THE 



KOOK OF NATURE. 



SERIES I. 



LECTURE I, 



ON MATTES, AND A 3IATEEIAL WORLD. 



In the comprehensive range of science proposed to be treated of m the 

 Surrey Iivstitutiow, the department to which I shall have the honom- of 

 beseeching your attention will be that of natural philosophy, or physics, 

 in the most extensive sense of these terms : that branch of science which 

 makes use of the individual principles and discoveries of every other 

 branch within the range of nature, as the architect makes use of the bricks, 

 the mortar, the wood, and the marble of different artizans, and builds up 

 the v/hole into a perfect edifice ; which takes a bird's-eye view, as it were, 

 of a picturesque and spreading landscape from some commanding emi- 

 nence ; and, without having laboured in the details of arranging the 

 ground, of cultivating the soil, of planting the woods, of winding the rivers, 

 of enriching the scenery with flocks, herds, bridges, and buildings, points 

 out the general connexion of part with part, and the harmony which 

 flows from their combined effect. This, indeed, is to employ these terms 

 in a somewhat wider sense than has been assigned to them in modern 

 times ; for even the Natural Philosophy of Lord Bacon, though it em- 

 braces the two divisions of special physic and metaprysic, as he calls 

 them, does not extend to the doctrine of" the nature and state of man," 

 which is transferred to another division of general science yet that the 

 study of physics, or natural philosophy, had this more extended meaning 

 among the Greeks and Romans, is clear, since the poem of Empedocles 

 on " Nature," and that of Lucretius, on '^the Nature of Things," the 

 two most complete physiological works of which we have any account in. 

 antiquity, were expressly formed upon this comprehensive scale ; and 

 hence the philosophy of geology and mineralogy, the philosophy of bo- 

 tany and zoology, the philosophy of human understanding, the philosophy 

 of society and whatever relates to it, or general and synthetical surveys 

 of these different departments of science, are as equally branches of 

 physics, or the nature of things, as equally part of the book op nature, 

 as any separate branch which is more ordinarily so arranged. 



Thus explained, the scope of the study before us is almost universal, 



* Advancement of Learning, b. ii. p. 52. 56. vol. i. 4to. General science is here divided 

 into three classes : I. Doctrina de numine, or Divine Philosophy. 11. Doctriiia de natura, 

 or Natural Philosophy, III. Doctrina de honiinc, or Human Philosophy, The common 

 stem from which they ramify is denominated philosonbia prima, primitive, summarv. or 

 >mirer&al philosopb^> > - - ■ , - 



