124 PHENOMENA OF THE UNIVERSE. 



sought out experiments for the sake of gain and not of 

 knowledge, and have been intent upon bringing out 

 something magnificent, not upon revealing the oracles of 

 nature, which is the work of works, and comprehends all 

 power in itself. And this evil hath been occasioned by the 

 fastidious curiosity of men, in generally turning their at 

 tention to the secrets and rarities of nature, and in expending 

 all their research upon these, passing over experiments 

 and ordinary observations with contempt. And they seem 

 to have been determined to this choice either from the 

 pursuit of applause, or from having fallen into this error, 

 that the office of philosophy is as much to trace the cause 

 of ordinary occurrences and the remoter causes of those 

 causes, as it is to harmonize extraordinary with ordinary 

 events. But the cause of this universal complaint respect 

 ing natural history is chiefly this, that men have not merely 

 erred in their mode of proceeding but in their design. For 

 that natural history which now exists seems to have been 

 composed either on account of the profitableness of experi 

 ments or the pleasure of details, and to have been made for 

 its own sake, and not to serve as the elements and as it 

 were to be the nurse of philosophy and the sciences. It is 

 therefore my design, as far as lies in my power, to supply 

 this deficiency. For I have long since made up my opinion 

 as to the province of abstract philosophies : it is my in 

 tention also to adhere to the methods of true and good 

 induction, in which are contained all things ; and, as it were, 

 by the help of instruments or by a clue to a labyrinth, to 

 assist as much as possible the power of the human under 

 standing, of itself inadequate and very unequal to the 

 attainment of the sciences. And I am at the same time 

 aware that if I would include in that restoration of the 

 sciences, which I have in contemplation, any greater scope, 

 I might indeed reap the greater honour. 



But since it has pleased God to give me a mind that can 

 learn to yield to circumstances, and out of a sense of real 

 desert and confidence of success to reject with readiness 

 what is only plausible, I have tak,en upon myself that part 

 of the work which would probably have been passed over 

 by others altogether, or would not have been treated in 

 accordance with my design. And there are two admonitions 

 which I would give on this head, as at other times, so 

 especially now, in proceeding to this very thing: first, that 

 we should dismiss that notion, which though so thoroughly 

 f.ilse and destructive, easily takes possession of the mind, 

 that the investigation of particular objects is an infinite 



