102 BACON 



CHAPTER VI 



The Great Appendix of Natural Philosophy both Speculative and Prac- 

 tical. Mathematics. Its Proper Position not among the Substantial 

 Sciences, but in their Appendix. Mathematics divided into Pure 

 and Mixed 



It was well observed by Aristotle, that physics and mathe- 

 matics produce practice, or mechanics ; a therefore, as we have 

 treated both the speculative and practical part of the doctrine 

 of nature, we should also consider mathematics as an auxiliary 

 science to both, which being revived into philosophy, comes in 

 as a third part after physics and metaphysics. But upon due 

 recollection, if we designed it as a substantial and principal 

 science, it were more agreeable to method and the nature of the 

 thing to make it a part of metaphysics. For quantity, the sub- 

 ject of mathematics applied to matter, is as the dose of nature, 

 and productive of numerous effects in natural things, and there- 

 fore ought to be reckoned among essential forms. And so 

 much did the power of figures and numbers prevail with the 

 ancients, that Democritus chiefly placed the principles of the 

 variety of things in the figures of their atoms ; b and Pythag- 

 oras asserted that the nature of things consisted of numbers.^ 

 Thus much is true, that of natural forms, such as we understand 

 them, quantity is the most abstracted and separable from mat- 

 ter; and for this reason it has been more carefully cultivated 

 and examined into by mankind than any other forms, which are 

 all of them more immersed in matter. For, as to the great dis- 

 advantage of the sciences, it is natural for men's minds to de- 

 light more in the open fields of generals, than in the inclosures 

 of particulars, nothing is found more agreeable than mathemat- 

 ics, which fully gratifies this appetite of expatiating and rang- 

 ing at large. But as we regard not only truth and order, but 

 also the benefits and advantages of mankind, it seems best, since 

 mathematics is of great use in physics, metaphysics, mechanics, 

 and magics, to make it an appendage or auxiliary to them all. 

 And this we are in some measure obliged to do, from the fond- 

 ness and towering notions of mathematicians, who would have 

 their science preside over physics. It is a strange fatality, that 

 mathematics and logic, which ought to be but handmaids to 

 physics, should boast their certainty before it, and even exer- 

 cise dominion against it. But the place and dignity of this 



