THE SECOND BOOK. 69 



instances of exception to general kinds. It is true I find a 

 number of books of fabulous experiments and secrets, and 

 frivolous impostures for pleasure and strangeness ; but a sub 

 stantial and severe collection of the heteroclites or irregulars of 

 Nature, well examined and described, I find not, specially not 

 with due rejection of fables and popular errors. For as things 

 now are, if an untruth in Nature be once on foot, what by 

 reason of the neglect of examination, and countenance of 

 antiquity, and what by reason of the use of the opinion in 

 similitudes and ornaments of speech, it is never called down. 



(4) The use of this work, honoured with a precedent in 

 Aristotle, is nothing less than to give contentment to the 

 appetite of curious and vain wits, as the manner of Mirabilaries 

 is to do ; but for two reasons, both of great weight : the one 

 to correct the partiality of axioms and opinions, which are 

 commonly framed only upon common and familiar examples ; 

 the other because from the wonders of Nature is the nearest 

 intelligence and passage towards the wonders of art, for it is no 

 more but by following and, as it were, hounding Nature in her 

 wanderings, to be able to lead her afterwards to the same place 

 again. Neither am I of opinion, in this history of marvels, 

 that superstitious narrations of sorceries, witchcrafts, dreams, 

 divinations, and the like, where there is an assurance and clear 

 evidence of the fact, be altogether excluded. For it is not yet 

 known in what cases and how far effects attributed to supersti 

 tion do participate of natural causes ; and, therefore, howso 

 ever the practice of such things is to be condemned, yet from 

 the speculation and consideration of them light may be taken, 

 not only for the discerning of the offences, but for the further 

 disclosing of Nature. Neither ought a man to make scruple of 

 entering into these things for inquisition of truth, as your 

 Majesty hath showed in your own example, who, with the two 

 clear eyes of religion and natural philosophy, have looked 

 deeply and wisely into these shadows, and yet proved yourself 

 to be of the nature of the sun, which passeth through pollu 

 tions and itself remains as pure as before. But this I hold fit, 

 that these narrations, which have mixture with superstition, 

 be sorted by themselves, and not to be mingled with the narra 

 tions which are merely and sincerely natural. But as for the 

 narrations touching the prodigies and miracles of religions, 

 they are either not true or not natural ; and, therefore, im 

 pertinent for the story of Nature. 



(5) For history of Nature, wrought or mechanical, I find 

 some collections made of agriculture, and likewise of manual 

 arts ; but commonly with a rejection of experiments familiar 



