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saw plainly, that opinion of store was a cause of | faith, the greatest number of wits have been emwant; and that both works and doctrines appear ployed, and the greatest helps and rewards have many, and are few. been conferred, upon divinity. And before-time likewise, the greatest part of the studies of philosophers was consumed in moral philosophy, which was as the heathen divinity. And in both times a great part of the best wits betook themselves to law, pleadings, and causes of estate; specially in the time of the greatness of the Romans, who by reason of their large empire needed the service of all their able men for civil business. And the time amongst the Grecians, in which natural philosophy seemed most to flourish, was but a short space; and that also rather abused in differing sects and conflicts of opinions than profitably spent. Since which time, natural philosophy was never any profession, nor never possessed any whole man, except perchance some monk in a cloister, or some gentleman in the country, and that very rarely; but became a science of passage, to season a little young and unripe wits, and to serve for an introduction to other arts, especially physic and the practical mathematics. So as he saw plainly, that natural philosophy hath been intended by few persons, and in them hath occu

4. He thought also, that knowledge is uttered to men in a form, as if every thing were finished; for it is reduced into arts and methods; which in their divisions do seem to include all that may be. And how weakly socver the parts are filled, yet they carry the show and reason of a total; and thereby the writings of some received authors go for the very art: whereas antiquity used to deliver the knowledge which the mind of man hath gathered, in observations, aphorisms, or short and dispersed sentences, or small tractates of some parts that they had diligently meditated and laboured; which did invite men, both to ponder that which was invented, and to add and supply further. But now sciences are delivered to be believed and accepted, and not to be examined and further discovered; and the succession is between master and disciple, and not between inventor and continuer or advancer: and therefore sciences stand at a stay, and have done for many ages, and that which is positive is fixed, and that which is question is kept question, so as the columns of no further proceeding are pitched. And | pied the least part of their time, and that in the therefore he saw plainly men had cut themselves weakest of their age and judgment. off from further invention; and that it is no marvel, that that is not obtained which hath not been attempted, but rather shut out and debarred.

7. He thought also, how great opposition and prejudice natural philosophy had received by superstition, and the immoderate and blind zeal of religion; for he found that some of the Grecians, which first gave the reason of thunder, had been condemned of impiety; and that the cosmographers, which first discovered and described the roundness of the earth, and the consequence thereof touching the antipodes, were not much otherwise censured by the ancient fathers of the Christian church; and that the case is now much

5. He thought also, that knowledge is almost generally sought either for delight and satisfaction, or for gain or profession, or for credit and ornament, and that every of these are as Atalanta's balls, which hinder the race of invention. For men are so far in these courses from seeking to increase the mass of knowledge, as of that mass which is they will take no more than will serve their turn: and if any one amongst so many seek-worse, in regard of the boldness of the schooleth knowledge for itself, yet he rather seeketh to know the variety of things, than to discern of the truth and causes of them; and if his inquisition be yet more severe, yet it tendeth rather to judgment than to invention; and rather to discover truth in controversy, than new matter; and if his heart be so large as he propoundeth to himself further discovery or invention, yet it is rather of new discourse and speculation of causes, than of effects and operations. And as for those that have so much in their mouths, action and use and practice, and the referring of sciences thereunto; they mean it of application of that which is known, and not of a discovery of that which is unknown. So he saw plainly, that this mark, namely, invention of further means to endow the condition and life of man with new powers or works, was almost never yet set up and resolved in man's intention and inquiry.

6. He thought also, that, amongst other knowlodges, natural philosophy hath been the least followed and laboured. For since the Christian VOL. I.-13

men and their dependences in the monasteries, who having made divinity into an art, have almost incorporated the contentious philosophy of Aristotle into the body of Christian religion: and generally he perceived in men of devout simplicity this opinion, that the secrets of nature were the secrets of God; and part of that glory whereinto the mind of man, if it seek to press, shall be oppressed; and that the desire in men to attain to so great and hidden knowledge, hath a resemblance with that temptation which caused the original fall; and on the other side, in men of a devout policy, he noted an inclination to have the people depend upon God the more, when they are less acquainted with second causes; and to have no stirring in philosophy, lest it may lead to an innovation in divinity, or else should discover matter of further contradiction to divinity. But in this part, resorting to the authority of the Scriptures, and holy examples, and to reason, he rested not satisfied alone, but much confirmed. For first, he considered that the knowledge of nature, by I

And

another reason, not inferior to this, is, that the same natural philosophy principally amongst all other human knowledge, doth give an excellent defence against both extremes of religion, superstition, and infidelity; for both it freeth the mind from a number of weak fancies and imaginations, and it raiseth the mind to acknowledge that to God all things are possible: for to that purpose speaketh our Saviour in that first canon against heresies, delivered upon the case of the resurrection, "You err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God;" teaching that there are but two fountains of heresy, not knowing the will of God revealed in the Scriptures, and not knowing the power of God revealed or at least made most sensible in his creatures. So as he saw well, that natural philosophy was of excellent use to the exaltation of the Divine Majesty; and, that which is admirable, that being a remedy of superstition, it is nevertheless an help to faith. He saw likewise, that the former opinions to the prejudice hereof had no true ground; but must spring either out of mere ignorance, or out of an excess of devotion, to have divinity all in all; whereas it should be only above all; both which states of mind may be best pardoned; or else out of worse causes, namely out of envy, which is proud weakness, and deserveth to be despised; or out of some mixture of imposture, to tell a lie for God's cause; or out of an impious diffidence, as if men should fear to discover som things in nature which might subvert faith. But still he saw well, howsoever these opinions are in right reason reproved, yet they leave not to be most effectual hinderances to natural philosophy and invention.

the light whereof man discerned of every living and benefits, appearing and engraven in his works, creature, and imposed names according to their which without this knowledge are beheld but as propriety, was not the occasion of the fall; but through a veil: for if the heavens in the body of the moral knowledge of good and evil, affected to them do declare the glory of God to the eye, the end to depend no more upon God's command- much more do they in the rule and decrees of ments, but for man to direct himself. Neither them declare it to the understanding. could he find in any Scripture, that the inquiry and science of man in any thing, under the mysteries of the Deity, is determined and restrained, but contrariwise allowed and provoked. For concerning all other knowledge the Scripture pronounceth, "That it is the glory of God to conceal, but it is the glory of man (or of the king, for the king is but the excellency of man) to invent;" and again, "The spirit of man is as the lamp of God, wherewith he searcheth every secret ;" and again most effectually, "That God hath made all things beautiful and decent, according to the re turn of their seasons; also that he hath set the world in man's heart, and yet man cannot find out the work which God worketh from the beginning to the end;" showing that the heart of man is a continent of that concave or capacity, wherein the content of the world, that is, all forms of the creatures, and whatsoever is not God, may be placed or received; and complaining, that through the variety of things, and vicissitudes of times, which are but impediments and not impuissances, man cannot accomplish his invention. In precedent also he set before his eyes, that in those few memorials before the flood, the Scripture honoureth the name of the inventors of music and works in metal; that Moses had this addition of praise, that he was seen in all the learning of the Egyptians; that Solomon, in his grant of wisdom from God, had contained, as a branch thereof, that knowledge whereby he wrote a natural history of all verdure, from the cedar to the moss, and of all that breatheth: that the book of Job, and many places of the prophets, have great aspersion of natural philosophy; that the church in the bosom and lap thereof, in the greatest injuries of times, ever preserved, as holy relics, the books of philosophy and all heathen learning; and that when Gregory, the bishop of Rome, became adverse and unjust to the memory of heathen antiquity, it was censured for pusillanimity in him, and the honour thereof soon after restored, and his own memory almost persecuted by his successor Sabinian; and lastly, in our times, and the ages of our fathers, when Luther and the divines of the Protestant church on the one side, and the Jesuits on the other, have enterprised to reform, the one the doctrine, the other the discipline and manners of the church of Rome, he saw well how both of them have awaked to their great honour and succour, all human learning. And for reason, there cannot be a greater and more evident than this, that all knowledge, and specially that of natural philosophy, tendeth highly to the magnifying of the glory of God, in his power, providence,

8. He thought also, that there wanted not great contrariety to the further discovery of sciences in regard of the orders and customs of universities, and also in regard of common opinion. For in universities and colleges men's studies are almost confined to certain authors, from which if any dissenteth or propoundeth matter of redargution, it is enough to make him thought a person turbulent; whereas if it be well advised, there is a great difference to be made between matters contemplative and active. For in government change is suspected, though the better; but it is natural to arts to be in perpetual agitation and growth. Neither is the danger alike of new light, and of new motion or remove; and for vulgar and received opinions, nothing is more usual, or more usually complained of, than that it is imposed for arrogancy and presumption, for men to authorize themselves against antiquity and authors, towards whom envy is ceased, and reverence by time amortised

although Ixion of a cloud in the likeness of Juno begat Centaurs and Chimæras, yet Jupiter also of the true Juno begat Vulcan and Hebe. Neither is it just to deny credit to the greatness of the acts of Alexander, because the like or more strange have been feigned of an Amadis or an Arthur, or other fabulous worthies. But though this in true reason should be, and that men ought not to make a confusion of unbelief; yet he saw well it could not otherwise be in event, but that experience of untruth had made access to truth more difficult, and that the ignominy of vanity had abated all greatness of mind.

it not being considered what Aristotle himself did, | pass, hold much more of imagination and belief than upon whom the philosophy that now is chiefly de- of sense and demonstration. But to use the poet's pendeth, who came with a professed contradiction | language, men ought to have remembered, that to all the world, and did put all his opinions upon his own authority and argument, and never so much as nameth an author but to confute and reprove him; and yet his success well fulfilled the observation of Him that said, "If a man come in his own name, him will you receive." Men think, likewise, that if they should give themselves to the liberty of invention and travail of inquiry, that they shall light again upon some conceits and contemplations which have been formerly offered to the world, and have been put down by the better, which have prevailed and brought them to oblivion; not seeing, that howsoever the property and breeding of knowledges is in great and excellent wits, yet the estimation and price of them is in the multitude, or in the inclinations of princes and great persons meanly learned. So as those knowledges are like to be received and honoured, which have their foundation in the subtilty or finest trial of common sense, or such as fill the imagination, and not such knowledge as is digged out of the hard mine of history and experience, and falleth out to be in some points as adverse to common sense, or popular reason, as religion, or more. Which kind of knowledge, except it be delivered with strange advantages of eloquence and power, may be likely to appear and disclose a little to the world, and straight to vanish and shut again. So that time seemeth to be of the nature of a river or flood, that bringeth down to us that which is light and blown up, and sinketh and drowneth that which is solid and grave. So he saw well, that both in the state of religion, and in the administration of learning, and in common opinion, there were many and continual stops and traverses to the course of invention.

9. He thought also, that the invention of works and further possibility was prejudiced in a more special manner than that of speculative truth; for besides the impediments common to both, it hath by itself been notably hurt and discredited by the vain promises and pretences of alchemy, magic, astrology, and such other arts, which, as they now

10. He thought also, there was found in the mind of man an affection naturally bred and fortified, and furthered by discourse and doctrine, which did pervert the true proceeding towards active and operative knowledge. This was a false estimation, that it should be as a diminution to the mind of man to be much conversant in experiences and particulars, subject to sense, and bound in matter, and which are laborious to search, ignoble to meditate, harsh to deliver, illiberal to practise, infinite as is supposed in number, and noways accommodate to the glory of arts. This opinion or state of mind received much credit and strength by the school of Plato, who thinking that particulars rather revived the notions, or excited the faculties of the mind, than merely informed and having mingled his philosophy with superstition, which never favoureth the sense, extolleth too much the understanding of man in the inward light thereof. And again, Aristotle's school, which giveth the due to the sense in assertion, denieth it in practice much more than that of Plato. For we see the schoolmen, Aristotle's successors, which were utterly ignorant of history, rested only upon agitation of wit; whereas Plato giveth good example of inquiry by induction and view of particulars: though in such a wandering manner as is of no force or fruit. So that he saw well, that the supposition of the sufficiency of man's mind hath lost the means thereof.

SEQUELA CHARTARUM;

SIVE

INQUISITIO LEGITIMA

DE CALORE ET FRIGORE.

SECTIO ORDINIS.

Charta suggestionis, sive memoria fixa.

THE Sunbeams hot to sense. The moonbeams not hot, but rather conceived to have a quality of cold, for that the greatest colds are noted to be about the full, and the greatest heats about the change. Query.

The sun noted to be hotter when it shineth forth between clouds, than when the sky is open and serene.

The middle region of the air hath manifest effects of cold, notwithstanding locally it be nearer the sun, commonly imputed to antiperistasis, assuming that the beams of the sun are hot either

The beams of the stars have no sensible heat by themselves; but are conceived to have an augmentative heat of the sunbeams by the instance follow-by approach or by reflection, and that falleth in ing. The same climate arctic and antarctic are observed to differ in cold, viz. that the antarctic is the more cold, and it is manifest the antarctic hemisphere is thinner planted with stars.

The heats observed to be greater in July than in June; at which time the sun is nearest the greatest fixed stars, viz. Cor Leonis, Cauda Leonis, Spica, Virginis, Sirius, Canicula.

the middle term between both; or if, as some conceive, it be only by reflection, then the cold of that region resteth chiefly upon distance. The instances showing the cold of that region, are the snows which descend, the hails which descend, and the snows and extreme colds which are upon high mountains.

But Qu. of such mountains as adjoin to sandy The conjunction of any two of the three highest vales, and not to fruitful vales, which minister planets noted to cause great heats.

no vapours: or of mountains above the region

Comets conceived by some to be as well causes of vapours, as is reported of Olympus, where any as effects of heat, much more the stars.

The sunbeams have greater heat when they are more perpendicular than when they are more oblique as appeareth in difference of regions, and the difference of the times of summer and winter in the same region; and chiefly in the difference of the hours of mid-day, mornings, evenings, in the same day.

The heats more extreme in July and August than in May or June, commonly imputed to the stay and continuance of heat.

The heats more extreme under the tropics than under the line commonly imputed to the stay and continuance of heat, because the sun there doth as it were double a cape.

The heats more about three or four of clock than at noon; commonly imputed to the stay and continuance of heat.

inscription upon the ashes of the altar remained untouched of wind or dew. And note, it is also reported that men carry up sponges with vinegar to thicken their breath, the air growing too fine for respiration, which seemeth not to stand with coldness.

The clouds make a mitigation of the heat of the sun. So doth the interposition of any body, which we term shades: but yet the nights in summer are many times as hot to the feeling of men's bodies as the days are within doors, where the beams of the sun actually beat not.

There is no other nature of heat known from the celestial bodies or from the air, but that which cometh by the sunbeams. For in the countries near the pole, we see the extreme colds end in the summer months, as in the voyage of Nova Zembla, where they could not disengage their

barks from the ice, no, not in July, and met with great mountains of ice, some floating, some fixed, at that time of the year, being the heart of summer. The caves under the earth noted to be warmer in winter than in summer, and so the waters that spring from within the earth.

Great quantity of sulphur, and sometimes naturally burning after the manner of Ætna, in Iceland; the like written of Groenland, and divers others the cold countries.*

The heat or beams of the sun doth take away the smell of flowers, specially such as are of a milder odour.

The beams of the sun do disclose summer flowers, as the pimpernel, marigold, and almost all flowers else, for they close commonly morning and evening, or in overcast weather, and open in the brightness of the sun which is but imputed to dryness and moisture, which doth make the beams heavy or erect, and not to any other proThe trees in the cold countries are such as are priety in the sunbearas; so they report not only fuller of rosin, pitch, tar, which are matters apt a closing, but a bending or inclining in the for fire, and the woods themselves more combus-"heliotropium" and "calendula." Qu. tible than those in much hotter countries; as, for example, fir, pineapple, juniper. Qu. Whether their trees of the same kind that ours are, as oak and ash, bear not, in the more cold countries, a wood more brittle and ready to take fire than the same kinds with us?

The sunbeams heat manifestly by reflection, as in countries pent in with hills, upon walls or buildings, upon pavements, upon gravel more than earth, upon arable more than grass, upon rivers if they be not very open, &c.

The uniting or collection of the sunbeams multiplieth heat, as in burning-glasses, which are made thinner in the middle than on the sides, as I take it, contrary to spectacles; and the operation of them is, as I remember, first to place them between the sun and the body to be fired, and then to draw them upward towards the sun, which it is true maketh the angle of the cone sharper. But then I take it if the glass had been first placed at the same distance to which it is after drawn, it would not have had that force, and yet that had been all one to the sharpness of the angle. Qu.

So in that the sun's beams are hotter perpendicularly than obliquely, it may be imputed to the union of the beams, which in case of perpendicularity reflect into the very same lines with the direct; and the further from perpendicularity the more obtuse the angle, and the greater distance between the direct beam and the reflected beam. The sunbeams raise vapours out of the earth, and when they withdraw they fall back in dews. The sunbeams do many times scatter the mists which are in the mornings.

The sunbeams cause the divers returns of the herbs, plants, and fruits of the earth; for we see in lemon-trees and the like, that there is coming on at once fruit ripe, fruit unripe, and blossoms; which may show that the plant worketh to put forth continually, were it not for the variations of the excesses and recesses of the sun, which call forth, and put back.

The excessive heat of the sun doth wither and destroy vegetables, as well as the cold doth nip and blast them.

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The sunbeams do ripen all fruits, and addeth to them a sweetness or fatness; and yet some sultry hot days overcast, are noted to ripen more than bright days.

The sunbeams are thought to mend distilled waters, the glasses being well-stopped, and to make them more virtuous and fragrant.

The sunbeams do turn wine into vinegar; but Qu. whether they would not sweeten verjuice? The sunbeams do pall any wine or beer that is set in them.

The sunbeams do take away the lustre of any silks or arras.

There is almost no mine but lieth some depth in the earth; gold is conceived to lie highest, and in the hottest countries; yet Thracia and Hungary are cold, and the hills of Scotland have yielded gold, but in small grains or quantity.

If you set a root of a tree too deep in the ground, that root will perish, and the stock will put forth a new root nearer the superficies of the earth.

Some trees and plants prosper best in the shade; as the bays, strawberries, some wood-flowers. Almost all flies love the sunbeams, so do snakes; toads and worms the contrary.

The sunbeams tanneth the skin of man; and in some places turneth it to black.

The sunbeams are hardly endured by many, but cause headache, faintness, and with many they cause rheums; yet to aged men they are comfortable.

The sun causes pestilence, which with us rages about autumn: but it is reported in Barbary they break up about June, and rage most in the winter.

The heat of the sun, and of fire, and living creatures, agree in some things which pertain to vivification; as the back of a chimney will set forward an apricot-tree as well as the sun; the fire will raise a dead butterfly as well as the sun; and so will the heat of a living creature. The heat of the sun in sand will hatch an egg. Qu.

The heat of the sun in the hottest countries nothing so violent as that of fire, no not scarcely so hot to the sense as that of a living creature.

The sun, a fountain of light as well as heat. The other celestial bodies manifest in light, ana yet "non constat" whether all borrowed, as in the moon, but obscure in heat.

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