NOTE A. 



&quot; loss, or diminution of its virtue; and we find the same kind of 

 &quot; virtue in yeast, &e. CO by the prou-cupation of motion.&quot; 



Under the head of byoTOfflCtScal instances in the Novum Or- 

 ganum, the expression of preomipation of motion is explained. 

 &quot; Wlien a musical &amp;gt;tring is struck, it vibrates, and the strings 

 &quot; appear double, treble, &c. Rings, twirled upon an axis, appear 

 &quot; spheres. Alighted stick moved quickly in a circle, appears a circle 

 * of fire, or what boys &amp;lt; all gold lace. A lighted flambeau carried 

 &quot; quickly by night, appears tailed like a comet.&quot; But if these mo 

 tions, are performed slowly, such appearances do not exist. It 

 seems, therefore, that they originate in a new impression being made 

 before the effect of a former impression is removed, that is, by the 

 motion of impulse being quicker than the motion of recovery. 



So too Bacon says, &quot; The effects produced by gunpowder, are 

 &quot; occasioned by the impelling power being quicker than the power 

 &quot; of resistance.&quot; He says, the cause whereof is doubtless this, 

 &quot; that the motion of dilatation in the powder, which is the impelling 

 &quot; force, is many degrees swifter than the motion of gravity, which 

 &quot; makes the resistance, so that the prevailing motion is performed 

 &quot; before the opposite motion begins, whilst at first there was a kind 

 &quot; of neutrality, or want of resistance. And hence, in all projec- 

 tiles, it is riot so much the strong as the sharp and quick stroke 

 that carries the body furthest.&quot; And he adds, &quot; IX or was it 

 possible that a small quantity of spirit in animals, especially in 

 them so bulky as the. elephant, or the whale, should move and 

 manage so great a mass of matter, but for the velocity of the 

 motion of the spirit before the quantity of the corporeal mass 

 can resist.&quot; 



Lord Bacon s opinion supon vital spirit are chiefly contained in his 

 History of Life and Death : but in his tract upon the Prolongation 

 of Life in the treatise &quot; De Augmentis,&quot; he says that length of life 

 partly depends upon strengthening the resistance of the body, and 

 diminishing the activity of the spirit. His words are 



&quot; Consumption is caused by two depredations, depredation of 

 &quot; innate spirit ; and depredation of ambient air. The resistance of 

 both is two-fold, either when the agents (that is, the suck and 

 moistures of the body; become less predatory, or the patients are 

 made less depredable The spirit is made less predatory ; if either 

 it be condensed in substance, as in the use of opiates, and nitrous 

 application, and in contristations ; or be diminished in quantity, 

 as in spare, Pythagorical, or monastical diets; or is sweetened and 

 refreshed with motion, as in case and tranquillity.&quot; 



&quot; &amp;lt; &amp;gt;ur second precept is, that the prolongation of life be expected, 

 &quot; rather from working upon spirits, and from a malacissation or in- 

 &quot; teneratiou of parts, than from any kinds of aliment or order of diet. 

 &quot; For seeing the body of man, and the frame thereof (leaving aside 

 &quot; outward accidents) three ways become passive, namely, from the 

 &quot; spirits; from the parts ; and from aliments; the way of prolonga- 

 &quot; tion of life, by means of aliment is a long way about, and that by 

 &quot; many ambages and circuits ; but the ways by working upon the 

 &quot; spirits, and upon the parts, are more compendious, and sooner 

 &quot; bring us to the end desired ; because the spirits are suddenly 

 &quot; moved, both from vapours and passions, which work strangely 

 &quot; upon them : and the parts, by baths, unguents, emplaisters, which 

 &quot; in like manner make way by sudden impressions. 



Shaw, in his edition of Bacon, lately published, says, &quot; the whole 



