haue beene these many ages should be affraide and tremble at sight of a wolfe since neyther he nor his damme or sire nor theirs in multitudes of generations euer saw a wolfe or receiued hurt by any In like manner how should a tame weasell brought into England from Ireland where there are no poysonous creatures be affraide of a toade as soone as he seeth one Neyther he nor any of his race euer had any impressions following harme made vpon their fantasies and as litle can a lyon receiue hurt from a household cocke therefore we must seeke the reasons of these and such like antipathies a litle further and we shall find them hanging vpon the same string with sympathies proportionable to them Lett vs goe by degrees we dayly see that dogges will haue an auersion from glouers that make their ware of dogges skinnes they will barke at them and be churlish to them and not endure to come neere them although they neuer saw theÌ„ before The like hatred they will expresse to the dogge killers in the time of the plague and to those that flea dogges I haue knowne of a man that vsed to be employed in such affaires who passing sometimes ouer the groundes neere my mothers house for he dwelled at a village not farre off the dogges would winde him at a very great distance and would all runne furiously out the way he was and fiercely fall vpon him which made him goe alwayes well prouided for them and yet he hath beene sometimes hard put to it by the fierce mastifes there had it not beene for some of the seruantes coming in to his reskew who by the frequent happening of such accidents were warned to looke out when they obserued so great commotion and fury in the dogges and yet perceiued no present cause for it Warreners obserue that vermine will hardly come into a trappe wherein an other of their kind hath beene lately killed and the like happeneth in mouse-trappes into which no mouse will come to take the bayte if a mouse or two haue already beene killed in it vnlesse it be made very cleane so that no sent of them remaine vpon the trappe which can hardly be done on the suddaine otherwise then by fire It is euident that these effects are to be referred to an actiuity of the obiect vpon the sense for some smell of the skinnes or of the dead dogges or of the vermine or of the mice can not choose but remaine vpon the men and vpon the trappes which being altered from their due nature and temper must needes offend â—hâ—m Their conformity on the one side for something of the canine nature remaineth maketh them haue easy ingression into them and so they presently make a deepe impression but on the other side their distemper from what they should be maketh the impression repugnant to their nature and be disliked by them and to affect them worse then if they were of other creatures thaâ— had no conformity with them as we may obserue that stinkes offend vs more when they are accompanied with some weake perfume then if they sett vpon vs single for the perfume getteth the stinke easyer admittance into our sense and in like manner it is said that poisons are more dangerous when they are mingled with a cordiall that is not able to resist them for it serueth to conuey them to the hart though it be not able to ouercome their malignity From hence then it followeth that if any beast or bird do prey vpon some of an other kind there will be some smell about them exceedingly noysome to all others of that kind and not only to beastes of that same kind but for the same reason euen to others likewise that haue a correspondence and agreement of temper and constitution with that kind of beast whose hurt is the originall cause of this auersion Which being assented vnto the same reason holdeth to make those creatures whose constitutions and tempers do consist of thinges repugnant and odious to one an other beat perpetuall enmity and flye from one an other at the first sight or at the least the sufferer from the more actiue creature as we see among those men whose vnhappy trade and continuall exercises it is to empty iakeses such horride stinkes are by time growne so conformable to their nature as a strong perfume will as much offend them and make them as sicke as such stinks would do an other man bred vp among perfumes and a cordiall to their spirits is some
strength and security of the fabrike no more I hope will the slight escapes which so difficult a taske as this is subiect vnto endamage or weaken the maine body of what I haue here deliuered I haue not yet seene any piece vpon this subiect made vp with this methode beginning from the simplest and plainest notions and composing them orderly till all the principall variety which their nature is capable of be gone through and therefore it can not be expected but that the first modell of this kind and moulded by one distracted with continuall thoughts of a much different straine and whose exercise as well as profession hath allowed him but litle commerce with bookes and study must needes be very rough hewed and require a great deale of polishing Which whosoeuer shall do and be as exact and orderly in treating of Phylosophy and Theology as Mathematicians are in deliuering their sciencies I do assure my selfe that Demonstrations might be made and would proceed in them as currently and the conclusions be as certaine and as full as in the Mathematikes themselues But that is not all these demonstrations would haue the oddes exceedingly of the other and be to vs inestimably more aduantagious for out of them do spiring much higher and nobler effects for mans vse and life then out of any Mathematicall ones especially when they extend themselues to the gouuernement of Man as he is Man which is an art as farre beyond all the rules of Physike or other gouuernement of our body or temporall goodes as the end is beyond the meanes we employ to gaine it for all the others do but serue instrumentally to this end That we may liue well whereas these do immediately teach it These are the fruites in generall that I hope may in some measure grow out of this discourse in the handes of equall and iuditious Readers but the particular ayme of it is to shew what actions can proeeed from a body and what can not In the conduct whereof one of our chiefe endeauours hath beene to shew that those actions which seeme to draw strongly into the order of bodies the vnknowne nature of certaine entities named Qualities eyther do or may proceed from the same causes which produce those knowne effects that all sides agree do not stand in neede of any such mysticall Philosophy And this being the maine hinge vpon which hangeth and moueth the full and cleare resoluing of our maine and great question Of the Immortality of the Soule I assure my selfe the paines I haue taken in this particular will not be deemed superfluous or tedious and withall I hope I haue employed them with so good successe as hence foreward we shall not be any more troubled with obiections drawne from their hidden and incomprehensible nature and that we stand vpon euen ground with those of the contrary opinion for since we haue shewed how all actions may be performed among bodies without hauing any recourse to such Entities and Qualities as they pretend and paint out to vs it is now their part if they will haue them admitted to proue that in nature there are such Hauing thâ—n brought the Philosophy of bodies vnto these termes that which remaineth for vs to performe is to shew thâ—t those actions of our soule for which we call her a spiritt are of such a nature as they can not be reduced into those principles by which all corporeall actions are effected For the proofe of our originall intent no more then this can be exacted at our handes so that if our positiue proofes shall carry vs yet beyond this it can not be denyed but that we giue ouermeasure and do illustrate with a greater light what is already sufficiently discerned In our proceeding we haue the precedency of nature for laying for our ground the naturall conceptions which mankind maketh of quantity we find that a body is a meere passiue thing consisting of diuers partes which by motion may be diuersly ordered and consequently that it is capable of no other change or operation then such as motion may produce by various ordering the diuers partes of it and then seeing that Rare and Dense is the primary and adequate diuision of Bodies it followeth euidently that what can not be effected by the various disposition of rare and dense partes can not proceed or be effected by a pure body and consequently it will be sufficient for vs to shew that the motions of our soules are such and they who will not agree to this conclusion must take vpon them to shew that our first premisse is defectiue by prouing that other vnknowne wayes are necessary for bodies to be wrought vpon or to worke by and that the motion and various ordering of rare and dense partes in them is not cause sufficient for the effects we see among them Which whosoeuer shall attempt to do must remember that he hath this disaduantage before he beginneth that whatsoeuer hath beene hitherto discouered in the science of bodies by the helpe eyther of Mathematikes or Physickes it hath all beene resolued and hath fallen into this way which we declare Here I should sett a periode to all further discourse concerning this first Treatise of bodies did I not apprehend that the preiudice of Aristotles authority may dispose many to a harsh conceite of the draught we haue made But if they knew how litle reason they haue to vrge that against vs they would not crye vs downe for contradicting that oracle of nature not only because he himselfe both by word and by example exhorteth vs when verity leadeth vs an other way to forsake the trackes which our forefathers haue beaten for vs so we do it with due respect and gratitude for the much they haue left vs nor yet because Christian Religion as it will not heare of any man purely a man free from sinne so it inclineth to persuade vs that no man can be exempt from errour and therefore it sauoureth not well to defend peremptorily any mans sayings especially if they be many as being vncontrollable how be it I intend not to preiudice any person that to defend a worthy authors honour shal endeauour to vindicate him from absurdities and grosse errors nor lastly because it hath euer beene the common practise of all graue Peripatetikes and Thomistes to leaue their Masters some in one article some in an other but indeede because the very truth is that the way we take is directly the same solide way which Aristotle walked in before vs and they who are scandalised at vs for leauing him are exceedingly mistaken in the matter and out of the sound of his wordes not rightly vnderstood do frame a wrong sense of the doctrine he hath left vs which generally we follow Lett any vnpartiall Aristotelian answere whether the conceptions we haue deliuered of QuaÌ„tity of Rarity and DeÌ„sity of the foure first Qualities of the combinations of the Elements of the repugnance of vacuities be not exactly and rigorously
Aristotles Whether the motion of weighty and light thinges and of such as are forced be not by him as well as by vs atttibuted to externe causes In which all the differēce betweene vs is that we enlarge ourselues to more particulars then he hath done Lett any man reade his bookes of Generation and Corruption and say whether he doth not expressely teach that mixtion which he deliuereth to be the generation or making of a mixt body is done per minima that is in our language and in one word by atomes and signifyeth that all the qualities which are naturall qualities following the composition of the Elements are made by the mingling of the least partes or atomes of the said Elements which is in effect to say that all the nature of bodies their qualities and their operations are compassed by the mingling of atomes the shewing and explicating of which hath beene our labour in this whole Treatise Lett him reade his bookes of Meteores and iudge whether he doth not giue the causes of all the effects he treateth of there by mingling and seperating of great and litle grosse and subtile fiery and watry aery and earthy partes iust as we do The same he doth in his Problemes and in his Parua naturalia and in all other places wheresoeuer he hath occasion to render Physically the causes of Physicall effects The same do Hippocrates and Galen the same their Master Democritus and with them the best sort of Physitians the same do Alchymistes with their Master Geber whose maxime to this purpose we cited aboue the same do all naturall Philosophers eyther auncient commentatours of Aristotle or else moderne inquirers into naturall effects in a sensible and vnderstandable way as who will take the paines to looke into them will easily perceiue Wherefore lett any iuditious Reader that hath looked further into Aristotle then only vpon his Logicall and Metaphysicall workes iudge whether in bulke our doctrine be not conformable to the course of his and of all the best Philosophers that haue beene and are though in detaile or particulars we sometimes mingle therewith our owne priuate iudgements as euery one of them hath likewise shewed vs the way to do by the liberty themselues haue taken to dissent in some pointes from their predecessours And were it our turne to declare and teach Logike and Metaphisikes we should be forced to goe the way of matter and of formes and of priuations in such sort as Aristotle hath trodden it out to vs in his workes of that straine But this is not our taske for the present for no man that contemplateth nature as he aught can choose but see that these notions are no more necessary when we consider the framing of the elements then when we examine the making of compounded bodies and therefore these are to be sett apart as higher principles and of an other straine then neede be made vse of for the actuall composition of compounded thinges and for the resolution of them into their materiall ingredients or to cause their particular motions which are the subiects we now diseourse of Vpon this occasion I thinke it not amisse to touch how the latter sectatours or rather pretenders of Aristotle for truly they haue not his way haue introduced a modell of doctrine or rather of ignorance out of his wordes which he neuer so much as dreamed of howbeit they alleage textes out of him to confirme what they say as Heretikes do out of scripture to prooue their assertions for whereas he called certaine collections or positions of thinges by certaine common names as the art of Logike requireth terming some of them Qualities others actions others places or habites or relatiues or the like these his latter followers haue conceited that these names did not designe a concurrence of sundry thinges or a diuers disposition of the partes of any thing out of which some effect resulted which the vnderstanding considering all together hath expressed the notion of it by one name but haue imagined that euery one of these names had correspondent vnto it some reall positiue entity or thing seperated in its owne nature from the maine thing or substance in which it was and indifferent to any other substance but in all vnto which it is linked working still that effect which is to be expected from the nature of such a quality or action c. And thus to the very negatiues of thinges as to the names of pointes lines instantes and the like they haue imagined positiue Entities to correspond likewise to the names of actions places and the like they haue framed other Entities as also to the names of colours soundes tastes smels touches and the rest of the sensible qualities they haue vnto euery one of them allotted speciall Entities and generally to all qualities whatsoeuer Whereas nothing is more euidēt then that Aristotle meaned by qualities no other thing but that disposition of partes which is proper to one body and is not found in all as you will plainely see if you but examine what beauty health agility science and such other qualities are for by that name he calleth them and by such examples giueth vs to vnderstand what he meaneth by the word Quality the first of which is nothing else but a composition of seuerall partes and colours in due proportion to one an other the next but a due temper of the humours and the being of euery part of the body in the state it should be the third but a due proportion of the spirits and strength of the sinnewes and the last but ordered Phantasmes Now when these peruerters of Aristotle haue framed such Entities vnder that conception which nature hath attributed to substances they do immediately vpon the nicke with the same breath that described them as substances deny them to be substances and thus they confound the first apprehensions of nature by seeking learned and strained definitions for plaine thinges After which they are faine to looke for glew and paste to ioyne these entities vnto the substance they accompany which they find with the same facility by imagining a new Entity whose nature it is to do that which they haue neede of And this is the generall course of their Philosophy whose great subtility and queint speculations in enquiring how thinges do come to passe afford no better satisfaction then to say vpon euery occasion that there is an Entity which maketh it be so As if you aske them how a wall is white or blacke They will tell you there is an Entity or Quality whose essence is to be whitenesse or blackenesse diffused through the wall If you continue to aske how doth whitenesse sticke to the wall They reply that it is by meanes of an Entity called Vnion whose nature it is actually to ioyne whitenesse and the wall together And then if you enquire how it cometh to passe that one white is like an other They will as readily answere that this is wrought by an
and consequently if we can find the soules Being to be without partes and that her operations are no locall translation we euidently conclude her to be an immateriall or spirituall substance Peraduenture it may be obiected that all this might haue beene done a much shorter way then we haue taken and that we needed not haue branched our discourse into so many particulars nor haue driuen them so home as we haue done but that we might haue taken our first rise from this ground which is as euident as light of Reason can make it that seeing we know biggenesse and a Body to be one and the same as well in the notion as in the thing it must of necessity follow that what hath not partes nor worketh nor is wrought vpon by diuision is not a body I confesse this obiection appeareth very reasonable and the consideration of it weighed so much with me as were all men of a free iudgement and not imbued with artificiall errours I would for its sake haue saued my selfe a great deale of paines but I find as in the former Treatise I haue frequently complained of that there is crept into the world a fansy so contrary to this pregnant truth and that it is so deepely settled in many mens minds and not of the meanest note as all we haue said is peraduenture too litle to roote it out If any that being satisfyed with the rationall maxime we euen now mentioned and therefore hath not deemed it needefull to employ his time in reading the former Treatise should wish to know how this is come to passe I shall here represent vnto him the summe of what I haue more at large scattered in seuerall places of the former Treatise and shall entreate him to consider how nature teacheth vs to call the proprieties of thinges whereby one is distinguished from an other the Qualities of those thinges and that according to the varieties of them they haue diuers names suted out to diuers of them some being called Habites others Powers and others by other names Now what Aristotle and the learned Grecians did meane by these thinges is cleere by the examples they giue of them they terme Beauty and Health Habites the dispositions of our bodies to our bodily motions Powers as strength which is the good temper of the sinewes a Power likewise Agility a Power so they vse the names of the concoctiue the nutritiue the retentiue the excretiue Power the health of the eyes the eares the nosethrills c they call the Powers of seeing of hearing of smelling c and the like of many others But later Philosophers being very disputatiue and desiring to seeme ignorant of nothing or rather to seeme to know more then any that are gone before them and to refine their conceptions haue taken the notions which by our first Masters were sett for common and confused explications of the natures to serue for conueniency and succinctenesse of discourse to be truly and really particular Entities or thinges of themselues and so haue filled their bookes and the schooles with vnexplicable opinions out of which no account of nature can be giuen and which is worse the way of searching on is barred to others and a mischieuous error is growne into mens beliefes that nothing can be knowne By this meanes they haue choaked the most plaine and euident definition of a body bringing so many instances against it that vnwary men are forced to desert and deny the very first notions of nature and reason for in truth they turne all bodies into spirits making for example heare or cold to be of it selfe indiuisible a thing by it selfe whose nature is not conceiuable not the disposition or proportion of the partes of that body which is said to be hoat or cold but a reall thing that hath a proper Being and nature peculiar to it selfe whereof they can render you no account and so may as well be against the notion of a body as not for if light the vertue of the loadestone the power of seing feeling c be thinges that worke without time iâ— an instant if they be not the dispositions of partes as partes whose nature is to be more or lesse to be next or farre off c how can it be truly said that the notion of a body is to be of partes For if this be a true definition of a body it followeth that all corporeall qualities and actions must likewise be some disposition and order of partes as partes and that what is not so is no body nor bodily quality or propriety This then was it that obliged me to go so farre about and to shew in common how all those effects which are so much admired in bodies are or may be made and continued by the sole order of quantitatiue partes and locall motion this hath forced vs to anatomise nature and to beginne our dissection with what first occurreth vnto our sense from a body In doing which out of the first and most simple notion of Biggenesse or Quantity we found out the prime diuision of Bodies into Rare and Dense then finding them to be the Qualities of diuiding and of being diuided that is of locall motion we gained knowledge of the common properties of Grauity and Leuity from the combination of these we retriued the foure first Qualities and by them the Elements When we had agreed how the Elements were made wee examined how their action and composition raiseth those second qualities which are seene in all mixt bodies and doe make their diuisions Thence proceeding into the operations of life we resolued they are composed and ordered meerely by the varieties of the former nay that sense and fantasy the highest thinges we can discerne out of man haue no other source but are subiect to the lawes of partes and of Rarity and Density so that in the end we became assured of this important Maxime That nothing whatsoeuer we know to be a Body can be exempted from the declared lawes and orderly motions of Bodies vnto which lett vs adde two other positions which fell also within our discouery the first that it is constantly found in nature that none of the bodies we know do moue themselues but their motion must be founded in some thing without them the second that no body moueth an other vnlesse it selfe be also moued and it will follow euidently out of them if they be of necessity and not preuaricable that some other Principle beyond bodies is required to be the roote and first ground of motion in them as Mr. White hath most acutely aud solidely demonstrated in that excellent worke I haue so often cited in my former Treatise But it is time we should fall to our intended discourse leauing this point settled by what we haue already said that if we shew our soule and her operations to be not composed of partes we also therein conclude that she is a spirituall substance and not a body Which is our designe and
vniuersality or particularity for that vnity which the two termes whose identification is enquired after must haue by being ioyned with the third becometh much varied by such diuers application and from hence shooteth vp that multitude of kindes of syllogismes which our Logitians call moodes All which I haue thus particularly expressed to the end we may obserue how this great variety hangeth vpon the sole string of identity Now these Syllogismes being as it were interlaced and wouen one within an other so that many of them do make a long chaine whereof each of them is a linke do breede or rather are all the variety of mans life they are the stepps by which we walke in all our conuersations and in all our businesses man as he is man doth nothing else but weaue such chaines whatsoeuer he doth swaruing from this worke he doth as deficient from the nature of man and if he do ought beyond this by breaking out into diuers sortes of exteriour actions he findeth neuerthelesse in this linked sequele of simple discourses the art the cause the rule the boundes and the modell of it Lett vs take a summary view of the vast extent of it and in what an immeÌ„se Ocean one may securely sayle by that neuer varying compasse when the needle is rightly touched and fitted to a well moulded boxe making still new discoueries of regions farre out of the sight and beliefe of them who stand vpon the hither shore Humane operations are comprised vnder the two generall heades of knowledge and of action if we looke but in grosse vpon what an infinity of diuisions these branch themselues into we shall become giddy our braines will turne our eyes will grow weary and dimme with ayming only att a suddaine and rouing measure of the most conspicuous among them in the way of knowledge We see what mighty workes men haue extended their labours vnto not only by wild discourses of which huge volumes are coÌ„posed but euen in the rigorous methode of Geometry Arithmetike and Algebra in which an Euclide an Apollonius an Archimedes a Diophantus and their followers haue reached such admirable heights and haue wound vp such vast bottomes sometimes shewing by effects that the thing proposed must needes be as they haue sett downe and can not possibly be any otherwise otherwhiles appaying the vnderstanding which is neuer truly at rest till it hath found the causes of the effects it seeth by exposing how it cometh to be so that the reader calling to mind how such a thing was taught him before and now finding an other vnexpectedly conuinced vpon him easily seeth that these two put together do make and force that third to be whereof he was before in admiration how it could be effected which two wayes of discourse are ordinarily knowne by the names of Demonstrations the one called a Priori the other a Posteriori Now if we looke into the extent of the deductions out of these we shall find no end In the heaueÌ„s we may perceiue Astronomy measuring whatsoeuer we can imagine and ordering those glorious lights which our Creator hath hanged out for vs and shewing them their wayes and pricking out their pathes and prescribing them for as many ages as he pleaseth before hand the various motions they may not swarue from in the least circumstance Nor want there sublime soules that tell vs what mettall they are made of what figures they haue vpon what pillars they are fixed and vpon what gimals they moue and performâ— their various periodes wittnesse that excellent and admirable worke I haue so often mentioned in my former Treatise If we looke vpon the earth we shall meete with those that will tell vs how thicke it is and how much roome it taketh vp they will shew vs how men and beastes are hanged vnto it by the heeles how the water and ayre do couer it what force and power fire hath vpon them all what working is in the depths of it and of what composition the maine body of it is framed where neyther our eyes can reach nor any of our senses can send its messengers to gather and bring back any relations of it Yet are not our Masters contented with all this the whole world of bodies is not enough to satisfy them the knowledge of all corporeall thinges and of this vast machine of heauen and earth with all that they enclose can not quench the vnlimited thirst of a noble minde once sett on fire with the beauty and loue of truth Aestuat infoelix angusto limite mundi Vt Gyarae clausus scopulis paruâque seripho But such heroike spirits cast their subtile nettes into an other world after the winged inhabitans of the heauens and find meanes to bring them also into account and to serue them how imperceptible soeuer they be to the senses as daynties at the soules table They enquire after a maker of the world we see and are ourselues a maine part of and hauing found him they conclude him oâ—t of the force of contradiction to be aeternall infinite omnipotent omniscient immutable and a thousand other admirable qualities they determine of him They search after his tooles and instruments wherewith he built this vast and admirable pallace and seeke to grow acquainted with the officiers and stewardes that vnder him gouerne this orderly and numerous family They find them to be inuisible creatures exalted aboue vs more then we can estimate yet infinitely further short of their and our maker then we are of them If this do occasion them to cast their thoughts vpon man himselfe they find a nature in him it is true much inferiour to these admirable Intelligences yet such an one as they hope may one day arriue vnto the likenesse of them and that euen at the present is of so noble a moulde as nothing is too bigge for it to faddome nor any thing too small for it to discerne Thus we see knowledge hath no limits nothing escapeth the toyles of science all that euer was that is or can euer be is by them circled in their extent is so vast that our very thoughts and ambitioÌ„s are too weake and too poore to hope for or to ayme at what by them may be coÌ„passed And if any man that is not invred to raise his thoughts aboue the pitch of the outward obiects he coÌ„uerseth dayly with should suspect that what I haue now said is rather like the longing dreames of passionate louers whose desires feede them with impossibilities then that it is any reall truth or should imagine that it is but a poetike Idea of science that neuer was or will be in act or if any other that hath his discoursing faculty vitiated and peruerted by hauing beene imbued in the schooles with vnsound and vmbratile principles should persuade himselfe that howsoeuer the pretenders vnto learning and science may talke loude of all thinges and make a noise with scholastike termes and persuade their ignorant hearers that they speake
soules Mortality is to be esteemed such There remaineth yet one consideration more and peraduenture more important then any we haue yet mentioned to conuince the soules immortality which is that spirituall thinges are in a state of Being But we shall not be able to declare this vntill we haue proceeded a litle further THE TENTH CHAPTER Declaring what the soule of a man seperated from his body is and of her knowledge and manner of working VNhappy man how long wilt thou be inquisitiue and curious to thine owne perill Hast thou not already payed too deare for thy knowing more then thy share Or hast thou not heard that who will prye into maiesty shall be oppressed by the glory of it Some are so curious shall I say or so ignorant as to demaund what a humane soule will be after she is deliuered from her body and vnlesse they may see a picture of her and haue whereby to fansie her they will not be persuaded but that all are dreames which our former discourses haue concluded as if he who findeth himselfe dazeled with looking vpon the sunne had reason to complaine of that glorious body and not of his owne weake eyes that can not entertaine so resplendent a light Wherefore to frame some conceit of a seperated soule I will endeauour for their satisfaction to say some what of her future state Lett vs then first consider what a Thought is I do not meane that corporeall spiritt which beateth at our common sense but that which is within in the inward soule whose nature we find by discourse and effects though we can not see it in it selfe To this purpose we may obserue that if we are to discourse or to do any thing we are guided the right way in that subiect we haue in hand by a multitude of particular thoughts which are all of them terminated in that discourse or action and consequently euery act of our mind is as it were an actuall rule or direction for some part of such discourse or action so that we may conceiue a complete thought compounded of many particular ones to be a thing that ordereth one entire discourse or action of our life A thought being thus described lett vs in the next place trye if we can make an apprehension what a science or an art is as what the science of Astronomy is or what the art of playing on the Organes is when the Astronomer thinketh not of the motions of the heauens nor the Organist of playing on his instrument which science and art do neuerthelesse euen then reside in the Astronomer and in the Organist and we find that these are but the resultes of many former complete thoughts as being those very thoughts in remainder whatsoeuer this may signify Lastly lett vs conceiue if we can a power or capacity to Being vnto which capacity if any Being be brought that it is vnseperably glewed and riueted vnto it by its very being a Being and if any two thinges be brought vnto it by the vertue of one Being common to both those thinges that both of them by this one being do become one betwixt themselues and with this capacity and that so there is no end or periode of this addition of thinges by the mediation of Being but that by linkes and ringes all the thinges that are in the world may hang together betwixt themselues and to this Power if all of them may be brought vnto it by the glew and vertue of being in such sort as we haue formerly declared passeth in the soule Now lett vs putt this together and make vp such a thing as groweth out of the capacity to Being thus actuated and cleauing to all thinges that any way haue being and we shall see that it becometh a whole entire world ordered and clinging together with as great strength and necessity as can proceede from the nature of Being and of contradiction and our reason will tell vs that such a thing if it be actiue can frame a world such an one as we liue in and are a small parcell of if it haue matter to worke vpon and can order whatsoeuer hath Being any way that it is capable of being ordered to do by it and to make of it whatsoeuer can be done by and made of such matter All these conceptions especially by the assistance of the last may serue a litle to shadow out a perfect soule which is a knowledge an art a rule a direction of all thinges and all this by being all thinges in a degree and straine proper and peculiar to it selfe and an vnperfect soule is a participation of this Idea that is a knâ—wledge a rule and a direction for as much as it is and as it attaineth vnto Now as in our thoughts it is the corporeall part only which maketh a noise and a shew outwardly but the spirituall thought is no otherwise perceiued then in its effect in ordering the bodily acts in like sort we must not conceiue this knowledge to be a motion but meerely to be a thing or Being out of which the ordering and mouing of other thinges doth flow it selfe remaining fixed and immoueable and because all that is ioyned vnto it is there riueted by Being or identification and that when one thing is an other the other is againe it it is impossible that one should exceed the other and be any thing that is not it and therefore in the soule there can be no partes no accidents no additions no appendances nothing that sticketh to it and is not it but whatsoeuer is in her is soule and the soule is all that which is within her so that all that is of her and all that belongeth vnto her is nothing but one pure simple substance peraduenture Mâ—taphysically or formally diuisible in such sort as we haue explicated in the first Treatise of the diuisibility betweene quantity and substance but not quantitatiuely as bodies are diuisible In fine substance it is and nothing but substance all that is in it being ioyned and imped into it by the very nature of Being which maketh substance This then is the substantiall conceite of a humane soule stripped of her body Now to conceiue what proprieties this substance is furnished with lett vs reflect vpon the notions we frame of thinges when we consider them in common as when we think of a man of bread of some particular vertue of a vice or of whatsoeuer else and lett vs note how in such our discourse determineth no place nor time nay if it should it would marre the discourse as Logitians shew when they teach vs that scientificall syllogismes can not be made without vniuersall propositions so that we see vnlesse these thinges be stripped from Place and Time they are not according to our meaning and yet neuerthelesse we giue them both the name and the nature of a Thing or of a substance or of a liuing Thing or of whatsoeuer else may by our manner of conceiuing or
vpon her yet so that of her selfe she still is what she is And therefore as soone as she is out of the passible oore in which she suffereth by reason of that oore she presently becometh impassible as being purely of her owne nature a fixed substance that is a pure Being Both which states of the soule may in some sort be aduÌ„brated by what we see passeth in the coppelling of a fixed mettall for as long as any lead or drosse or allay remaineth with it it continueth melted flowing and in motion vnder the muffle but as soone as they are parted from it and that it is become pure without any mixture and singly it selfe it contracteth it selfe to a narrower roome and at that very instant ceaseth from all motion groweth hard permanent resistent vnto all operations of fire and suffereth no change or diminution in its substance by any outward violence we can vse vnto it THE ELEVENTH CHAPTER Shewing what effects the diuers manners of liuing in this world do cause in a soule after she is separated from her body ONe thing may peraduenture seeme of hard digestion in our past discourse and it is that out of the groundes we haue layed it seemeth to follow that all soules will haue an equality since we haue concluded that the greatest shall see or know no more then the least and indeed there appeareth no cause why this great and noble creature should lye imprisoned in the obscure dungeon of noysome flesh if in the first instant in which it hath its first knowledge it hath then already gained all whatsoeuer it is capable of gaining in the whole progresse of a long life afterwardes Truly the Platonike Philosophers who are persuaded that a humane soule doth not profitt in this life nor that she acquired any knowledge here as being of her selfe completely perfect and that all our discourses are but her remembringes of what she had forgotten will find themselues ill bestedd to render a Philosophicall and sufficient cause of her being locked into a body for to putt forgettfulnesse in a pure spiritt so palpable an effect of corporeity and so great a corruption in respect of a creature whose nature is to know of it selfe is an vnsufferable errour Besides when they tell vs that she can not be changed because all change would preiudice the spirituall nature which they attribute to her but that well she may be warned and excitated by being in a body they meerely trifle for eyther there is some true mutation made in her by that which they call a warning or there is not if there be not how becometh it a warning to her Or what is it more to her then if a straw were wagged at the Antipodes But if there be some mutation be it neuer so litle made in her by a corporeall motion what should hinder why she may not by meanes of her body attaine vnto science she neuer had as well as by it receiue any the least intrinsecall mutation whatsoeuer For if once we admitt any mutability in her from any corporeall motion it is farre more conformable vnto reason to suppose it in regard of that which is her naturall perfection and of that which by her operations we see she hath immediately after such corporeall motions and whereof before them there appeared in her no markes at all then to suppose it in regard of a darke intimation of which we neyther know it is nor how it is performed Surely no Rationall Philosopher seeing a thing whose nature is to know haue a being whereas formerly it existed not and obseruing how that thing by little and little giueth signes of more and more knowledge can doubt but that as she could be changed from not being to being so may she likewise be changed from lesse knowing to more knowing This then being irrefragably settled that in the body she doth encrease in knowledge lett vs come to our difficulty and examine what this encrease in the body auaileth her seeing that as soone as she parteth from it she shall of her owne nature enioy and be replenished with the knowledge of all thinges why should she laboriously striue to anticipate the getting of a few droppes which but encrease her thirst and anxiety when hauing but a litle patience she shall at one full and euerlasting draught drinke vp the whole sea of it We know that the soule is a thing made proportionably to the making of its body seeing it is the bodies compartener and we haue concluded that whiles it is in the body it acquireth perfection in that way which the nature of it is capable of that is in knowledge as the body acquireth perfection its way which is in streÌ„gth and agility Now then lett vs coÌ„pare the proceedinges of the one with those of the other substance and peraduenture we may gaine some light to discerne what aduantage it may proue vnto a soule to remaine long in its body if it make right vse of its dwelling there Lett vs coÌ„sider the body of a man well and exactly shaped in all his members yet if he neuer vse care nor paines to exercise those well framed limbes of his he will want much of those corporeall perfections which others will haue who employ them sedulously Though his legges armes and handes be of an exact symmetry yet he will not be able to runne to wrestle or to throw a dart with those who labour to perfect themselues in such exercises though his fingers be neuer so neately moulded or composed to all aduantages of quicke and smart motion yet if he neuer learned and practised on the lute he will not be able with them to make any musike vpon that instrument euen after he seeth plainely and comprehendeth fully all that the cunningest Lutenist doth nether will he be able to playe as he doth with his fingers which of themselues are peraduenture lesse apt for those voluble motions then his are That which maketh a man dexterous in any of these artes or in any other operations proper to any of the partes or limbes of his body is the often repetitions of the same actes which do amend and perfect those limbes in their motions and which make them fitt and ready for the actions they are designed vnto In the same manner it fareth with the soule whoâ—e essence is that which she knoweth her seuerall knowledges may be compared to armes handes fingers legges thighes c in a body and all her knowledges taken together do compose as I may say and make her vp what she is Now those limbes of hers though they be when they are at the worst entire and well shaped in bulke to vse the comparison of bodies yt they are susceptible of further perfection as our corporeall limbes ae by often and orderly vsage of them When we iterate our acts of our vnderstanding any obiect the second act is of the same nature as she first the third as the second and so of
she would in the first instant of her being be perfect in knowledge or she would not if she were then would she be a perfect and complete immateriall substance not a soule whose nature is to be a compartner to the body and to acquire her perfection by the mediation and seruice of corporeall senses but if she were not perfect in science but were only a capacity therevnto and like vnto white paper in which nothing were yet wâ—â—tten then vnlesse she were putt in a body she could neuer arriue to know any thing because motion and alteration are effects peculiar to bodies therefore it must be agreed that she is naturally designed to be in a body but her being in a body is her being one thing with the body she is said to be in and so she is one part of a whole which from its weaker part is determined to be a body Againe seeing that the matter of any thing is to be prepared before the end is prepared for which that matter is to serue according to that Axiome Quod est primum in intentione est vltimum in executione we may not deny but that the body is in being some time before the soule or at the least that it existeth as soone as she doth and therefore it appeareth wholy vnreasonable to say that the soule was first made out of the body and was afterwardes thrust into it seeing that the body was prepared for the soule before or at the least as soone as she had any beginning and so we may conclude that of necessity the soule must be begunne layed hatched and perfected in the body And although it be true that such soules as are separated from their bodies in the first instant of their being there are notwithstanding imbued with the knowledge of all thinges yet is not their longer abode therein vaine not only because thereby the species is multiplyed for nature is not content with barely doing that without addition of some good to the soule it selfe but as well for the wonderfull and I may say infinite aduantage that may thereby accrew to the soule if she make right vse of it for as any act of the abstracted soule is infinite in comparison of the acts which men exercise in this life according to what we haue already shewed so by consequence must any encrease of it be likewise infinite and therefore we may conclude that a long life well spent is the greatest and most excellent guift which nature can bestow vpon a man The vnwary reader may perhapps haue difficulty at our often repeating of the infelicity of a miserable soule since we say that it proceedeth out of the iudgements she had formerly made in this life which without all doubt were false ones and neuerthelesse it is euident that no false iudgements can remaine in a soule after she is separated from her body as we haue aboue determined How then can a soules iudgements be the cause of her misery But the more heedefull reader will haue noted that the misery which we putt in a soule proceedeth out of the inequality not out of the falsity of her iudgements for if a man be inclined to a lesser good more then to a greater he will in action betake himselfe to the lesser good and desert the greater wherein neyther iudgemeÌ„t is false nor eyther inclination is naught meerely out of the improportion of the two inclinations or iudgements to their obiects for that a soule may be duely ordered and in a state of being well she must haue a lesser inclination to a lesse good and a greater inclination to a greater good and in pure spirits these inclinations are nothing else but the strength of their iudgements which iudgements in soules whiles they are in their bodies are made by the repetition of more acts from stronger causes or in more fauourable circumstances And so it appeareth how without any falsity in any iudgement a soule may become miserable by her conuersation in this world where all her inclinations generally are good vnlesse the disproportion of them do make them bad THE TWELFTH CHAPTER Of the perseuerance of a soule in the state she findeth her selfe in at her first separation from her body THus we haue brought mans soule out of the body she liued in here and by which she conuersed and had commerce with the other partes of this world and we haue assigned her her first array and stole with which she may be seene in the next world so that now there remaineth only for vs to consider what shall betide her afterwardes and whether any change may happen to her and be made in her after the first instant of her being a pure spiritt separated from all consortshippe with materiall substances To determine this point the more clearely lett vs call to minde an axiome that Aristotle giueth vs in his logike which teacheth vs That as it is true if the effect be there is a cause so likewise it is most true that if the cause be in act or causing the effect must also be Which Axiome may be vnderstood two wayes the one that if the cause hath its effect then the effect also is and this is no great mystery or for it are any thankes due to the teacher it being but a repetition and saying ouer againe of the same thing The other way is that if the cause be perfect in the nature of being a cause then the effect is which is as much as to say that if nothing be waÌ„ting to the cause abstracting precisely from the effect then neyther is the effect wanting And this is the meaning of Aristotles Axiome of the truth and euidence whereof in this sense if any man should make the least doubt it were easy to euince it as thus if nothing be wanting but the effect and yet the effect doth not immediately follow it must needes be that it can not follow at all for if it can and doth not then something more must be done to make it follow which is against the supposition that nothing was wanting but the effect for that which is to be done was wanting To say it will follow without any change is senselesse for if it follow without change it followeth out of this which is already putt but if it do follow out of this which is precisely putt then it followeth against the supposition which was that it did not follow although this were putt This then being euident lett vs apply it to our purpose and lett vs putt three or more thinges namely A. B. C. and D whereof none can worke otherwise then in an instant or indiuisibly and I say that whatsoeuer these foure thinges are able to do without respect to any other thing besides them is completely done in the first instant of their being putt and if they remayne for all eternity without communication or respect to any other thing there shall neuer be any innouation in any of them or
surfaces 9 A body of greater partes and greater pores maketh a greater refraction then one of lesser partes and lesser pores 10 A coÌ„firmation of the former doctrine out of the nature of bodies that refract light 1 The coÌ„nexion of this chapter with the rest and the Authors intent in it 2 That there is a least cise of bodies and that this least cise is found in fire 3 The first coniunction of partes is in bodies of least cise and it is made by the force of Quantity 4 The second sort of coniunction is coÌ„pactednesse in simple Elements and it proceedeth from density 5 The third coniunction is of partes of different Elements and it proceedeth from quantity and density together 6 The reason why liquide bodies do easily ioyne together and dry ones difficultly 7 That no two hard bodies can touch one an other immediately 8 How mixed bodies arâ— framed in generall 9 The cause of the seuerall degrees of solidity in mixed bodies 10 The rule wherevnto are reduced all the seuerall combinations of Elements in compounding of mixed bodies 11 Earth and water are the basis of all permanent mixed bodies 12 What kind of bodies those are where water is the basis and earth the predominant Element ouer the other two 13 Of those bodies where water being the basis ayre is the predominant Element 14 What kind of bodies result where water is the basis and fire the predominant Element 15 Of those bodies where water is in excesse it alone being both the basis and the predominant Element 16 Of those bodies where Earth alone is the basis and also the predominant in excesse ouer the other threâ— Elements 17 Of those bodies where Earth is the basis and water the predominâ—t Element ouer the other two 18 Of those bodies where earth being the basis ayre is the predominant 19 Of those bodies where Earth being the basis fire is the predominant 20 All the second qualities of mixed bodies arise from seuerall combinations of the first qualities and are att last resolued into seuerall degrees of rarity and density 21 That in the planets and starres there is a like varietâ— of mixed bodies caused by light as here vpon Earth 22 In what maÌ„ner the Elements do worke vpon one an other in the compositioÌ„ of mixed bodies and in particular fire which is the most actiue 23 A particular declaration touching the generation of mettalls 1 Why some bodies are brittle and others tough or apt to withstand outward violence the first instrument to dissolue mixed bodies 2 How outward violence doth worke vpon the most compacted bodies 3 The seuerall effects of fire the second and chiefest instrumeÌ„t to dissolue all coÌ„pounded bodies 4 The reason why some bodies are not dissolued by fire 5 The reason why fire molteth gold but can not consume it 6 Why leade is easily consumed and calcined by fire 7 Why and how some bodies are diuided by fire into spirits waters oyles saltes and earth And what those partes are 8 How water the third iâ—strumeÌ„t to dissolue bodies dissolueth calx into salt and so into Terra damnata 9 How water mingled with salt becometh a most powerfull Agent to dissolue other bodies 10 How putrefactioÌ„ is caused 1 What is the sphere of actiuity in corporeall Agents 2 The reason why no body can worke in distance 3 An obiection answered against the manner of explicating the former axiomâ— 4 Of reaction and first in pure locall motion that each AgeÌ„t must suffer in acting and actâ— in suffering 5 The former doctrine applyed to other locall motions designed by particular names And that Suisseths argument is of no force against this way of doctrine 6 Why some notions do admitt of intension and Remission and others do not 7 That in euery part of our habitable world all the foure ElemeÌ„ts are found pure in small atomes but not in any great bulke 1 The Authors intent in this and the following chapters Mr. Thomas White 2 That bodies may be rarifyed both by outward and inward heat and how this is performed 3 Of the great effects of Rarefaction 4 The first manner of condensation by heate 5 The second manner of condensation by cold 6 That yce is not water rarifyed but condensed 7 How wind snow and haile are made and wind by raine allayed 8 How partes of the same or diuers bodies are ioyned more strongly together by condensation 9 Vacuites can not be the reason why water impregnated to the full with one kind of salt will notwithstaÌ„ding receiue more of an other 10 The true reason of the former effect 11 The reason why bodies of the same nature do ioyne more easily together then others 1 What AttractioÌ„ is and from whence it proceedeth 2 The true sense of the Maxime that Nature abhorreth from vacuity 3 The true reasâ— of attraction 4 Water may be brought by the force of attraction to what height soeuer 5 The doctrine touching the attraction of water in syphons 6 That the syphon doth not proue water to weigh in its owne orbe 7 Concerning attraction caused by fire 8 Concerning attractioÌ„ made by vertue of hoat bodies amulets etc. 9 The naturall reason giuen for diuers operations esteemed by some to be magicall 1 What is Filtration and how it is effected 2 What causeth the water in filtration to ascend 3 Why the filter will not droppe vnlesse the labell hang lower then the water 4 Of the motion of Restitution and why some bodies stand bent others not 5 Why some bodies returne onely in part to their natural figure others entirely 6 Concerning the nature of those bodies which do shrinke and stretch 7 How great and wonderfull effects proceed from small plaine and simple principles 8 Concerning Electricall attraction and the causes of it 9 Cabeus his opinion refuted concerning the cause of Electricall motâ—ons 1 The extreme heat of the sunne vnder the zodiacke draweth a streame of ayre from each Pole into the torride zone Chap. 18. §. 7. 2 The atomes of these two streames coming together are apt to incorporate with one an other 3 By the meeting and mingling together of these streames att the Equator diuers riuolets of atomes of each Pole are continuatâ—d from one Pole to the other 4 Of these atomes incorporated with some fitt matter in the bowels of the earth is made a stone 5 This stone worketh by emanations ioyned with agreeing streames that meete them in the ayre and in fine it is a loadestone 6 A methode for making experiences vpon any subiect 7 The Loadestones generatioÌ„ by atomes flowing from both Poles is confirmed by experiments obserued in the stone it selfe 8 Experiments to proue that the loadestone worketh by emanations meeting with agreeing streames 1 The operations of the loadestone are wrought by bodies and not by qualities 2 Obiections against the former positioÌ„ answered 3 The loadestone is imbued
they did when it was in an other position 6 The reason of the various colours in generall by pure light passing through a prisme 7 Vpon what side euery colour appeareth that is made by pure light passing through a prisme 1 The reason of each seuerall colour in particular caused by light passing through a prisme 2 A difficult probleme resolued touching the prisme 3 Of the rainebow and how by the colour of any body wee may know the compositioÌ„ of the body it selfe 4 That all the seÌ„sible qualities are reall bodies resulting out of seuerall mixtures of rarity and density 5 Why the senses are only fiue in number with a conclusion of all the former doctrine concerning them 1 Monsieur des Cartes his opinion touching sensation 2 The Authors opinion touching sensation 3 Reasons to persuade the authors opinioÌ„ 4 That vitall spiritts are the immediate instruments of sensation by conueying sensible qualities to the braine 5 How sound is conueyed to the braine by vitall spirits 6 How colours are conueyed to the braine by vitall spirits 7 ReasoÌ„s against Monsieur des Cartes his opinion 8 That the symptomes of the palsie do no way confiâ—me Monsieur des Cartes his opinion 9 That Monsieur des Cartes his opinioÌ„ can not giue a good account how thinges are coÌ„serued in the memory 1 How thinges are coÌ„serued in the memory 2 How thinges coÌ„serued in the memory are brought backe in to the fantasie 3 A ConfirmatioÌ„ of the former doctrine 4 How thinges renewed in the fantasie returne with the same circumstaÌ„ces that they had at first 5 How the memory of thinges past is lost or confounded and how it is repaired againe 1 Of what matter the braine is composed 2 What is voluntary motion 3 What those powers are which are called naturall faculties 4 How the attractiue and secretiue faculties worke 5 Concerning the concoctiâ—â— faculty 6 Concerning the retentiue and expulsiue faculties 7 Concerning expulsion made by Physicke 8 How the braine is moued to worke voluntary motion 9 Why pleasing obiects doe dilate the spirits and displeasing ones contract them 10 Concerning the fiue senses for what vse and end they are 1 That Septum Lucidum is the seat of the fansie 2 What causeth vs to remeÌ„ber not only the obiect it selfe but also that we haue thought of it before 3 How the motions of the fantasie are deriued to the hart 4 Of paine and pleasure 5 Of Passion 6 Of seuerall pulses caused by passions 7 Of seuerall other effects caused naturally in the body by passioÌ„s 8 Of the diaphragma 9 Concerning paine and pleasure caused by the memory of thinges past 10 How so small bodies as atomes are can cause so great motions in the hart 11 How the vital spirits sent froÌ„ the braine do runne to the intended part of the body without mistake 12 How men are blinded by Passion 1 The order and connexion of the subsequent Chapters 2 From whence proceedeth the doubting of beasts 3 Concerning the inuention of Foxes and other beasts 4 Of foxes that catch hennes by lying vnder their roost and by gazing vpon them 5 From whence proceedeth the foxes inuentioÌ„ to ridde himselfe of fleas 6 An explication of two other inuentions of foxes 7 Concerning Mountagues argument to prooue that dogges make syllogismes 8 A declaration how some tricks are performed by foxes which seeme to argue discourse 9 Of the Iaccatrays inuention in calling beasts to himselfe 10 Of the Iaccalls designe in seruing the lyon 11 Of seuerall inuentions of fisshes 12 A discouery of diuers thinges done by hares which seeme to argue discourse 13 Of a foxe reported to haue weighed a goose before he would venture with it ouer a riuer and of fabulous stories in common 14 Of the seuerall cryings and tones of beasts with a refutation of those authours who maintaine theÌ„ to haue compleat laÌ„guages 1 How hawkes and other creatures are taught to doe what they are browght vp to 2 Of the Baboone that played on a guitarre 3 Of the teaching of ElephaÌ„tes and other beasts to doe diuers tricks 4 Of the Orderly traine of actions performed by beasts in breeding their yong ones 1 why beasts are affraide of men 2 How some qualiâ—â—es caused at first by chance in beasts may passe by generation to the whole offspring 3 How the pareÌ„ts fantasie doth oftentimes worke strange effects in their issue 4 Of Antipaties 5 Oâ— Sympaties 6 That the Antipathy of beasts towards one an other may be taken away by assuefaction 7 Of longing markes seene in children 8 Why diuers men hate some certaine meates and particularly cheese 9 Concerning the prouidence of Aunts in laying vp in store for winter 10 Concerning the foreknowing of beasts Dialog 3o. Nodo 2 do 1 What is a right apprehension of a thing 2 The very thing it selfe is truly in his vnderstanding who rightly apprehendeth it 3 The Apprehension of things coÌ„ming vnto vs by our senses are resoluable into other more simple apprehensions 4 The apprehension of a Being is the most simple and Basis of all the rest 5 Thâ— apprehension of a thing is in next degree to that of Being and it is the Basis of all the subsequeÌ„t ones 6 The apprehension of things knowne to vs by our senses doth consist in certaine respects betwixt too things 7 Respect or relation hath not really any formall being but only in the apprehension of man 8 That Existence or being is the proper affectioÌ„ of man and that mans soule is a comparing power 9 A thing by coming into the vnderstanding of man looseth nothing of its owne peculiar nature 10 A multitude of things may be vnited in mans vnderstaÌ„ding without being mingled or comfounded together 11 Of abstracted and concrete termes 12 Of vniuersal notions 13 Of apprehending a multitude vnder oâ—e notion 14 The power of the vnderstanding reacheth as farre as the extent of being 1 How a iudgement is made by the vnderstanding 2 That two or more apprehensions are identifyed in the soule by vniting them in the stock of being 3 How the notioÌ„s of a substantiue and an adiectiue are vnited in the soule by the common stocke of being 4 That a settled iudgement becometh a part of our soule 5 How the Soule commeth to deeme or settle a iudgement 6 How opinion is begotten in the vnderstanding 7 How faith is begotten in the vnderstanding 8 Why truth is the perfection of a reasonable soule and why it is not found in simple apprehensions as well as in Enuntiations 9 What is a solid iudgement and what a slight one 10 What is an acute iudgement and what a dull one 11 In what consisteth quicknesse and Clearenesse of iudgement and there oposite vices 1 How discourse smade 2 Of the figures and moodes of Syllogismes 3 That the life of man as man doth consist