CHAP. II.] VARIOUS KINDS OF NATURAL HISTORY. 79 



CHAPTER II. 



History divided into Natural and Civil ; — Civil subdivided into Eccle» 

 siastical and Literary. The Division of Natural History according to 

 the subject matter, into the H' story of Generations, of Pra;ter- 

 Generati-ons, and the Arts. 



History is either natural or civil : the natural records the 

 works and acts of nature ; the civile the works and acts of 

 men. Divine interposition is unquestionably seen in both, 

 particularly in the affairs of men, so far as to constitute a 

 different species of history, which we call sacred or ecclesias- 

 tical. But such is the dignity of letters and arts, that they 

 deserve a separate history, which, as well as the ecclesiastical, 

 we comprehend under civil history. 



We form our division of natural history upon the three- 

 fold state and condition of nature ; which is, 1. either free, 

 proceeding in her ordinary course, without molestation ; 

 or 2. obstructed by some stubborn and less common matters, 

 and thence put out of her course, as in the ])roduction of 

 monsters ; or 3. bound and wrought upon by human means, 

 for the production of things artificial. Let all natural his- 

 tory, therefore, be divided into the history of generations, 

 praetergenerations, and arts ; the first to consider nature at 

 liberty ; the second, nature in her errors ; and the third, 

 nature in constraint. 



The history of arts should the rather make a si^ecies of 

 natural history, because of the prevalent opinion, as if art 

 were a different thing from nature, and things natural 

 different from things artificial : whence many writers of 

 natural history think they perform notably, if they give us 

 the history of animals, plants, or minerals, without a word 

 of the mechanic arts. A farther mischief is to have art 

 esteemed no more than an assistant to nature, so as to help 

 her forwards, correct or set her free, and not to bend, change, 

 and radically affect her ; whence an untimely despair has 

 crept upon mankind; who should rather be assured that 

 artificial things differ not from natural in form or essence, 

 but only in the efficient : for man has no power over nature 

 in anything but m.otion, whereby he either puts bodies to- 

 gether, or separates them. And therefore, so far as natural 

 bodies may be separated or conjoined, man may do anything. 



