CHAPTER IV 



NATURE AND THE LIVING WORLDS 



WE have found that, according to Bruno, the universe 

 is infinite in extent, and that there are innumerable 

 worlds within it : it remains to know what are the 

 materials that constitute the universe, and the moving 

 principles that govern its changes and direct the worlds 

 in their courses. 



Nature, he said, is the same in kind, in its substance, uniformity 

 and in its elements, throughout its whole extent a 

 daring conception for a time when the empyrean and 

 all space beyond it were still regarded as the special 

 abode of divinity. He reminded his opponents of his 

 own childish experiences : when from Cicala he looked 

 towards Mount Vesuvius, he thought it dark, gloomy, 

 bare of trees and flowers ; but when he approached it, 

 he found it fairer than Cicala itself, while now the latter 

 looked bare and dark. 1 The Aristotelians were com- 

 mitting a similar error in judging the distant stars and 

 the firmament to be in reality as they appeared to our 

 eyes, and in denying the existence of that which was 

 not visible to us. "As the philosopher must not 

 believe what cannot be demonstrated by evidence, so 

 neither must he foolishly despise or find fault with 

 what cannot be disproved by reason." 2 Had men, 



1 De Immense, iii. ch. I. (p. 313 ff.). 2 P. 317. 



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