INTRODLCTION. 17 



plants and animals — are the cil'ect of these two ever-divided 

 forces, of which the one, heat, specially appertains to the ce- 

 lestial, and the other, cold, to the terrestrial spliere. 



With yet more unbridled fancy, but with a profound spirit 

 of inquiry, Giordano Bruno of Nola attempted to comprehend 

 the whole universe, in three works,* entitled Dc la causa 

 Priricipio c U?io ; Cotitcmplationi circa lo Infmito, Uni- 

 verso c Moduli innumerabili ; and De Minimo et Maximo. 

 In the natural philosophy of Telesio, a cotemporary of Co- 

 pernicus, we recognize at all events the tendency to reduce 

 the changes of matter to two of its fundamental forces, which, 

 although " supposed to act from without," yet resemble the 

 fundamental forces of attraction and repulsion in the dy- 

 namic theory of nature of Boscovich and Kant. Tlie cos- 

 mical views of the Philosopher of Nola are purely meta- 

 physical, and do not seek the causes of sensuous phenomena 

 in matter itself, but treat of "the infinity of space, filled 

 with self - illumined worlds, of the animated condition of 

 those worlds, and of the relations of the highest intelligence 

 — God — to the universe." 



Scantily endowed with mathematical knowledge, Giorda- 

 no Bruno continued nevertheless to the period of his fearful 

 martyrdomf an enthusiastic admirer of Copernicus, Tycho 

 Brahe, and Kepler. He Avas cotemporary with Galileo, but 

 did not live to see the invention of the telescope by Hans 

 Lippershey and Zacharias Jansen, and did not therefore wit- 

 ness the discovery of the " lesser Jupiter world," the phases 

 of Venus, and the nebulcB. AYith bold confidence in what 

 he terms the lume interno, ragione naturale, altezza delV 

 intelletto (force of intellect), he indulged in happy conjec- 

 tures regarding the movement of the fixed stars, the planet- 



* Coinpai-e the acute and learned commentary on the works of the 

 Philosopher of Nola, in the treatise Jordano Bruno par Christian Bar- 

 tholmess, torn, ii., 1847, p. 129, 149, and 201. 



t He was burned at Rome on the 17th of February, 1600, pursuant 

 to the sentence "ut quani clementissime et citra sansninis effusionem 

 puniretur." Bruno was imprisoned six years in the Piovibi at Venice, 

 and two years in the Inquisition at Rome. When the sentence of death 

 was announced to him, Bruno, calm and unmoved, gave utterance to 

 the following noble expression: " Majori forsitan cum timore sententi- 

 am in me fertis quam ego accipiam." When a fugitive from Italy in 

 1580, he taught at Geneva, Lyons, Toulouse, Paris, Oxford, Marburg, 

 Wittenberg (which he calls the Athens of Germany). Prague, and Helm- 

 Rtedt, where, in 1589, he completed the scientific instruction of Duko 

 Henry Julius of Brunsyvick-Wolfenbiittel. — Bartholmess, toip. ' ,, p. 167- 

 178. He also taught at Padua Kubsequently to 1592. 



