NOVUM ORGANUM 193 



descend is either in the conformation of the moving body, 

 or in its harmony and sympathy with another body. But 

 if aay dense and solid body be found, which does not, how 

 ever, tend toward the earth, the classification is at an end. 

 Now, if we allow of Gilbert s opinion, that the magnetic 

 power of the earth, in attracting heavy bodies, is not ex 

 tended beyond the limit of its peculiar virtue (which oper 

 ates always at a fixed distance and no further), 57 and this 

 be proved by some instance, such an instance will be one 

 of alliance in our present subject. The nearest approach 

 to it is that of waterspouts, frequently seen by persons navi 

 gating the Atlantic toward either of the Indies. For the 

 force and mass of the water suddenly effused by water 

 spouts, appears to be so considerable, that the water must 

 have been collected previously, and have remained fixed 

 where it was formed, until it was afterward forced down by 

 some violent cause, rather than made to fall by the natural 

 motion of gravity: so that it may be conjectured that a 

 dense and compact mass, at a great distance from the earth, 

 may be suspended as the earth itself is, and would not fall, 

 unless forced down. We do not, however, affirm this as 

 certain. In the meanwhile, both in this respect and many 

 others, it will readily be seen how deficient we are in nat- 



Newton and the system so generally received at the present day. It is, how 

 ever, unjust, as the centre of which Newton so often speaks is not a point with 

 an active inherent force, but only the result of all the particular and reciprocal 

 attractions of the different parts of the planet acting upon one spot. It is evi 

 dent, that if all these forces were united in this centre, that the sum would 

 be equal to all their partial effects. Ed. 



57 Since Newton s discovery of the law of gravitation, we find that the at 

 tractive force of the earth must extend to an infinite distance. Bacon himself 

 alludes to the operation of this attractive force at great distances in the 

 Instances of the Rod, Aphorism xlv. 



