NOVUM ORGANUM. 321 



primo Instantias Virgce, sive Radii; quas etiam Instantias 

 Perlationis, vel de Non Ultra appellare consuevimus. Virtutes 

 enim rerum et motus operantur et expediuntur per spatia non 

 indefinita aut fortuita, sed finita et certa; quae ut in singulis 

 naturis inquisitis teneantur et notentur plurimum interest Pra- 

 cticae, non solum ad hoc, ut non fallat, sed etiam ut magis sit 

 aucta et potens. Etenim interdum datur virtutes producere, 

 et distantias tanquam retrahere in propius ; ut in perspecillis. 



Atque plurimge virtutes operantur et afficiunt tantum per 

 tactum manifestum ; ut fit in percussione corporum, ubi alterum 

 non summovet alterum, nisi impellens impulsum tangat. Etiam 

 medicinae quae exterius applicantur, ut unguenta, emplastra, 

 non exercent vires suas nisi per tactum corporis. Denique 

 objecta sensuum tactus et gust us non feriunt nisi contigua 

 organis. 



Sunt et alias virtutes quae operantur ad distantiam, verum 

 valde exiguam, quarum paucae adhuc notatae sunt, cum tamen 

 plures sint quam homines suspicentur; ut (capiendo exempla 

 ex vulgatis) cum succinum 1 aut gagates 2 trahunt paleas; bulla9 

 approximatae solvunt bullas ; medicinae nonnullae purgativas 

 eliciunt humores ex alto 3 , et hujusmodi. At virtus ilia ma- 

 gnetica per quam ferrum et magnes, vel magnetes invicem, 

 coeunt, operatur intra orbem virtutis certum, sed parvum ; ubi 

 contra, si sit aliqua virtus magnetica emanans ab ipsa terra 

 (paulo nimirum interiore) super acum ferream, quatenus ad 

 verticitatem, operatic fiat ad distantiam magnam. 



Rursus, si sit aliqua vis magnetica quae operetur per con- 

 sensum inter globum terras et ponderosa, aut inter globum 

 lunae et aquas maris (quae maxime credibilis videtur in fluxibus 

 et refluxibus semi-menstruis 4 ), aut inter coelum stellatum et 



1 Amber. 2 Jet. 



9 Bacon here speaks in accordance with the medical theory in which the brain is 

 the origin and seat of the rheum, which descends from thence and produces disease in 

 other organs a theory preserved in the word catarrh. Certain purgatives were sup- 

 posed to draw the rheum down. 



4 It is worth remarking that Galileo speaks contemptuously of the notion that the 

 moon exerts any influence on the tides. His strong wish to explain everything me- 

 chanically led him in this instance wrong, as a similar wish has led many others; It 

 arose, not unnaturally, from a reaction against the unsatisfactory explanations which 

 the schoolmen were in the habit of deducing from the specific or occult properties of 

 bodies. Even Leibnitz, in his controversy with Clarke, shows a tendency towards an 

 exclusive preference of a mechanical system of physics, though in other parts of his 

 writings he had spoken favourably of the doctrine of attraction, and though his 

 whole philosophy ought, one would think, to have made him indifferent to the point 

 in dispute. In a system of pre-established harmony, action by contact is as merely 

 apparent as action at a distance. 



YOU I. Y 



