74 PREFACE TO 



a somewhat less finished form the whole substance of the hun- 

 dred and twenty-fifth aphorism of the first book of the Novum 

 Organum. Yet we must admit this improbable supposition, if 

 we decide on giving to the Inquisitio legitima the place which 

 M. Bouillet has assigned to it. The truth is, that many of 

 Bacon's shorter tracts preserved by Gruter and others are 

 merely, so to speak, experimental fragments, of which the sub- 

 stance is embodied in his more finished writings. 



Of the fourth and fifth parts of the Instauratio nothing, as I 

 have already remarked, has been preserved except the prefaces, 

 if indeed any other portion of them ever existed. But of the 

 third, though it is altogether incomplete, we have nevertheless 

 large fragments. Two years after the publication of the Novum 

 Organum Bacon published the Historia Naturalis ad con-' 

 dendam Philosophiam, which has been already mentioned. In 

 this however only the Historia Ventorum is contained in ex- 

 tenso ; and of the five other Histories of which Bacon speaks in 

 the dedication, and of which he proposed to publish one every 

 month, only two are now in existence, namely the Historia Vitce 

 et Mortis, published in 1623, and the Historia Densi et Rari 

 which is contained in Rawley's Opuscula varia posthuma, 

 published in 1658. Of the other three, namely the Historic 

 Gravis et Levis, Sympathies et Antipathic^ Rerum, and Sulphuris 

 Mercurii et Satis, we have only the prefaces, which were published 

 in the same volume as the Historia Ventorum. 



These Histories, and the Sylv a Sylvarum, published soon after 

 Bacon's death by Rawley, are the only works which we are 

 entitled to refer to the third part of the Instauratio. With 

 respect to the former we have the authority of Bacon's own 

 title page and dedication ; and Bawley's dedication of the latter 

 to King Charles shows that it is included under the general 

 designation of Historia Naturalis ad condendam Philosophiam.* 



Other tracts however, of more or less importance, have been 



(July 27.) several pages of notes for an Inquisitio legitima de Motu. It would seem 

 that this Inquisitio was designed originally to be the example in which the new method 

 was to be set forth (see last section of Coyitata et Visa), but that the Jnquisitio de 

 Galore et Frigore was afterwards preferred ; probably as more manageable J. S. 



1 " The whole body of the Natural History, either designed or written by the late 

 Lord Viscount St. Albans, was dedicated to Your Majesty in the book De Vent-is, about 

 four years past, when Your Majesty was prince, so as there needed no new dedication of 

 this work, but only in all humbleness to let Your Majesty know that it is yours." 

 Dedication to tlie King of the Sylva Sylvarum. 



