488 NOVUM ORGANUM. [BOOK 1L 



than the same arrows pointed with iron,&quot; owing to the similarity 

 of substance, though this quality was previously latent in the 

 wood. Again, although in the mass air does not appear to attract 

 air, nor water water, yet when one bubble is brought near 

 another, they are both more readily dissolved, from the tendency 

 to contact of the water with the water, and the air with the air.* 

 These clandestine instances (which are, as has been observed, of 

 the most important service) are principally to be observed in 

 small portions of bodies, for the larger masses observe more 

 universal and general forms, as ^ill be mentioned in its proper 

 place. y 



XXVI. In the fifth rank of prerogative instances we will class 

 constitutive instances, which we are wont also to call collective 

 instances. They constitute a species or lesser form, as it were, 

 of the required nature. For since the real forms (which are 



tt Query? 



x The real cause of this phenomenon is the attraction of the surface- 

 water in the vessel by the sides ot the bubbles. When the bubbles 

 approach, the sides nearest each other both tend to raise tha small space 

 of water between them, and consequently less water is raised by each 

 of these nearer sides than by the exterior part of the bubble, and the 

 greater weight of the water raised on the exterior parts pushes the 

 bubbles together. In the same manner a bubble near the side of a 

 vessel is pushed towards it ; the vessel and bubble bth drawing the 

 water that is between them. The latter phenomenon cannot be explained 

 on Bacon s hypothesis. 



y Modern discoveries appear to bear out the sagacity of Bacon s 

 remark, and the experiments of Baron Cagnard may be regarded as a 

 first step towards its full demonstration. After the new facts elicited 

 by that philosopher, there can be little doubt that the solid, liquid, and 

 aeriform state of bodies are merely stages in a progress of gradual transi 

 tion from one extreme to the other, and that however strongly marked 

 the distinctions between them may appear, they will ultimately turn 

 out to be separated by no sudden or violent line of demarcation, but 

 slide into each other by imperceptible gradations. Bacon s suggestion, 

 however, is as old as Pythagoras, and perhaps simultaneous with the 

 first dawn of philosophic reason. The doctrine of the reciprocal trans 

 mutation of the elements underlies all the physical systems oi the 

 ancients, and was adopted by the Epicureans as well as the Stoics. 

 Ovid opens his last book of the Metamorphoses with the poetry oi the 

 subject, where he expressly points to the hint of Bacon : 



&quot; Tenuatus in auras 



Aeraque humor abit, &c. &c. 



**** 



Inde retro redeunt, idemque retexitur ordo.&quot; xv. 246 249. 

 and Seneca, in the third book of his Natural Philosophy, quest, iv. 

 states the opinion in more precise language tha.n either the Ancient 

 or the modern philosopher* d, 



