ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF PARIS. 343 



" banished from plivi^ics by Dc?cartep, and apparently banished forever, return 

 under the leadership of Newton, armed with a new force of -which they were 

 thought incapable, and only perhaps a little disguised." He confounds, in this 

 E/oge, the attraction of Newton with the occult qualities of the scholastics — a 

 demonstrated fact with imaginary forces — and, without doubt, he is deceived ; 

 but we can afford to pardon the ingenious Avriter and profound thinker who 

 had exerted so much talent in defending and extolling Descartes, if he re- 

 mained Cartesian somewhat longer than others. We must render justice to 

 Fontenelle for a half century of struggle against the ancients, and forgive him 

 for having been himself something of an ancient. 



§ 2. Of the modern lilrilosophy. 



Fontenelle everywhere ojiposes the modern philosophy to the scholastic. 

 He calls it, as we have seen, the philosophy of things ; he further calls it (and 

 here we have the right word) the experimental philosophy.* 



The modern philosophy is, in fact, philosophy sprixng from the direct obser- 

 vation of things — from the study of facts — from experiment. And herein this 

 most decided partisan of Descartes becomes the most judicious admirer of the 

 great Galileo. "A rare genii;s," he says of him, " and one whose name will 

 always be seen at the head of some of the most important disco\''eries on Avhich 

 modern philosophy is founded." Since Galileo, experiment is the guide, and. 

 a.s Fontenelle has well said, the sovereign mistress of all our physical sciences. 

 " We are at present thoroughly persuaded," he says, " that physics must not 

 be treated except by experiments." — Hist, of the Academy of Sciences, 1724. 



He delights to point out at once the accurate attention and the auspicious 

 sagacity which these experiments require. " The art of making experiments,'' 

 he says, " carried to a certain stage, is by no means common. The least fact 

 which offers itself to our eyes is complicated with so many other facts whicli 

 compose or modify it, that it is impossible, wdthout extreme address, to sepa- 

 rate all that enters into it, or even, without extreme sagacity, to suspect all 

 that may enter into it. It is necessary to decompose the fact which is before 

 us into others which have also their own composition ; and sometimes, if the 

 route has not been well chosen, we become engaged in labyrinths from which 

 there is no extrication. To us it appears that primitive and elementary facts 

 have been hidden by nature Avith even as much care as causes ; and when we 

 arrive at a sight of them, it is a spectacle altogether new and wholly unfore- 

 seen." — Eloge if Kcu-ton. 



No one before Fontenelle had so distinctly defined the great art of experi- 

 ment.! That whole art, in effect, has but one end, that of giving us simple 

 facts — simple facts which, compared together according to their nature, give 

 us laws ; and on this last point — which is the most elevated point of the ex- 

 perimental method — we may again profitably listen to Fontenelle : " The 

 time will perhaps come when we shall unite in a regular body these scattered 

 members, (isolated facts ;) and if they are such as we could Avish, they will 

 come together, in some sort, of themselves. Various separate truths, at least. 



* "Wliat the eipcrimental philosophy is in relation to the scholastic." * * » (Elogc 

 of Diiliamcl.) One utility of this work, (the Opticks of Newton,) as important, perhaps, "ii.< 

 that which we derive from the g^reat nnmber of new facts of which it is full, is, that it fur- 

 nishes an excellent model of the art with whk-h the eipcrimental philosophy is to be con- 

 ducted. 



tHe made an approach to this lucid definition when he said : "The laws of the impact of 

 bodies are very simple, but in almo-^t all the efiects which they produce to our eyes they are 

 60 enveloped and so smothered under the multitude of difl'ercut circumstances that it is'difii- 

 cult to disentangle them, and to see them in their natural simplicity. The secret is, to sep- 

 arate first the greatest number of circumstances possible, and to consider only the cases into 

 whicJi there enter the fewest of those circumstances.'" — Hist, of the Academy of Sciences, I70ti. 



