Matter hath oâ— appetite to these Accidents more thâ—â— to any others they demand how without a substantial Form these Accidenâ— can be contain'd and preserv'd Tâ— this I might represent that I am not â— well satisfy'd with the Notion wont iâ— be taken for granted not onely by the vulgar but by Philosophers of the Natural state of Bodies as if it were undeniable that every Natural Body for a to some I shall not now question it has a certain state wherein Nature endeavours to preserve it and out of which it cannot be put but by being put into a Praeternatural state For the World being once constituted by the great Author of Things as it now is I look upon the Phaenomena of Nature to be caus'd by the Local Motion of one part of Matter hitting against another and am not so fully convinc'd that there is such a thing as Natures designing to keep such a parcel of Matter in such a state that is cloth'd with just such Accidents rather then with any other But I look upon many Bodies especially fluid ones as frequently changing their state according as they happen to be more or lesse agitated or otherwise wrought upon by the Sun and other considerable Agents in Nature As the Air Water and other Fluids if the temperature as to Cold or Heat and Rarefaction or Condensation which they are in at the beginning of the Spring here at London be pitcht upon as their Natural state then not onely in the torrid and frozen Zones they must have other and very differing Natural states but here it self they will almost all the Summer and all the Winter as our Weather Glasses inform us be in a varying Praeternatural state because they will be in those seasons either more hot and rarify'd or more cold and condens'd then in the beginning of the Spring And in more stable and constant Bodies I take in many cases the Natural state to be but either the most usual state or That wherein that which produces a notable Change in them finds them As when a slender piece of Silver that is most commonly flexible and will stand bent every way comes to be well hammer'd I count that Flexibility to be the Natural state of that Mettal because most commonly Silver is found to be flexible and because it was so before it was hammer'd but the Springinesse it acquires by hammering is a state which is properly no more unnatural to the Silver then the other and would continue with the Mettal as long as It if both pieces of Silver the one flexible the other springy were let alone and kept from outward violence And as the Silver to be depriv'd of its flexibleness needed the violent Motion of the Hammer so to deprive it of its Spring it needs the violent Agitation of a nealing fire These things and much more I might here represent but to come close to the Objection I Answer That the Accidents spoken of are introduced into the Matter by the Agents or Efficient Causes whatever they be that produce in it what in the sense formerly explain'd we call an essential though not a substantial Form And these Accidents being once thus introduc'd into the Matter we need not seek for a new substantial Principle to preserve them there since by the general law or common course of Nature the Matter qualify'd by them must continue in the state such Accidents have put it into till by some Agent or other it be forcibly put out of it and so divested of those Accidents as in the formerly mention'd Example borrow'd from Aristotle of a Brazen Sphaere when once the Motion of Tools impell'd and guided by the Artificer have turn'd a piece of Brass into a Sphaere there needs no new Substance to preserve that round figure since the Brasse must retain it till it be destroy'd by the Artificer himself or some other Agent able to overcome the resistance of the Matter to be put into another figure And on this occasion let me confirme this ad hominem by representing That there is not an inconsiderable Party among the Peripateticks themselves who maintain That in the Elements the First Qualities as they call them are instead of Forms and that the Fire for instance hath no other Form then Heat and Drynesse and the Water then Coldnesse and Moisture Now if these Bodies that are the vastest and the most important of the Sublunary World consist but of the Universal Matter and the few Accidents and if in these there needs no substantial Form to keep the Qualities of the Matter united to it and conjoyn'd among themselves and preserve them in that state as long as the Law of Nature requires though besides the four Qualities that are call'd First the Elements have divers others as Gravity and Levity Firmnesse and Fluidity Opacousnesse and Transparency c. why should the favourers of this Opinion deny That in other Bodies besides the Elements Qualities may be preserv'd and kept united to the Matter they belong to without the Band or Support of a substantial Form And as when there is no competent destructive Cause the Accidents of a Body will by the Law of Nature remain such as they were so if there be it cannot with reason be pretended that the substantial Form is able to preserve all those Accidents of a Body that are said to slow from it and to be as it were under its care and tuition for if for instance you expose a Sphaere or Bullet of Lead to a strong fire it will quickly loose not to mention its Figure both its Coldness its Consistence its Malleableness its Colour for 't will appear of the colour of fire its Flexibility and some other Qualities and all this in spight of the imaginary substantial Form which according to the Peripatetical Principles in this case must still remain in it without being able to help it And though upon the taking the Lead from off the fire it is wont to be reduc'd to most of its former Qualities for it will not of it self recover its Sphaericity yet That may well be ascrib'd partly to its peculiar Texture and partly to the Coldness of the ambient Air according to what we lately discours'd touching heated and refrigerated Water which Temperature of the Air is an extrinsecal thing to the Lead and indeed it is but Accidental that the Lead upon refrigeration regains its former Qualities for in case the Lead have been expos'd long enough to a sufficiently intense fire it will as we have purposely try'd be turn'd into Glasse and loose its colour its opacity its malleableness and former degree of flexiblenesse and acquire a Reddishness a degree of Transparency a Brittlenesse and some other Qualities that it had not before and let the supposed substantial Form do what it can even when the Vessel is remov'd from the fire to reduce or restore the Body to its Natural state and Accidents yet the former Qualities will remain lost as long
the Corruption be produc'd onely for ought appears by introducing a new Motion and Disposition into the parts of the Frozen Water yet it thereupon ceases to be Ice however it be as much VVater and consequently as much a Body as before it was frozen or thaw'd These and the like Examples may teach us rightly to understand that common Axiom of Naturalists Corruptio unius est generatio alterius è contrà for since it is acknowledged on all hands that Matter cannot be annihilated and since it appears by what we have said above that there are some Properties namely Size Shape Motion or in its absence Rest that are inseparable from the actual parts of Matter and since also the Coalition of any competent number of these parts is sufficient to constitute a Natural Body endow'd with diverse sensible Qualities it can scarce be otherwise but that the same Agents that shatter the Frame or destroy the Texture of one Body will by shuffling them together and disposing them after a New manner bring them to constitute some new sort of Bodies As the same thing that by burning destroyes Wood turns it into Flame Soot and Ashes Onely I doubt whether the Axiome do generally holâ— true if it be meant That every Corruption must end in the Generation of a Body belonging to some particular Species â— things unlesse we take Powders anâ— fluid Bodies indefinitely for Speciesâ— Natural Bodies since it is plain theâ— are multitudes of Vegetables and other Concretions which when they rot dâ— not as some others do turn inâ—â— Worms but either into some slimy oâ— watery Substance or else which is thâ— most usuall they crumble into a kinâ— of Dust or Powder which thougâ— look'd upon as being the Earth inâ— which rotten Bodies are at length resolv'd is very far from being of an Elementary nature but as yet a Compounded Body retaining some if not many Qualities which often makes the Dâ— of one sort of Plant or Animal diffâ— much from that of another And Thâ— will supply me with this Argument Ad hominem viz. That since in those violent Corruptions of Bodies that are made by Outward Agents shattering them into pieces if the Axiome hold true the New Bodies emergent upon the Dissolution of the Former must be really Natural Bodies as indeed divers of the Moderns hold them to be and Generated according to the course of Nature as when Wood is destroy'd by Fire and turn'd partly into Flame partly into Soot partly into Coals and partly into Ashes I hope we may be allow'd to conclude That those Chymical Productions which so many would have to be but Factitious Bodies are Natural ones and regularly Generated For it being the same Agent the Fire that operates upon Bodies whether they be expos'd to it in close Glasses or in Chimnies I see no sufficient reason why the Chymical Oyls and Volatile Salts and other things which Spagirites obtain from mixt Bodies should not be accounted Natural Bodies as well as the Soot and Ashes anâ— Charcoal that by the same fire are obtain'd from Kindled Wood. But before we passe away from the mention of the Corruption of Bodies must take some notice of what is call'd their Putrefaction This is but a Peculiar kind of Corruption wrought slowly whereby it may be distinguish'd from Destruction by Fire and otheâ— nimble Agents in Bodies it happens to them for the most part by means oâ— the Air or some other Ambient Fluid which by penetrating into the Pores oâ— the Body and by its agitation in them doth usually call out some of the more Agile and lesse entangled parts of the Body and doth almost ever loosen and dislocate the parts in general and thereby so change the Texture and perhaps too the Figure of the Corpuscles that compose it that the Body thus chang'd acquires Qualities unsuitable to its Former Nature and for the most part offensive to Our Senses especially of Smelling and Tasting which last clause I therefore adde not onely because the Vulgar look not upon the Change of an Egge into a Chick as a Corruption but as a Perfection of the Egge but because also I think it not improbable that if by such slow Changes of Bodies as make them loose their former Nature and might otherwise passe for Putrefaction many Bodies should acquire better Sents or Tasts then before or if Nature Custom or any other cause should much alter the Texture of our Organs of Tasting and Smelling it would not perhaps be so well agreed on what should be call'd Putrefaction as that imports an impairing Alteration but Men would find some favourabler Notion for such Changes For I observe that Medlars though they acquire in length of time such a Colour and Softness as rotten Apples and other putrify'd Fruits do yet because their Tast is not then harsh as before we call that Ripeness in them which otherwise we should call Rottenness And though upon the Death of a fourfooted Beast we generally call that Change which happens to the Flesh or Bloud Putrefaction yet we passe a more favourable judgment upon That which happens to the Flesh and other softer parts of that Animal whether it be a kind of large Rabbets or very small and hornlesse Deer of which in China and in the Levant they make Musk because by the Change that ensues the Animals death the Flesh acquires not an odious but a grateful Smell And we see that some Men whose Appetites are gratified by Rotten Cheese think it Then not to have degenerated but to have attain'd its best State when having lost its former Colour Smell and Tast and which is more being in great part turn'd into those Insects call'd Mites 't is both in a Philosophical sense corrupted and in the aestimate of the generality of Men grown Putrid But because it very seldom happens that a Body by Generation acquires no other Qualities then just those that are absolutely necessary to make it belong to the Species that Denominates it therefore in most Bodies there are diverse other Qualities that may be there or may be missing without Essentially changing the Subject as Water may be clear or muddy odorous or stinking and still remain Water and Butter may be white or yellow sweet or rancid consistent or melted and still be call'd Butter Now therefore whensoever a Parcâ—l of Matter does acquire or loose a Quality that is not Essential to it That Acquisition or Losse is distinctly call'd Alteration or by some Mutation the Acquist onely of the Qualities that are absolutely necessary to constitute its Essential and Specifical difference or the Loss of any of those Qualities being such a Change as must not be call'd meer Alteration but have the particular name of Generation or Corruption both which according to this Doctrine appear to be but several Kinds of Alteration taken in a large sense though they are distinguish'd from it in a more strict and Limited acception of that Terme And here we
at least in a general way by intelligible principles I am not yet arriv'd to the distinct and particular knowledg of Now for our Doctrine touching the Origine of Forms it will not be difficult to collect it from what we formerly discours'd about Qualities and Forms together for the Form of a Natural Body being according to us but an Essential Modification and as it were the Stamp of its Matter or such a convention of the Bigness Shape Motion or Rest Scituation and Contexture together with the thence resulting Qualities of the small parts that compose the Body as is necessary to constitute and denominate such a particular Body and all these Accidents being producible in Matter by Local Motion 't is agreeable to our Hypothesis to say That the first and Universal though not immediate cause of Forms is none other but God who put Matter into Motion which belongs not to its Essence and Establish'd the Laws of Motion amongst Bodies and also according to my Opinion guided it in divers cases at the beginning of Things and that among Second Causes the Grand Efficient of Forms is Local Motion which by variously dividing sequestring transposing and so connecting the parts of Matter produces in them those Accidents and Qualities upon whose account the portion of Matter they diversifie comes to belong to this or that determinate species of Natural Bodies which yet is not so to be understood as if Motion were onely an Efficient cause in the Generation of Bodies but very often as in water fire c. t is also one of the chiefe Accidents that concurre to make up the Form But in this last Summary Account of the Origine of Forms I think my self oblig'd to declare to you a little more distinctly what I just now intimated to be my own Opinion And this I shall do by advertising you that though I agree with our Epicureans in thinking it probable that the World is made up of an innumerable multitude of singly insensible Corpuscles endow'd with their own Sizes Shapes and Motions and though I agree with the Cartesians in believing as I find that Anaxagoras did of Old that Matter hath not its Motion from its self but Originally from God yet in This I differ both from Epicurus and Des Cartes that whereas the former of them plainly denies that the World was made by any Deity for Deities he own'd and the Latter of them for ought I can find in his Writings or those of some of his Eminentest Disciples thought that God having once put Matter into Motion and establish'd the Laws of that Motion needed not more particularly interpose for the Production of Things Corporeal nor even of Plants or Animals which according to him are but Engines I do not at all believe that either these Cartesian Laws of Motion or the Epicurean casual Concourse of Atoms could bring meer Matter into so orderly and well contriv'd a Fabrick as This World and therefore I think that the wise Author of Nature did not onely put Matter into Motion but when he resolv'd to make the World did so regulate and guide the Motions of the small parts of the Universal Matter as to reduce the greater Systems of them into the Order they were to continue in and did more particularly contrive some portions of that Matter into Seminal Rudiments or Principles lodg'd in convenient Receptacles and as it were Wombs and others into the Bodies of Plants and Animals one main part of whose Contrivance did as I apprehend consist in this That some of their Organs were so fram'd that supposing the Fabrick of the greater Bodies of the Universe and the Laws he had establish'd in Nature some Juicy and Spirituous parts of these living Creatures must be fit to be turn'd into Prolifick Seeds whereby they may have a power by generating their like to propagate their Species So that according to my apprehension it was at the beginning necessary that an Intelligent and Wise Agent should contrive the Universal Matter into the World and especially some Portions of it into Seminal Organs and Principles and settle the Laws according to which the Motions and Actions of its parts upon one another should be regulated without which interposition of the Worlds Architect however moving Matter may with some probability for I see not in the Notion any Certainty be conceiv'd to be able after numberless Occursions of its insensible parts to cast it self into such grand Conventions and Convolutions as the Cartesians call Vortices and as I remember Epicurus speaks of under the name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet I think it utterly improbable that brute and unguided though moving Matter should ever convene into such admirable Structures as the Bodies of perfect Animals But the World being once fram'd and the course of Nature establish'd the Naturalist except in some few cases where God or Incorporeal Agents interpose has recourse to the first Cause but for its general and ordinary Support and Influence whereby it preserves Matter and Motion from Annihilation or Desition and in explicating particular Phaenomena considers onely the Size Shape Motion or want of it Texture and the resulting Qualities and Attributes of the small particles of Matter And thus in this great Automaton the World as in a Watch or Clock the Materials it consists of being left to themselves could never at the first convene into so curious an Engine and yet when the skilful Artist has once made and set it a going the Phaenomena it exhibits are to be accounted for by the number bignesse proportion shape motion or endeavour rest coapration and other Mechanical Affections of the Spring Wheels Pillars and other parts it is made up of and those effects of such a Watch that cannot this way be explicated must for ought I yet know be confess'd not to be sufficiently understood But to return thither whence my Duty to the Author of Nature oblig'd me to make this short Digression The hitherto propos'd Hypothesis touching the Origination of Forms hath I hope been rendred probable by divers particulars in the past Discourses and will be both exemplify'd and confirm'd by some of the Experiments that make the Latter part of this present Treatise especially the Fifth and 7th of them which containing Experiments of the Changing the Form of a Salt and a Mettal do chiefly belong to the Historical or Experimental part of what we deliver touching the Origine of Forms And indeed besides the two kinds of Experiments presently to be mention'd we might here present you a Third sort consisting partly of divers Relations of Metalline Transmutations deliver'd upon their own Credit by Credible men that are not Alchymists and partly of some Experiments some made some directed by us of Changing both Bodies totally inflammable almost totally into Water and a good part ev'n of distill'd Rain water without Additament into Earth and distill'd Liquors readily and totally mingleable with Water pro parte into a true
own particular Nature and diverse of the peculiar Qualities as in a Watch besides those things which the Watch performs as such the several parts whereof it consists as the Spring the Wheels the String the Pins c. may have each of them its peculiar Bulk Shape and other Attributes upon the account of one or more of which the Wheel or Spring c. may do other things then what it doth as meerly a Constituent part of the Watch. And so in the Milk of a Nurse that hath some hours before taken a Potion though the Corpuscles of the purging Medicine appear not to sense distinct from the other parts of the Milk which in far greater numbers concurre with them to constitute that white Liquor yet these Purgative Particles that seem but to be part of the Matter whereof the Milk consists do yet so retain their own Nature and Qualities that being suck'd in with the rest by the Infant they quickly discriminate and discover themselves by purging him But of this Subject more hereafter Of Generation Corruption and Alteration VIII IT now remains that we declare what according to the Tenour of our Hypothesis is to be meant by Generation Corruption and Alteration Three Names that have very much puzled and divided Philosophers In order hereunto we may consider 1. That there are in the World great store of Particles of Matter each of which is too small to be whilst single Sensible and being Entire or Undivided must needs both have its Determinate Shape and be very Solid Insomuch that though it be mentally and by Divine Omnipotence divisible yet by reason of its Smalness and Solidity Nature doth scarce ever actually divide it and these may in this sense be call'd Minima or Prima Naturalia 2. That there are also Multitudes of Corpuscles which are made up of the Coalition of several of the former Minima Naturalia and whose Bulk is so small and their Adhaesion so close and strict that each of these little Primitive Concretions or Clusters if I may so call them of Particles is singly below the discernment of Sense and though not absolutely indivisible by Nature into the Prima Naturalia that compos'd it or perhaps into other little Fragments yet for the reasons freshly intimated they very rarely happen to be actually dissolv'd or broken but remain entire in great variety of sensible Bodies and under various forms or disguises As not to repeat what we lately mention'd of the undestroy'd purging Corpuscles of Milk we see that even Grosser and more compounded Corpuscles may have such a permanent Texture For Quicksilver for instance may be turn'd into a red Powder for a Fusible and Malleable Body or a Fugitive Smoak and disguis'd I know not how many other wayes and yet remain true and recoverable Mercury And these are as it were the Seeds or immediate Principles of many sorts of Natural Bodies as Earth Water Salt c. and those singly insensible become capable when united to affect the Sense as I have try'd that if good Camphire be kept a while in pure Spirit of Wine it will thereby be reduc'd into such Little parts as totally to disappear in the Liquor without making it look less clear then fair Water and yet if into this Mixture you pour a competent quantity of Water in a moment the scatter'd Corpuscles of the Camphire will by reuniting themselves become White and consequently Visible as before their Dispersion 3. That as well each of the Minima Naturalia as each of the Primary Clusters above mention'd having its own Determinate Bulk Shape when these come to adhere to one another it must alwaies happen that the Size and often that the Figure of the Corpuscle compos'd by their Juxta-position and Cohaesion will be chang'd and not seldome too the Motion either of the one or the other or both will receive a new Tendency or be alter'd as to its Velocity or otherwise And the like will happen when the Corpuscles that compose a Cluster of Particles are disjoyn'd or any thing of the little Mass is broken off And whether any thing of Matter be added to a Corpuscle or taken from it in either case as we just now intimated the Size of it must necessarily be alter'd and for the most part the Figure will be so too whereby it will both acquire a Congruity to the Pores of some Bodies and perhaps some of our Sensories and become Incongruous to those of others and consequently be qualify'd as I shall more fully shew you hereafter to operate on diverse occasions much otherwise then it was fitted to do before 4. That when many of these insensible Corpuscles come to be associated into one visible Body if many or most of them be put into Motion from what cause soever the Motion proceeds That it self may produce great Changes and new Qualities in the Body they compose for not onely Motion may perform much even when it makes not any visible Alteration in it as Air put into swift Motion as when it is blown out of Bellows acquires a new Name and is call'd Wind and to the Touch appears far colder then the same Air not so form'd into a Stream and Iron by being briskly rubb'd against Wood or other Iron hath its small parts so agitated as to appear hot to our Sense but this Motion oftentimes makes visible Alterations in the Texture of the Body into which it is receiv'd for alwaies the Moved parts strive to communicate their Motion or somewhat of the degree of it to some parts that were before either at Rest or otherwise mov'd and oftentimes the same Mov'd parts do thereby either disjoyn or break some of the Corpuscles they hit against and thereby change their Bulk or Shape or both and either drive some of them quite out of the Body and perhaps lodge themselves in their places or else associate them anew with others Whence it usually follows that the Texture is for a while at least and unlesse it be very stable and permanent for good and all very much alter'd and especially in that the Pores or little Intervals intercepted betwixt the component Particles will be chang'd as to Bigness or Figure or both and so will cease to be commensurate to the Corpuscles that were fit for them before and become commensurate to such Corpuscles of other Sizes and Shapes as till then were incongruous to them Thus we see that Water by loosing the wonted agitation of its parts may acquire the Firmnesse and Brittlenesse we find in Ice and loose much of the Transparency it had whilst it was a Liquor Thus also by very hard rubbing two pieces of Resinous Wood against one another we may make them throw out diverse of their looser parts into Steams and visible Smoak and may if the Attrition be duely continued make that commotion of the parts so change the Texture of the whole as afterwards to turn the superficial parts into a kind of Coal And thus
as these Praeternatural ones introduc'd by the fire continue in the Matter and neither the one will be restor'd nor the other destroy'd till some sufficiently powerful extrinsick Agent effect the Change And on the other side I consider that the Fruit when sever'd from the Tree it grew on is confess'd to be no longer animated at least the Kernels or Seeds excepted by the Vegetative Soul or substantial Form of the Plant yet in an Orange or Lemmon for instance pluckt from the Tree we see that the same Colour the same Odour the same Tast the same Figure the same Consistence and for ought we know the same other Qualities whether sensible or even occult as are its Antidotal and Antiscorbutical virtues that must before be said to have flow'd from the Soul of the Tree will continue many months perhaps some years after the fruit has ceas'd to have any commerce with the Tree nay though the Tree whereon it grew be perhaps in the mean time hewn down or burnt and though consequently its Vegetative Soul or Form be destroy'd as when it grew thereon and made up one Plant with it And we find that Tamarinds Rhubarb Senna and many other Simples will for divers years after they have been depriv'd of their former Vegetative Soul retain their Purgative and other Specifick properties I find it likewise urg'd that there can be no Reason why Whiteness should be separable from a Wall and not from Snow or Milk unlesse we have recourse to substantial Forms But in case men have agreed to call a thing by such a name because it has such a particular Quality that differences it from others we need go no farther to find a Reason why one Quality is essential to one thing and not to another As in our former example of a Brass Sphaere the Figure is that for which we give it that Name and therefore though you may alter the figure of the Matter yet by that very alteration the Body perishes in the capacity of a Sphaere whereas its Coldness may be exchang'd for Heat without the making it the less a Sphaere because t is not for any such Quality but for Roundness that a Body is said to be a Sphaere And so Firmness is an inseparable Quality of Ice though this or that particular Figure be not because that t is for want of fluidity that any thing that was immediately before a Liquor is call'd Ice and congruously hereunto though Whiteness were inseparable from Snow and Milk yet that would not necessarily infer that there must be a substantial Form to make it so for the Firmness of the Corpuscles that compose Snow is as inseparable from it as the Whitenesse and yet is not pretended to be the effect of the substantial Form of the Water but of the excesse of the Coldnesse of the Air which to use vulgar though perhaps unaccurate expressions puts the Water out of its Natural state of Fluidity and into a Praeternatural one Firmness and Brittleness And the reason why Snow seldome looses its whiteness but with its nature seems to be that its component Particles are so dispos'd that the same heat of the ambient Air that is sit to turn it into a transparent Body is also fit to make it a fluid one which when it is become we no longer call it Snow but Water so that the Water looses its whiteness though the Snow do not But if there be a cause proper to make a convenient alteration of Texture in the Snow without melting or resolving it into water it may then exchange its Whiteness for Yellownesse without loosing its right to be call'd Snow as I remember I have read in an eminent Writer that de facto in the Northern Regions towards the Pole those parcels of Snow that have lain very long on the ground degenerate in time into a Yellowish colour very differing from that pure Whiteness to be observ'd in the neighbouring Snow lately fallen But there yet remains an Argument for substantial Forms which though perhaps because Physical wont to be overlook'd or slightly answer'd by their Opposers will for the same reason deserve to be taken notice of here and it is That there seems to be a necessity of admitting substantial Forms in Bodies that from thence we may derive all the various changes to which they are subject and the differing Effects they produce the Preservation and Restitution of the State requisite to each particular Body as also the keeping of its several parts united into one Totum To the answering of this Argument so many things will be found applicable both in the past and subsequent parts of these Notes that I shall at present but point the chief particulars on which the Solution is grounded I consider then first that many and great Alterations may happen to Bodies which seem manifestly to proceed from their peculiar Texture and the Action of outward Agents upon them and of which it cannot be shewn that they would happen otherwise though there were no substantial Forms in rerum natura as we see that Tallow for instance being melted by the fire looses its Coldness Firmness and its Whiteness and acquires Heat Fluidity and some Transparency all which being suffer'd to cool it presently exchanges for the three first nam'd Qualities And yet divers of these Changes are plainly enough the effects partly of the Fire partly of the ambient Air and not of I know not what substantial Form and it is both evident and remarkable what great variety of changes in Qualities and Productions of new ones the Fire that is a Body consisting of insensible parts that are variously and vehemently mov'd doth effect by its Heat that is by a modify'd Local Motion I consider further that various Operations of a Body may be deriv'd from the peculiar Texture of the Whole and the Mechanical Affections of the particular Corpuscles or other parts that compose it as we have often occasion to declare here and there in this Treatise and particularly by an Instance ere long to be further insisted on namely that though Vitriol made of Iron with a Corrosive liquor be but a factitious Body made by a convenient apposition of the small parts of the saline Menstruum to those of the Mettal yet this Vitriol will do most if not all of the same things that Vitriol made by Nature in the bowels of the Earth and digg'd out thence will perform and each of these Bodies may be endow'd with variety of differing Qualities which I see not why they must flow in the native Vitriol from a substantial Form since in the factitious Vitriol the same Qualities belong to a Form that does plainly emerge from the coalition of Metalline and Saline Corpuscles associated together and dispos'd of after a certain manner And lastly as to what is very confidently as well as plausibly pretended That a substantial Form is requisite to keep the parts of a Body united without which it would not be one
Body I answer That the contrivance of conveniently figur'd parts and in some cases their juxta-position may without the assistance of a substantial Form be sufficient for this matter for not to repeat what I just now mention'd concerning Vitriol made by Art whose Parts are as well united and kept together as those of the Native Vitriol I observe that a Pear grafted upon a Thorn or a Plum inoculated upon an Apricock will bear good fruit and grow up with the Stock as though they both made but one Tree and were animated but by the same common Form whereas indeed both the Stock and the inoculated or grafted Plant have each of them its o◠Form as may appear by the differing leaves and fruits and seeds they be◠And that which makes to our presen◠purpose is that even Vegetation and the Distribution of Aliments are in such cases well made though the nourish'd parts of the Total Plant if I may so ca◠it have not one common Soul or Form which is yet more remarkable in the Misletoes that I have seen growing upon old Hazletrees Crab-trees Apple-trees and other plants in which the Misletoe often differs very widely from that kind of Plant on which it grow and prospers And for the durableness◠of the Union betwixt Bodies that a substantial Form is not requisite to procure it I have been induc'd to think by considering that Silver and Gold being barely mingl'd by Infusion will ha◠their minute parts more closely united then those of any Plant or Animal tha◠we know of And there is scarce any Natural Body wherein the Form makes so strict durable and indissoluble an Union of the parts it consists of as that which in that Factitious Concrete we call Glass arises from the bare commistion of the Corpuscles of Sand with those Saline ones wherewith they are colliquated by the violence of the fire and the like may be said of the Union of the proper Accidents of Glasse with the Matter of it and betwixt one another To draw towards a Conclusion I know t is alledg'd as a main Consideration on the behalf of substantial Forms that these being in Natural Bodies the true principles of their Properties and consequently of their Operations their Natural Philosophy must needs be very imperfect and defective who will not take in such Forms but for my part I confess that this very consideration does rather indispose then incline me to admit them For if indeed there were in every Natural Body such a thing as a substantial Form from which all its Properties and Qualities immediately flow since we see that the Actions o◠Bodies upon one another are for the most part if not all immediately perform'd by their Qualities or Accidents it would scarce be possible to explicate very many of the explicable Phaenomen◠of Nature without having recourse to Them and it would be strange if many of the abstruser Phaenomena were not explicable by them onely Whereas indee◠almost all the rational Accounts to be met with of difficult Phaenomena are given by such as either do not acknowledge or at least do not take notice of substantial Forms And t is evident by the clear Solutions untouch'd by many vulgar Philosophers we meet with of many Phaenomena in the Staticks and other parts of the Mechanicks and especially in the Hydrostaticks and Pneumaticks how clearly many Phaenomena may be solv'd without imploying a substantial Form And on the other side I do not remember that either Aristotle himself who perhaps scarce ever attempted it or any of his Followers has given a solid and intelligible solution of any one Phaenomenon of Nature by the help of substantial Forms which you need not think it strange I should say since the greatest Patrons of Forms acknowledg their Nature to be unknown to Us to explain any Effect by a substantial Form must be to declare as they speak ignotum per ignotius or at least per aquè ignotum And indeed to explicate a Phaenomenon being to deduce it from something else in Nature more known to Us then the thing to be explain'd by It how can the imploying of Incomprehensible or at least Uncomprehended substantial Forms help Us to explain intelligibly This or That particular Phaenomenon For to say that such an Effect proceeds not from this or that Quality of the Agent but from its substantial Form is to take an easie way to resolve all difficulties in general without rightly resolving any one in particular and would make a rare Philosophy if it were not far more easie then satisfactory for if it be demanded why Jet attracts Straws Rhubarb purges Choller Snow dazles the Eyes rather then Grasse c. to say that these and the like Effects are perform'd by the substantial Forms of the respective Bodies is at best but to tell me what is the Agent not how the Effect is wrought and seems to be but such a kind of general way of answering as leaves the curious Enquirer as much to seek for the causes and manner of particular Things as Men commonly are for the particular causes of the several strang Things perform'd by Witchcraft though they be told that t is some Divel that does them all Wherefore I do not think but that Natural Philosophy without being for That the more Defective may well enough spare the Doctrine of Substantial Forms as an useless Theory not that Men are yet arriv'd to be able to explicate all the Phaenomena of Nature without them but because whatever we cannot explicate without them we cannot neither intelligibly explicate by them And thus Pyrophilus I have offer'd You some of those many things that indispos'd me to acquiesce in the receiv'd Doctrine of Substantial Forms but in case any more piercing Enquirer shall perswade himself that he understands it throughly and can explicate it clearly I shall congratulate him for such happy Intellectuals and be very ready to be inform'd by him But since what the Schools are wont to teach of the Origine and Attributes of substantial Forms is that which I confess I cannot yet comprehend and since I have some of the eminentest Persons among the Modern Philosophers to joine with me though perhaps not for the same Considerations in the like confession that t is not necessary the Reason of my not finding this Doctrine conceivable must be rather a Defectiveness in my Understanding then the unconceivable nature of the thing it self I who love not in matters purely Philosophical to acquiesce in what I do not understand nor to go about to explicate things to others by what appears to me it self inexplicable shall I hope be excus'd if leaving those that contend for them the liberty of making what use they can of substantial Forms I do till I be better satisfied decline imploying them my self and endeavour to solve those Phaenomena I attempt to give an account of without them as not scrupling to confess that those that I cannot explicate
not onely the generality of Refiners and Mineralists but divers of the most Judicious Cultivators of Chymistry it self hold Gold to be so fix'd a Body that it can as little be Volatiliz'd as Destroy'd and that upon This ground that the processes of subliming or distilling Gold to be met with in divers Chymical Books are either mystical or unpracticable or fallacious in which Opinion I think them not much mistaken though This I say be the perswasion even of some critical Chymists yet upon the just Expectation I had to find my Menstruum very operative upon Gold I attempted and found a way to Elevate it to a considerable height but far less proportion of Additament then one that were not fully perswaded of the possibility of Elevating Gold and though I have indeed found by two or three several Liquors especially the Aqua pugilum aenigmatically describ'd by Basilius that the Fixedness of Gold is not altogether invincible yet I found the Effect of these much inferior to that of our Mixture touching which I shall relate to You the easiest and shortest though not perhaps the very best manner of imploying it We take then the finest Gold we can procure and having either Granulated it or Laminated it we dissolve it in a moderate heat with a sufficient quantity of the Menstruum peracutum and having carefully decanted the Solution into a conveniently siz'd Retort we very gently in a Sand-Furnace distill off the Menstruum and if we have a mind to elevate the more Gold we either pour back upon the remaining substance the same Menstruum or which is better redissolve it with fresh the Liquor being abstracted we urge the remaining Matter by degrees of Fire and in no stronger a one then what may easily be given in a Sand Furnace a considerable quantity of the Gold will be Elevated to the upper part of the Retort and either fall down in a Golden colour'd Liquor into the Receiver or which is more usual fasten it self to the Top and Neck in the form of a Yellow or Reddish Sublimate and sometimes we have had the Neck of the Retort inrich'd with good store of large thin Chrystals not Yellow but Red and most like Rubies very glorious to behold though even these being taken out and suffer'd to lie a due time in the open Air would loose their saline Form and run per Deliquium into a Liquor Nor see I any cause to doubt but that by the Reaffusions of fresh Menstruum upon the dry Calx of Gold that stayes behind the whole Body of the Metal may be easily enough made to pass through the Retort though for a certain reason I forbore to prosecute the Experiment so far But here Pyrophilus I think my self oblig'd to interpose a Caution as well as to give you a further Information about our present Experiment For first I must tell You that though even Learned Chymists think it a sufficient proof of a true Tincture that not onely the colour of the Concrete will not be separated by Distillation but the extracting Liquor will pass over tincted into the Receiver yet this supposition though it be not unworthy of able men may in some cases deceive them And next I must tell You that whereas I scruple not in several Writings of mine to teach That the Particles of solid and consistent Bodies are not alwaies unfit to help to make up Fluid ones I shall now venture to say further That even a Liquor made by Distillation how volatile soever such Liquors may be thought may in part consist of Corpuscles of the most compact and ponderous Bodies in the World Now to manifest Both these things and to shew You withall the Truth of what I elsewhere teach That some Bodies are of so durable a Texture that their Minute parts will retain their own Nature notwithstanding variety of Disguizes which may impose not onely upon other men but upon Chymists themselves I will adde that to prosecute the Experiment I dropp'd into the Yellow Liquor afforded me by the Elevated Gold a convenient quantity of clean running Mercury which was immediately colour'd with a Golden colour'd Filme and shaking it to and fro till the Menstruum would guild no more when I suppos'd the Gold to be all praecipitated upon the Mercury I decanted the clarifi'd Liquor and mixing the remaining Amalgam if I may so call it of Gold and Mercury with several times its Weight of Borax I did as I expected by melting them in a small Crucible easily recover the scatter'd Particles of the Elevated Metal reduc'd into one little Mass or Bead of Corporal or Yellow though perhaps somewhat palish Gold But yet whether the Gold that tinged the Menstruum might not before the Metal was reduc'd or praecipitated out of it have been more succesfully apply'd to some considerable purposes then a bare Solution of Gold that hath never been Elevated may be a Question which I must not in this place determine and some other things that I have try'd about our Elevated Gold I have elsewhere taken notice of Onely this further Use I shall here make of this Experiment that whereas I speak in other Papers as if there may be a volatile Gold in some Oars and other Minerals where the Mine-men do not find any thing of that Metal I mention such a thing upon the Account of the past Experiment and some Analogies And therefore as I would not be understood to adopt what every Chymical Writer is pleas'd to fancie concerning Volatile Gold so I think Judicious men that are not so well acquainted with Chymical Operations are sometimes too forward to condemn the Chymists Observations not because their Opinions have nothing of Truth but because they have had the ill Luck not to be warily enough propos'd And to give an instance in the Opinion that some Minerals have a Volatile Gold and the like may be said of Silver I think I may give an Account rational enough of my admitting such a thing by explicating it thus That as in our Experiment though after the almost total abstraction of the Menstruum the remaining Body being true Gold and consequently in its own Nature fix'd yet it is so strictly associated with some volatile saline Particles that these being press'd by the fire carry up along with them the Corpuscles of the Gold which may be reduc'd into a Mass by the admistion of Borax or some other Body fitted to divorce the Corpuscles of the Metal from those that would Elevate them and to unite them into Grains too big and ponderous to be sublim'd so in some Mineral Bodies there may be pretty store of Corpuscles of Gold so minute and so blended with the unfix'd Particles that they will be carried up together with them by so vehement a heat as is wont to be imploy'd to bring Oars and even Metalline masses to Fusion And yet t is not impossible but that these Corpuscles of Gold that in ordinary Fusions fly away may be
remaining Masse some amends for it What we further did with this new or reproduced Concrete is not proper to be here told you onely for your satisfaction we have kept a Lump of it that you may with us take notice of what some Philosophers would call the Mindfulness of Nature which when a Body was deprived of a not inconsiderable portion of its chiefe Ingredient and had all its other parts dissipated and shuffled and discolour'd so as not to be knowable was able to rally those scatter'd and disguised parts and Marshal or dispose them into a Body of the former Consistence Colour c. though which is not here to be overlook'd the Contexture of Antimony by reason of the copious shining Styriae that enoble the darker Body be much more elaborate and therefore more uneasie to be restored then that of many other Concretes But among all my Tryals about the Redintegration of Bodies That which seem'd to succeed best was made upon Turpentine for having taken some Ounces of this very pure and good and put it into a Glass Retort I distill'd so long with a very gentle fire till I had separated it into a good quantity of very clear Liquor and a Caput mortuum very dry and brittle then breaking the Retort I powder'd the Caput mortuum which when it was taken out was exceeding sleek and transparent enough and very Red but being powder'd appear'd of a pure Yellow colour This Powder I carefully mixt vvith the Liquor that had been distill'd from it vvhich immediately dissolv'd part of it into a deep red Balsam but by further Digestion in a large Glass exquisitely stopt that Colour began to grovv fainter though the remaining part of the Povvder except a very little proportionable to so much of the Liquor as may be suppos'd to have been vvasted by Evaporation and Transfusion out of one Vessel into another be perfectly dissolv'd and so well reunited to the more fugitive parts of the Concrete that there is scarce any that by the smell or tast or consistence vvould take it for other then good and laudable Turpentine The I. Section of the Historical Part containing the Observations and beginning at pag 107. is misplac'd and ought to have come in here and have immediately preceded this II. Section containing the Experiments ADVERTISEMENTS about the ensuing II. SECTION THe Author would not have the Reader think that the following Experiments are the sole ones that he could have set down to the same purpose with them For they are not the onely that he had actually laid aside for this occasion till judging the ensuing ones sufficient for his present scope he thought it fitter to reserve Others for those Notes about the Production of particular Qualities to which they seem'd properly to belong Perhaps also it will be requisite for me because some Readers may think the Omission a little strange to excuse my having left divers particulars unmentioned in more then One of the ensuing Experiments And I confesse that I might easily enough both have taken notice of more Circumstances in them and made far more Reflections on them if I would have expatiated on the several Experiments according to the Directions deliver'd in other Papers But though there where t was my Design to give imployment to the Curiosity and Diligence of as many Votaries to Nature as for want of letter instructions had a mind to be so set on work it was fit the proposed Method should be suitable yet here where I deliver Experiments not so much as parts of Natural History as instances to confirm the Hypotheses and Discourses they are annexed to it seemed needlesse and improper if not impertinent to set down Circumstances Cautions Inferences Hints Applications and other Particulars that had no tendency to the scope for which the Experiments were alledged And as for the kind of Experiments here made choice of I have the less scrupled to pitch upon Chymical Experiments rather then Others on this occasion not onely because of those Advantages which I have ascrib'd to such Experiments in the latter part of the Preface to my Specimens but because I have been Encouraged by the success of the Attempt made in those Discourses For as new as it was when I made it four or five years ago and as unsual Thing as it could seem to divers Atomists and Cartesians That I should take upon me to Confirm and Illustrate the Notions of the Particularian Philosophy if I may so call it by the help of an Art whiâ—h many were pleas'd to thâ—ck cultivated but by Illiterate Oâ—erators or it hâ—msical Phâ—naticks in Philosophy and useful onely to maâ—e Medicines or Disguize Metals yet these Endeavours of ours met with much lesse opposition then new Attempts are most commonly fain to struggle with And in so short a time I have had the happiness to engage both divers Chymistâ—â— learn and relish the Notions of the Corpuscular Philosoâ—hy and divers eminent Embracers of That to endeavour to illustrate and promote the New Philosophy by addicting themselves to the Experiments and perusing the Books Chymists And I acknowledge it is not unwelcome to â—â— to have been in some â—â—ttle measure instrumental to mâ—â—â— the Corpuscularian Philosophy assisted by Chymistry preferred to that which has so long obtained in the Schâ—â—â— For not here to consider which â— elsewhere do how giâ—â— an Advantage That Philosophy by hath of This by having aâ— advantage of it in point of clearness though divers lâ—â—â—ned and worthy mâ—n that knew no better Principles hâ—â— in cultivating the Periâ—ateâ—ick Ones abundantly exercised and displaid their own Wit yet I fear they have very 〈◊〉 if at all improved their Readers Intellect or enricht it with any true or useful Knowledg of Nature but have rather taught him to Admire Their Subtlety then Understand Hers. For to ascribe all particular Phaenomena that seem any thing Difficult for abundance are not thought so that are so to substantial Forms and but nominally understood Qualities is so general and easie a way of resolving Difficulties that it allows Naturalists without Disparagement to be very Careless and Lazy if it do not make thâ—m so as in effect we may sâ—e that in about 2000 years since Aristotles time the Adorers of his Physicks at least by vertue of Hâ—s peculiar Principles seem to have done little more more then Wrangle without clearing up that I know of any mystery of Nature or producing any useful or noble Experiments whereas the Cultivators of the Particularian Phâ—losophy being obliged by the nature of their Hypothesis and their way of Reasoning to give the particular Accounts and Explications of particular Phaenomena of Nature are also obliged not onely to know the general Laws and Course of Nature but to enquire into the particular Structure of the Bodies they are conversant with as that wherâ—in for the most part their Power of acting and Disposition to be acted on does depend And in order to
this such Enquiries must take notice of Abundance of Minute Circumstances and to avoid mistaking the Causes of some of them must often Make and Vary Experiments by which means Nature comes to be much more diligently and in â—ustriously Studied and innumerable Particulars are discover'd and observed which in the Lazy Aristorelian way of Philosophizing would not be Heeded But to return to that Decad of Instances to which these Advertisements are premised I hope I need not make an Apology for making choice rather of Chymical Experiments then others in the second and concluding Section of the Historical Part of the present Treatise 〈◊〉 though I prefer that Kind of Instances yet I would not be thought to overvalue Them in their kind or to deny the some Artists may for ought I know be found to whose Chymical Arcana these Experiments may be little better theâ— Trifles Nor perhaps are these the considerablest that I my self could easily have communicated though these themselves would not be now Divulged if I would have been ruled by the Disswasions of such as would have nothing of Chymical made Common which they think Considerable But things of greater Value in themselves and of Noble Vse in Physick may be less Fit for our present purpose which is not to impart Medicinal or Alchymistical Processes but illustrate Philosophical Notions then such Experiments as these which besides that they containe Variety of Phaenomena do not for the most part require either much Time or much Charge or much Skill The II. SECTION containing the EXPERIMENTS Experiment I. TAke good and clear Oyl of Vitriol and cast into it a convenient quantity of good Camphire grosly beaten let it float there a while and without the help of external hear it will insenslibly be resolv'd into a Liquor which from time to time as it comes to be produc'd you may by shaking the Glass mingle with the Oyl of Vitriol whereunto you may by this means impart first a fine Yellow and then a colour which though it be not a true Red will be of kin to it and so very deep as to make the mixture almost quite Opacous When all the Camphire is perfectly dissolv'd by incorporating with the Menstruum if you hit upon good Ingredients and upon a right Proportion for a slight Mistake in either of them may make this part of the Experiment miscarry you may probably obtain such a mixture as I have more then once had namely such a one as not onely to me whose sense of Smelling is none of the Dullest but also to others that knew not of the Experiment seem'd not at all to have an Odour of the Camphire But if into this Liquor you pour a due quantity of fair Water you will see perhaps not without delight that in a trice the Liquor will become pale almost as at the first and the Camphire that lay conceal'd in the pores of the Menstruum will immediately disclose it self and emerge in its own nature and pristine form of white floating and combustible Camphire which will fill not the Viol onely but the neighbouring part of the Air with its strong and Diffusive Odour Now the Phaenomena of this Experiment may besides the uses we elsewhere make of it afford us several particulars pertinent to our present purpose I. For first we see a lighter and consistent Body brought by a Comminution into Particles of a certain figure to be kept swimming and mixed with a Liquor on which it floated before and which is by great odds heavier then it self so that as by the Solution of Gold in Aqua regis it appears that the ponperousest of Bodies if it be reduc'd to parts minute enough may be kept from sinking in a Liquor much lighter then it self So this Experiment of Ours manifests what I know not whether hitherto Men have prov'd That the Corpuscles of Lighter Bodies may be kept from emerging to the Top of a much heavier Liquor which Instance being added to that of the Gold may teach us that when Bodies are reduc'd to very minute parts we must as well consider their particular Texture as the receiv'd Rules of the Hydrostaticks in determining whether they will sink or float or swim II. This Experiment also shews that several Colours and even a very deep one may soon be produc'd by a White Body and a clear Liquor and that without the intervention of fire or any external heat III. And that yet this Colour may almost in the twinckling of an Eye be destroy'd and as it were annihilated and the Latitant Whiteness as many would call it may be as suddainly restor'd by the Addition of nothing but fair Water vvhich has no Colour of its ovvn upon vvhose account it might be surmis'd to be contrary to the perishing colour or to heighten the other into a Praedominancy nor does the Water take into its self either the Colour it destroy'd or That it restores For IV. The more then semi-opacity of the Solution of Camphire and Oyl of Vitriol does presently vanish and that Menstruum with the Water make up as soon as the Camphorate Corpuscles come to be a float one transparent and colourless Liquor V. And t is worth noting that upon the mixture of a Liquor which makes the Fluid much Lighter for so Water is in respect of Vitriol a Body is made to emerge that did not so when the Fluid was much heavier This Experiment may serve to countenance what we elsewhere argue against the Schools touching the Controversie about Mistion For whereas though some of them dissent yet most of them maintain that the Elements alwaies loose their Forms in the mix'd Bodies they constitute and though if they had dexterously propos'd their Opinion and limited their Assertions to some cases perhaps the Doctrine might be tolerated yet since they are wont to propose it crudely and universally I cannot but take notice how little t is favour'd by this Experiment wherein even a mix'd Body for such is Camphire doth in a further mistion retain its Form and Nature and may be immediately so divorced from the Body to which it was united as to turn in a trice to the manifest Exercise of its former Qualities And this Experiment being the easiest Instance I have devis'd of the preservation of a Body when it seems to be destroy'd and of the Recovery of a Body to its former Conditions I desire it may be takeâ— notice of as an instance I shall after have Occasion to have recourse to and make use of VI. But the notablest thing in the Experiment is that Odours should depend so much upon Texture that one of the subtlest and strongest sented Drugs that the East it self or indeed the World affords us should so soon quite loose its Odour by being mix'd with a Body that has scarce if at all any sensible Odour of its own and This while the Camphorate Corpuscles survive undestroy'd in a Liquor from whence one would think that lesse subtle and fugitive