APPENDIX 1). 357 



our knowledge of Bacon s system. Thence we learn ( i ) The 

 futility of Ancient Logic, its &quot; mera palpatio,&quot; its groping with 

 out light to guide it ; (2) The necessity of a &quot; Literate Expe 

 rience,&quot; or of the systematic committal to paper of all facts 

 and results which may come under notice ; (3) The ascent in 

 generalization from particulars, through intermediate Axioms, 

 to the highest truths, &quot; per scalam veram et per gradus con 

 tinues.&quot; 



(1.) Of the first of these heads, we need only stay to give 

 Bacon due praise for the wise boldness with which he attacked 

 the Ancient Process. There was clearly nothing to be hoped 

 for in Physics (or in any other branch of science) so long as the 

 old Scholastic distinctions and cramped views were dominant, 

 And AVC cannot too much admire the bravery which could face 

 a world in arms ; however much we may regret the strange 

 jealousy which refused to consider those as friends who were 

 doing so much for Experimental Philosophy, and whose minds 

 had intuitively grasped the same thoughts, and followed the 

 same lines of discovery which he was himself proposing for 

 men s consideration and adoption. 



(2.) For the Experientia Literata, the consequence of the 

 spread of learning, and of printing, we may observe that 

 Bacon himself gives us an example of it in his Tables on 

 Heat, and in his &quot; Vindemiatio Prima,&quot; II. n, 12, 13, 18, and 

 20. It was the putting results on record, for the good of 

 posterity. 



(3.) Now we come to the chief principle of the Method the 

 successive steps. 



The question which first meets us here is, How do we obtain 

 any of these steps / Is it by the Simple Enumeration con 

 demned above ? or by selection of cases affirmatively ? or by 

 rejection of negatives ? 



As to this, Bacon provides us with no thoroughly definite 

 answer. It is hard to sec how the first Table (II. 11.) of 

 &quot; Instantias convenientes in natura calidi&quot; is other than a sim 

 ple enumeration, so far as it goes. Bacon provides us with 

 no real rules for selection ; nor does he seem to have been 

 struck by the hopelessness of attempting to catalogue so in- 



