168 NOVUM ORGANUM. 



to whose senses this light is proportioned can see by night, 

 which does not, in all probability, proceed from their seeing 

 either without light or by any internal light. 



Here too we would observe, that we at present discuss 

 only the wants of the senses, and their remedies ; for their 

 deceptions must be referred to the inquiries appropriated to 

 the senses, and sensible objects; except that important 

 deception, which makes them define objects in their rela 

 tion to man, and not in their relation to the universe, and 

 which is only corrected by universal reasoning and philo 

 sophy. 



41. In the eighteenth rank of prerogative instances we 

 will class the instances of the Road, which we are also wont 

 to call Itinerant and jointed instances. They are such as 

 indicate the gradually continued motions of nature. This 

 species of instances escapes rather our observation, than 

 our senses; for men are wonderfully indolent upon this 

 subject, consulting nature in a desultory manner, and at 

 periodic intervals, when bodies have been regularly finished 

 and completed, and not during her work. But if any one 

 were desirous of examining and contemplating the talents 

 and industry of an artificer, he would not merely wish to 

 see the rude materials of his art, and then his work when 

 finished, but rather to be present whilst he is at labour, and 

 proceeding with his work. Something of the same kind 

 should be done with regard to nature. For instance, if 

 any one investigate the vegetation of plants, he should 

 observe from the first sowing of any seed (which can easily 

 be done, by pulling up every day seeds which have been 

 two, three, or four days in the ground, and examining them 

 diligently), how and when the seed begins to swell and 

 break, and be filled as it were with spirit; then how it 

 begins to burst the bark and push out fibres, raising itself 

 a little at the same time, unless the ground be very stiff; 

 then how it pushes out these fibres, some downwards for 

 roots, others upwards for the stem, sometimes also creeping 

 laterally, if it find the earth open and more yielding on one 

 side, and the like. The same should be done in observing 

 the hatching of eggs, where we may easily see the process 

 of animation and organization, and what parts are formed 

 of the yolk, and what of the white of the egg, and the like. 

 The same may be said of the inquiry into the formation of 

 animals from putrefaction ; for it would not be so humane 

 to inquire into perfect and terrestrial animals, by cutting 

 the foetus from the womb ; but opportunities may perhaps 



