47 



passing the soul of man." Galileo, although willing 

 to conceive circular motion as perpetual 1 , and even 

 self-existent, was unable thus to conceive recti- 

 lineal motion. 



Harvey, then, and other naturalists of the 

 time, including Csesalpinus and after a fashion 

 even Descartes, followed the medieval world and 

 Aristotle in deriving the source of motion directly 

 from the spheres. Harvey says with Dante, 

 "Questi nei cuor mortali & permotore." The at- 

 traction exercised by external supreme mind (not 

 associated with matter) and its thoughts bring the 

 material cosmos and its parts into regular move- 

 ments. The so-called AlOijp, or fifth element, 

 " (TTOL^elov erepov TWV reao-dpwv, dtcrfparov re /cal 

 Qelov " (De Caelo, cap. 2 and vid. Zeller n. ii. 437), 

 under the name of the Quintessence, played a large 

 part in the speculations of Lulli, Paracelsus and 

 other chemical mystics. Till Copernicus transfigured 

 the cosmos, and Galileo and Newton carried terres- 

 trial physics into the celestial world, the heavenly 

 bodies were regarded as animated beings, them- 

 selves set in motion by spheres, and, by propagation 

 of their intense activity from sphere to sphere, 

 1 Vid. p. 44, note 2. 



