33 6 NOVUM ORGANUM. 



the nostrils into the mouth and palate. On the other hand, those in 

 whom the sense of smell is wanting, or is obstructed, perceive as well 

 as any one else what is salt, sweet, sharp, acid, rough, bitter, and the 

 like ; so that it is manifest that the sense of Taste is somehow com 

 pounded of an internal smell, and a certain exquisite power of touch, 

 of which this is not now the place to speak. 



To take another example : let the Nature investigated be the com 

 munication of Quality, without commixture of substance. The Instance 

 of Light will give or constitute one species of communication ; Heat 

 and the Magnet another. For the communication of light is, as it 

 were, momentary, and ceases directly the original light is removed. 

 But heat and magnetic influence, when they have been once trans 

 mitted to, or rather excited in, a body, abide and remain for a con 

 siderable time after the departure of the original moving power. 



In short, the Prerogative of Constitutive Instances is very great ; for 

 thev contribute very much both to definitions (especially particular 

 definitions) and to the division or partition of Natures, about which 

 it was not ill said by Plato : &quot;That he is to be held as a God, who 

 knows well how to define and divide.&quot; 



xxvii. Among Prerogative Instances, we shall put in the sixth place, 

 Conformable or Proportionate Instances, which we also call Parallels, 

 or Physical Resemblances. They are those which show likenesses and 

 conjunctions of things, not in lesser Forms (which is the work of 

 Constitutive Instances)^ but simply in the concrete. Whence they 

 form, as it were, the first and lowest steps towards the union of Nature. 

 Nor do they establish any Axioms immediately from the beginning, 

 but merely point out and mark a certain agreement of bodies. But 

 although they are not of much assistance for the discovery of Forms, 

 nevertheless they are very useful in revealing the fabric of the parts of 

 the Universe, and in making a sort of anatomy of its members ; 

 whence they sometimes lead us by the hand to sublime and noble 

 Axioms ; especially those which have relation to the configuration of 

 the world, rather than to simple Natures and Forms. 



For example ; the following are Conformable Instances : a mirror 

 and an eye ; likewise the construction of the ear, and places which 

 give back an echo. From this conformity, besides the actual observa 

 tion of likeness, which is useful for many purposes, it is easy further 

 to gather and form this Axiom, viz. that the organs of the senses, and 

 those bodies which generate reflections to the senses, are of like 

 Nature. Again, the Understanding, admonished by this, rises without 

 difficulty to a higher and nobler Axiom, viz. to this, that there is no 

 difference between the agreement or sympathies of bodies endowed 

 with sense, and those of inanimate bodies without sense, except that 

 in the former animal spirit is added to a body duly disposed for it, 

 while in the latter it is absent. So that there might be as many senses 

 in animals as there are sympathies in inanimate bodies, if there were 

 perforations in the animated body to allow the passage of the animal 

 spirit into a member rightly disposed for it, as into a fit organ. And 

 again, there may, doubtless, be as many motions in an inanimate 



