24 
FIRST REPORT-1831. 
reduce to practice the splendid fiction of the New Atlantis *. 
The same comprehensive mind which first developed the true 
method of interpreting nature, sketched also the first draught 
of a national Association for undertaking, by a system of dis¬ 
tributed and combined exertion, the labour of that work. 
“ This philosophical romance was not composed by its great 
author to amuse the fancy, but to dispose the minds of the 
legislature towards the foundation of a public establishment 
for the advancement of science. His plan for its maintenance 
* The actual and immediate effect produced by Bacon on the general spirit 
of philosophy has been underrated : His writings were quickly circulated 
through Europe, and their value was appreciated abroad even sooner than at 
home; he himself translated the New Atlantis into Latin, “in gratiam exte- 
rorum apud quos expeti inaudiverat,” and his most important works were 
rendered into that language and into French before his death. His letter to 
Baranzon, who lectured on Natural Philosophy at Annecy in Savoy, and who, 
it appears, had consulted him on the substitution of his inductive method for 
the syllogisms of Aristotle, deserves attention not only as containing the most 
perspicuous summary of his views, but as showing how far the authority and in¬ 
fluence of his writings had reached in 1621. It has been said by Playfair that 
Descartes, who became afterwards the head of so numerous a school, “ does not 
seem to have been acquainted with Bacon’s works and another eminent histo¬ 
rian of philosophy, Dugald Stewart, has admitted that “ if he ever read them he 
has nowhere alluded to them in his writings.” But the fact is, that in the corre¬ 
spondence of Descartes with Mersenne, published in 1642, there are, in several 
of his letters, passages in which he has referred to the works of “Verulam” 
with a respect which he yielded to no other writer, and has shown that he had 
both studied them and adopted the methods which they contain; so that there 
is no longer any difficulty in accounting for the remarkable coincidence with 
Bacon’s views and language which Mr. Stewart has noticed in the principles 
laid down by Descartes for studying the phenomena of the mind. The passages 
to which I refer are these : “ Scribis pi’aeterea velle te scire modum aliquem 
faciendi experimenta utilia; ad quod nihil est quod dicam post Verulamium qui 
hac de re scripsit, nisi quod omissis minutioribus circumstantiis oporteret in 
qualibet materia potissimum facere generales observationes rerum omnium 
maxime vulgarium et certissimarum et quae sine sumptu cognosci possint, ut, 
ex. gr. cochleas omnes in eandem partem esse contortas, atque utrum idem 
obtineat trans aequinoctialem ; omnium animalium corpus esse divisum in tres 
partes, caput, pectus, et ventrem, et alia id genus, hujusmodi enim observa¬ 
tiones ad veritatis investigationem certo deducunt.” (Ep. LXV.) “ Gratias 
tibi ago pro qualitatibus quas ex Aristotele desumpsisti; majorem illorum cata- 
logum, partim ex Verulamio desumptum, partim a me collectum jam conscrip- 
seram, illasque imprimis conabor explicare.” ( Ep. C. V.) “ Scripsisti ad me 
aliquando esse tibi notos viros quibus volupe erat scientiis propagandis dare 
operam, (these were probably the persons whose meetings at Mersenne’s house 
laid the foundation of the French Academy,) adeo ut nullum non experimen- 
torum genus propriis sumptibus se facturos profiterentur. Illorum siquis vellet 
conscribere historiamphaenomenorum ccelestium secundum methodum Verulamii, 
atque omissis rationibus et hypothesibus accurate describeret coelum prout nunc 
apparet, quern situm singulae stellae fixae respectu circumjacientium obtineant, 
quae sit autmagnitudinis, autcoloris, aut luminis, aut scintillationis, &c. differentia; 
