THE SECOND BOOK 261 



Productions of Effects ; so that part which concerneth the 

 Inquiry of Causes we do subdivide, according to the 

 received and sound division of Causes ; the one part, 

 which is Physic, enquireth and handleth the Material and 

 Efficient Causes; and the other, which is Metaphysic, 

 handleth the Formal and Final Causes. 



Physic (taking it according to the derivation, and not 

 according to our idiom for Medicine,) is situate in a 

 middle term or distance between Natural History and 

 Metaphysic. For Natural History describeth the variety 

 of things; Physic, the causes, but variable or respective 

 causes ; and Metaphysic, the fixed and constant causes. 



Limits ut hie durescit, et haec ut cera liquescit, 

 Uno eodemque igni: 



Fire is the cause of induration, but respective to clay ; fire 

 is the cause of colliquation, but respective to wax ; but fire 

 is no constant cause either of induration or colliquation. 

 So then the physical causes are but the efficient and the 

 matter. Physic hath three parts ; whereof two respect 

 nature united or collected, the third contemplateth nature 

 diffused or distributed. Nature is collected either into 

 one entire total, or else into the same principles or seeds. 

 So as the first doctrine is touching the Contexture or Con- 

 figuration of things, as de mundo, de universitate rerum. 

 The second is the doctrine concerning the Principles or 

 Originals of things. The third is the doctrine concerning 

 all Variety and Particularity of things, whether it be of the 

 differing substances, or their differing qualities and natures; 

 whereof there needeth no enumeration, this part being but 

 as a gloss or paraphrase, that attendeth upon the text 

 of Natural History. Of these three I cannot report any 

 as deficient. In what truth or perfection they are handled, 

 I make not now any judgment : but they are parts of 

 knowledge not deserted by the labour of man. 



For Metaphysic, we have assigned unto it the inquiry of 

 Formal and Final Causes ; which assignation, as to the 

 former of them, may seem to be nugatory and void, 

 because of the received and inveterate opinion that the 



