FABLE OP CUPID. 79 



not so if very thick and firm; and other experiments in 

 like manner. But these experiments are neither exactly 

 proved, nor are they quite satisfactory, nor conclusive on 

 the question, and though Telesius thinks he adds to dis 

 coveries by means of them, and endeavours after a more 

 subtle discernment of what others have seen but confusedly, 

 yet he does not come off equal to his subject, nor educe a 

 true conclusion, but fails in the means : the misfortune 

 indeed of Telesius and the Peripatetics, who in looking 

 into experiments are like owls, not through the inefficiency 

 of their faculties, but through the cataracts of opinions and 

 impatience of fixed and full contemplation. But the very 

 difficult question how far a vacuum is to be admitted, and 

 with respect to what spaces there can be a coition or sepa 

 ration of seeds, and what there is on this head that is 

 peremptory and invariable, I leave to my dissertation on 

 the vacuum. Nor does it relate much to my present pur 

 pose whether nature utterly abhors a vacuum, or (as Tele 

 sius imagines himself to speak more accurately) entities 

 delight in mutual contact. This we hold to be plain that 

 whether it be avoidance of a vacuum or inclination to con 

 tact does not in any degree depend on heat and cold, nor 

 does Telesius assert that it doth, nor can it be so ascribed 

 from any appearance in the things themselves : since mat 

 ter moved from its place attracts doubtless other matter, 

 whether that be hot or cold, liquid or dry, hard or soft, 

 friendly or adverse, so that a warm would sooner attract the 

 coldest body to come to it, than suffer itself to be disjoined 

 from and deserted by every kind of body. For the bond of 

 matter is stronger than the aversion of heat and cold : and the 

 sequacity of matter has no respect to the diversity of special 

 forms ; and so this influence of connexion is by no means 

 from those elements of heat and cold. The two influences 

 that are mutually opposite follow, which conferred (as may 

 be seen) this rule of elements upon heat and cold, but by 

 a right badly explicated. I mean those influences through 

 which entities open and rarify themselves, dilate and ex 

 pand so as to occupy a greater space, and dispose them 

 selves into a more extensive orbit ; or, other hand, shut up 

 and condense themselves, so as to retire from the space 

 they occupied and betake themselves to a narrower sphere. 

 We must show, therefore, how far that influence hath its 

 rise in heat and cold, and how far it dwells apart, and has 

 a separate nature from that other influence. And that is 

 certainly true, which Telesius affirms, that rarity and den 

 sity are, as it were, the peculiar works of heat and cold ; 



