APHORISMS BOOK II 



ON THE INTERPRETATION OF NATURE, OR THE 

 REIGN OF MAN 



I. To GENERATE and superinduce a new nature or new 

 natures, upon a given body, is the labor and aim of human 

 power: while to discover the form or true difference of a 

 given nature, or the nature 1 to which such nature is owing, 

 or source from which it emanates (for these terms approach 

 nearest to an explanation of our meaning), is the labor and 

 discovery of human knowledge; and subordinate to these 

 primary labors are two others of a secondary nature and 

 inferior stamp. Under the first must be ranked the trans 

 formation of concrete bodies from one to another, which is 

 possible within certain limits; under the second, the dis 

 covery, in every species of generation and motion, of the 

 latent and uninterrupted process from the manifest efficient 

 and manifest subject matter up to the given form: and a 

 like discovery of the latent conformation of bodies which 

 are at rest instead of being in motion. 



II. The unhappy state of man s actual knowledge is 

 manifested even by the common assertions of the vulgar. 

 It is rightly laid down that true knowledge is that which 

 is deduced from causes. The division of four causes also 

 is not amiss: matter, form, the efficient, and end or final 



i TO r\ fr cZrai, or *&quot; oi&a o f Aristotle. See lib. iii. Metap. 

 (108) 



