476 
EDITORIAL OBSERVATIONS. 
discoveries of Black and Priestly, on heat and aeriform fluids, 
had been preceded by the happy conjectures of Newton, and 
the experiments of others. Nay, Voltaire had well nigh dis¬ 
covered both the absorption of heat, the constitution of the 
atmosphere, and the oxidation of metals, and by a few more 
trials might have ascertained it. Cuvier had been preceded 
by inquirers who took sound views of fossil osteology; 
among whom the truly original genius of Hunter fills the 
foremost place. The inductive system of Bacon had been, 
at least in its practice, known to his predecessors. Obser¬ 
vations, and even experiments, were not unknown to the 
ancient philosophers, though mingled with gross errors. In 
early times, almost in the Dark Ages, experimental inquiries 
had been carried on with success by Friar Bacon, and that 
method actually recommended in a treatise, as it was two 
centuries later by Leonardo da Vinci; and at the latter end 
of the next century Gilbert examined the whole subject of 
magnetic action entirely by experiments. So that Lord 
Bacon's claim to be regarded as the father of modern philo¬ 
sophy rests upon the important, the invaluable step, of re¬ 
ducing to a system the method of investigation adopted by 
those eminent men, generalising it, and extending its appli¬ 
cation to all matters of contingent truth, exploding the 
errors, the absurd dogmas, and fantastic subtleties of the 
ancient schools; above all, confining the subject of our in¬ 
quiry, and the manner of conducting it, within the limits 
which our faculties prescribe. Nor is this great law 7 of gra¬ 
dual progress confined to the physical sciences; in the moral 
it equally governs. Before the foundations of political 
economy v r ere laid by Hume and Smith, a great step had 
been made by the French philosophers, disciples of Quesnai; 
but a nearer approach to sound principles had signalised 
the labours of Gournay, and those labours had been shared 
and his doctrines patronised by Turgot, when chief minister. 
Again, in constitutional policy, see by what slow degrees, 
from its first rude elements, the attendance of feudal tenants 
at their lords' court, and the summons of burghers to grant 
supplies of money, the great discovery of modern times in 
