XVI ADVERTISEMENT. 



own fagacity, have, under the influence of his 

 name merely, deduced from their own opera- 

 tions a falfe conclufion in fupport of that er- 

 ror ^ rejeded the preceding experiments of their 

 Schools, refpeding the (inking of the barometer 

 in the North, v/ith the other geographical ob- 

 fervations which contradided it; eflablifhed on 

 it the bafis of all future phyfical knowledge; and 

 have given it afterwards, by the weight of their 

 own reputation, an authority which has not left, 

 to the reft of the Learned World, fo much as the 

 liberty of doubting ; it behoves us, poor, ignorant, 

 and obfcure men, to take good care of ourfelves, 

 we who fearch after truth fingly for the happinefs 

 of knowing it. Let us miftruft, then, in our re- 

 fearches after it, all human authority, as Dejcartes 

 did, who, by doubting only, diffipated the Philo- 

 fophy of the age in which he lived, which had fo 

 long concealed the laws of Nature from the eyes 

 of all Europe, by means of the prejudice of the 

 name of Ariftotle, then held facred in every Uni- 

 verfity : and let us affume as a maxim, that which 

 led 'Newton himfelf to fo many real difcoveries, 

 and after him the Royal Society of London, who 

 have taken it for their motto: Nullius in 

 Verba. 



To return to literary Journals, if they have, as it 

 were in concert, with-held their approbation from 



the 



