'iib Cn Ckemieai Philcsopky. 



is founded, without however submitting any thing better in their 

 piace. 



" It is liy attraction," says Newton, (by which he meant one 

 grand power, without intending: to convey anv thing as to its 

 ti&ture,) ''that we must expect to learn the manner of the changes, 

 production , generations, corruptions, &:c. of natural things, &c." 

 Bacon too, who constantly recommends an inquiry into the phy- 

 sical causes and reasons of things, says, " that he who duly at- 

 tends to the appetences and affections of matter (which both 

 in the earth and in the heaven are exceeding powerful, indeed 

 pervade the universe) will receive from what he sees passing oil 

 earth, clear information respecting the nature of the heavenly 

 bodies ; and contrariwise, from motions which he shall discover 

 in the heavens, will learn many particulars relating to things 

 below, which now lie concealed from us." 



It is evident from this quotation, that Bacon considered at- 

 traction, or the general laivs and principles of that power which 

 moves and unites and regulates the diflerent tendencies of mat- 

 ;er (or as he expresses it, " the appetences and general ten- 

 dencies or affections," whiclj matter has to unite), to be the same, 

 whether it acted on small portions or large masses of matter ; 

 whether on minute particles or on celestial masses; and that the 

 actions of these two wlien viewed together, would tend very 

 much to illustrate each other. We might quote without end pas- 

 sages to the same purpose from the ancients, as well as froin ail 

 the moderns, Kepler, Copernicus, Fermat, Roberval, Galileo, &c. 

 All of them had the same sublime views of the majestic simplicity 

 of nature ; and indeed with Dr. Hooke they prepared the way for 

 the exertions of Sir Isaac Newton, who improved and extended 

 the attraction of gravitation, and who first discovered or clearly 

 stated the doctrine of attraction among minute particles, since 

 called chemical affinityi He not only frequently intimates that 

 the same power is applied to both particles and masses, but 

 conjectures that the principles by which they are regulated are 

 also the same, and that the apparent differences would vanish 

 when they were better understood : "All those actions," says he, 

 '•' l)y virtue of which the particles of similar and dissimilar bodies 

 tevid towards each other (and to which he applies the term at- 

 traction) are the same as that by which distant bodies tend to- 

 wards each other." 



" Again," says Lord Bacon, " the harmony of a system, each 

 part sup])orting the other, is and-ought to be the true and brief 

 confutation of all minor sort of objections." " Again," says he, 

 " it is the harmony of a philosophy in itself which giveth it light 

 and credence ) whereas if it be singled and broken, it will seem 

 more foreign and d'ssonant." Again, in another place, *' Ge- 



neiKllv 



