430 FALLACIES. 



of any considerable value to be made respecting the 

 class. The misleading effect is greatest, when a word 

 which in common use expresses some definite fact, is 

 extended by slight links of connexion to cases in 

 which that fact does not exist, but some other or 

 others only slightly resembling it. Thus Bacon*, in 

 speaking of the Idola or Fallacies arising from notions 

 temere et incequaliter a rebus abstractly exemplifies 

 them by the notion of Humidum or Wet, so familiar 

 in the physics of antiquity and of the middle ages. 

 "Invenietur verbum istud, Humidum, nihil aliud 

 quam nota confusa diversarum actionum, quee nullam 

 constantiam aut reductionem patiuntur. Significat 

 enim, et quod circa aliud corpus facile se circumfundit ; 

 et quod in se est indeterminabile, nee consistere 

 potest; et quod facile cedit undique; et quod facile 

 se dividit et dispergit; et quod facile se unit et colligit; 

 et quod facile fluit, et in motu ponitur ; et quod alteri 

 corpori facile adhseret, idque madefacit ; et quod facile 

 reducitur in liquidum, sive colliquatur, cum antea 

 consisteret. Itaque quum ad hujus nominis prsedica- 

 tionem et impositionem ventum sit; si alia accipias, 

 flamma humida est; si alia accipias, aer humidus non 

 est; si alia, pulvis minutus humidus est ; si alia, 

 vitrum humidum est: ut facile appareat, istam no- 

 tionem ex aqua tantum, et communibus et vulgaribus 

 liquoribus, absque ulla debita verificatione, temere 

 abstractam esse." 



Bacon himself is not exempt from a similar accu- 

 sation when inquiring into the nature of heat; where 

 he occasionally proceeds like one who seeking for the 

 cause of hardness, after examining that quality in 

 iron, flint, and diamond, should expect to find that it 



* Nov. On/., Aph. 60. 



