250 NOVUM OROANUM 



itself to receive the former, and excludes or removes the 

 latter. 83 Nor is the effect or power of this motion confined 

 to contact, for the electric energy (of which Gilbert and 

 others after him have told so many fables) is only the 

 energy excited in a body by gentle friction, and which 

 does not endure the air, but prefers some tangible substance 

 if there be any at hand. 



Let the seventh be that which we term the motion of 

 greater congregation, by which bodies are borne toward 

 masses of a similar nature, for instance, heavy bodies toward 

 the earth, light to the sphere of heaven. The schools termed 

 this natural motion, by a superficial consideration of it, be 

 cause produced by no external visible agent, which made 

 them consider it innate in the substances; or perhaps 

 because it does not cease, which is little to be wondered 

 at, since heaven and earth are always present, while the 

 causes and sources of many other motions are sometimes 

 absent and sometimes present. They therefore called this 

 perpetual and proper, because it is never interrupted, but 

 instantly takes place when the others are interrupted, and 

 they called the others adscititious. The former, however, 

 is in reality weak and slow, since it yields, and is inferior 

 to the others as long as they act, unless the mass of the 

 body be great; and although this motion have so filled 

 men s minds, as almost to have obscured all others, yet 

 they know but little about it, and commit many errors in 

 its estimate. 



Let the eighth be that which we term the motion of 

 lesser congregation, by which the homogeneous parts in 



83 This is one of the moat useful practical methods in chemistry at the 

 present day. 



