100 ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 



gions of the air; 3. The earth and sea, as integral parts of 

 the universe, including mountains, rivers, tides, sands, 

 woods, and islands, with a view to natural inquiries 

 rather than cosmography; 4. The elements, or greater 

 assemblages of matter, as I call them viz., fire, air, 

 water, and earth; and 5. The species of bodies, or more 

 exquisite collections of matter, by us called the smaller 

 assemblages, in which alone the industry of writers has 

 appeared, and that too rather in a luxurious than solid 

 manner; as rather abounding in things superfluous, viz., 

 the representation of plants and animals, etc., than careful 

 observations, which should ever be subjoined to natural 

 history. In fine, all the natural history we have is abso 

 lutely unfit for the end we propose, viz., to build philos 

 ophy upon; and this both in the manner and matter thereof; 

 hence we set down inductive history as deficient. 



CHAPTER IV 



Civil History divided into Ecclesiastical and Literary. Deficiency of the 

 latter. The Absence of Precepts for its Compilation 



CIVIL history, in general, may be divided into three 

 particular kinds, viz., sacred, civil, and literary; 

 the latter whereof being wanting, the history of the 

 world appears like the statue of Polyphemus, without its 

 eye; the part that best shows the life and spirit of the 

 person. In many particular sciences indeed, as the law, 

 mathematics, and rhetoric, there are extant some short 

 memoirs, and jejune relations of sects, schools, books, 

 authors, and the successions of this kind of sciences, as 

 well as some trivial accounts of the inventors of things and 

 arts; but we say, that a just and universal literary history 

 has not hitherto been published. 



The design of this work should be, to relate from the 

 earliest accounts of time 1, what particular kinds of learn- 



