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The chapter immediately following the Inventory; being
the 11th in order; a part thereof.
It appeareth then what is now in proposition not by
general circumlocution but by particular note. No former philosophy varied
in terms or method; no new placet or speculation upon particulars
already known; no referring to action by any manual of practice; but the
revealing and discovering of new inventions and operations. This to be done
without the errors and conjectures of art, or the length or difficulties of
experience; the nature and kinds of which inventions have been described as
they could be discovered; for your eye cannot pass one kenning without
further sailing; only we have stood upon the best advantages of the notions
received, as upon a mount, to shew the knowledges adjacent and confining.
If therefore the true end of knowledge not propounded hath bred large
error, the best and perfectest condition of the same end not perceived will
cause some declination. For when the butt is set up men need not rove, but
except the white be placed men cannot level. This perfection we mean not in
the worth of the effect, but in the nature of the direction; for our
purpose is not to stir up men's hopes, but to guide their travels. The
fullness of direction to work and produce any effect consisteth in two
conditions, certainty and liberty. Certainty is when the direction is not
only true for the most part, but infallible. Liberty is when the direction
is not restrained to some definite means, but comprehendeth all the means
and ways possible; for the poet saith well Sapientibus undique latae
sunt viae, and where there is the greatest plurality of change, there
is the greatest singularity of choice. Besides as a conjectural direction
maketh a casual effect, so a particular and restrained direction is no less
casual than an uncertain. For those particular means whereunto it is tied
may be out of your power or may be accompanied with an overvalue of
prejudice; and so if for want of certainty in direction you are frustrated
in success, for want of variety in direction you are stopped in attempt. If
therefore your direction be certain, it must refer you and point you to
somewhat which, if it be present, the effect you seek will of necessity
follow, else may you perform and not obtain. If it be free, then must it
refer you to somewhat which if it be absent the effect you seek will of
necessity withdraw, else may you have power and not attempt. This notion
Aristotle had in light, though not in use. For the two commended rules by
him set down, whereby the axioms of sciences are precepted to be made
convertible, and which the latter men have not without elegancy surnamed
the one the rule of truth because it preventeth deceit, the other the rule
of prudence because it freeth election, are the same thing in speculation
and affirmation which we now observe. An example will make my meaning
attained, and yet percase make it thought that they attained it not. Let
the effect to be produced be Whiteness; let the first direction be that if
air and water be intermingled or broken in small portions together,
whiteness will ensue, as in snow, in the breaking of the waves of the sea
and rivers, and the like. This direction is certain, but very particular
and restrained, being tied but to air and water. Let the second direction
be, that if air be mingled as before with any transparent body, such
nevertheless as is uncoloured and more grossly transparent than air itself,
that then &c. as glass or crystal, being beaten to fine powder, by the
interposition of the air becometh white; the white of an egg being clear of
itself, receiving air by agitation becometh white, receiving air by
concoction becometh white; here you are freed from water, and advanced to a
clear body, and still tied to air. Let the third direction exclude or
remove the restraint of an uncoloured body, as in amber, sapphires, &c.
which beaten to fine powder become white; in wine and beer, which brought
to froth become white. Let the fourth direction exclude the restraint of a
body more grossly transparent than air, as in flame, being a body
compounded between air and a finer substance than air; which flame if it
were not for the smoke, which is the third substance that incorporateth
itself and dyeth the flame, would be more perfect white. In all these four
directions air still beareth a part. Let the fifth direction then be, that
if any bodies, both transparent but in an unequal degree, be mingled as
before, whiteness will follow; as oil and water beaten to an ointment,
though by settling the air which gathereth in the agitation be evaporate,
yet remaineth white; and the powder of glass or crystal put into water,
whereby the air giveth place, yet remaineth white, though not so perfect.
Now are you freed from air, but still you are tied to transparent bodies.
To ascend further by scale I do forbear, partly because it would draw on
the example to an over-great length, but chiefly because it would open that
which in this work I determine to reserve; for to pass through the whole
history and observation of colours and objects visible were too long a
digression; and our purpose is now to give an example of a free direction,
thereby to distinguish and describe it; and not to set down a form of
interpretation how to recover and attain it. But as we intend not now to
reveal, so we are circumspect not to mislead; and therefore (this warning
being given) returning to our purpose in hand, we admit the sixth direction
to be, that all bodies or parts of bodies which are unequal equally, that
is in a simple proportion, do represent whiteness; we will explain this,
though we induce it not. It is then to be understood, that absolute
equality produceth transparence, inequality in simple order or proportion
produceth whiteness, inequality in compound or respective order or
proportion produceth all other colours, and absolute or orderless
inequality produceth blackness; which diversity, if so gross a
demonstration be needful, may be signified by four tables; a blank, a
chequer, a fret, and a medley; whereof the fret is evident to admit great
variety. Out of this assertion are satisfied a multitude of effects and
observations, as that whiteness and blackness are most incompatible with
transparence; that whiteness keepeth light, and blackness stoppeth light,
but neither passeth it; that whiteness or blackness are never produced in
rainbows, diamonds, crystals, and the like; that white giveth no dye, and
black hardly taketh dye; that whiteness seemeth to have an affinity with
dryness, and blackness with moisture; that adustion causeth blackness, and
calcination whiteness; that flowers are generally of fresh colours, and
rarely black, &c. All which I do now mention confusedly by way of
derivation and not by way of induction. This sixth direction, which I have
thus explained, is of good and competent liberty for whiteness fixed and
inherent, but not for whiteness fantastical or appearing, as shall be
afterwards touched. But first do you need a reduction back to certainty or
verity; for it is not all position or contexture of unequal bodies that
will produce colour; for aqua fortis, oil of vitriol, &c.
more manifestly, and many other substances more obscurely, do consist of
very unequal parts, which yet are transparent and clear. Therefore the
reduction must be, that the bodies or parts of bodies so intermingled as
before be of a certain grossness or magnitude; for the unequalities which
move the sight must have a further dimension and quantity than those which
operate many other effects. Some few grains of saffron will give a tincture
to a tun of water; but so many grains of civet will give a perfume to a
whole chamber of air. And therefore when Democritus (from whom Epicurus did
borrow it) held that the position of the solid portions was the cause of
colours, yet in the very truth of his assertion he should have added, that
the portions are required to be of some magnitude. And this is one cause
why colours have little inwardness and necessitude with the nature and
proprieties of things, those things resembling in colour which otherwise
differ most, as salt and sugar, and contrariwise differing in colour which
otherwise resemble most, as the white and blue violets, and the several
veins of one agate or marble, by reason that other virtues consist in more
subtile proportions than colours do; and yet are there virtues and natures
which require a grosser magnitude than colours, as well as scents and
divers other require a more subtile; for as the portion of a body will give
forth scent which is too small to be seen, so the portion of a body will
shew colours which is too small to be endued with weight; and therefore one
of the prophets with great elegancy describing how all creatures carry no
proportion towards God the creator, saith, That all the nations in
respect of him are like the dust upon the balance, which is a thing
appeareth but weigheth not. But to return, there resteth a further freeing
of this sixth direction; for the clearness of a river or stream sheweth
white at a distance, and crystalline glasses deliver the face or any other
object falsified in whiteness, and long beholding the snow to a weak eye
giveth an impression of azure rather than of whiteness. So as for whiteness
in apparition only and representation by the qualifying of the light,
altering the intermedium, or affecting the eye itself, it reacheth
not. But you must free your direction to the producing of such an
incidence, impression, or operation, as may cause a precise and determinate
passion of the eye; a matter which is much more easy to induce than that
which we have passed through; but yet because it hath a full coherence both
with that act of radiation (which hath hitherto been conceived and termed
so unproperly and untruly by some an effluxion of spiritual species and by
others an investing of the intermedium with a motion which
successively is conveyed to the eye) and with the act of sense, wherein I
should likewise open that which I think good to withdraw, I will omit.
Neither do I contend but that this motion which I call the freeing of a
direction, in the received philosophies (as far as a swimming anticipation
could take hold) might be perceived and discerned; being not much other
matter than that which they did not only aim at in the two rules of
Axioms before remembered, but more nearly also in that which they
term the form or formal cause, or that which they call the true difference;
both which nevertheless it seemeth they propound rather as impossibilities
and wishes than as things within the compass of human comprehension. For
Plato casteth his burden and saith that he will revere him as a God,
that can truly divide and define; which cannot be but by true forms and
differences. Wherein I join hands with him, confessing as much as yet
assuming to myself little; for if any man call by the strength of his
anticipations find out forms, I will magnify him with the foremost.
But as any of them would say that if divers things which many men know by
instruction and observation another knew by revelation and without those
means, they would take him for somewhat supernatural and divine; so I do
acknowledge that if any man can by anticipations reach to that which a weak
and inferior wit may attain to by interpretation, he cannot receive too
high a title. Nay I for my part do indeed admire to see how far some of
them have proceeded by their anticipations; but how? it is as I
wonder at some blind men, to see what shift they make without their
eye-sight; thinking with myself that if I were blind I could hardly do it.
Again Aristotle's school confesseth that there is no true knowledge but by
causes, no true cause but the form, no true form known except one, which
they are pleased to allow; and therefore thus far their evidence standeth
with us, that both hitherto there hath been nothing but a shadow of
knowledge, and that we propound now that which is agreed to be worthiest to
be sought, and hardest to be found. There wanteth now a part very
necessary, not by way of supply but by way of caution; for as it is seen
for the most part that the outward tokens and badges of excellency and
perfection are more incident to things merely counterfeit than to that
which is true, but for a meaner and baser sort; as a dubline is more like a
perfect ruby than a spinel, and a counterfeit angel is made more like a
true angel than if it were an angel coined of China gold; in like manner
the direction carrieth a resemblance of a true direction in verity and
liberty which indeed is no direction at all. For though your direction seem
to be certain and free by pointing you to a nature that is unseparable from
the nature you inquire upon, yet if it do not carry you on a degree or
remove nearer to action, operation, or light to make or produce, it is but
superficial and counterfeit. Wherefore to secure and warrant what is a true
direction, though that general note I have given be perspicuous in itself
(for a man shall soon cast with himself whether he be ever the nearer to
effect and operate or no, or whether he have won but an abstract or varied
notion) yet for better instruction I will deliver three particular notes of
caution. The first is that the nature discovered be more original than the
nature supposed, and not more secondary or of the like degree; as to make a
stone bright or to make it smooth it is a good direction to say, make it
even; but to make a stone even it is no good direction to say, make it
bright or make it smooth; for the rule is that the disposition of any thing
referring to the state of it in itself or the parts, is more original than
that which is relative or transitive towards another thing. So evenness is
the disposition of the stone in itself, but smooth is to the hand and
bright to the eye, and yet nevertheless they all cluster and concur; and
yet the direction is more unperfect, if it do appoint you to such a
relative as is in the same kind and not in a diverse. For in the direction
to produce brightness by smoothness, although properly it win no degree,
and will never teach you any new particulars before unknown; yet by way of
suggestion or bringing to mind it may draw your consideration to some
particulars known but not remembered; as you shall sooner remember some
practical means of making smoothness, than if you had fixed your
consideration only upon brightness by making reflexion, as thus, make it
such as you may see your face in it, this is merely secondary, and helpeth
neither by way of informing nor by way of suggestion. So if in the inquiry
of whiteness you were directed to make such a colour as should be seen
furthest in a dark light; here you are advanced nothing at all. For these
kinds of natures are but proprieties, effects, circumstances, concurrences,
or what else you shall like to call them, and not radical and formative
natures towards the nature supposed. The second caution is that the nature
inquired be collected by division before composition, or to speak more
properly, by composition subaltern before you ascend to composition
absolute, &c.
[@ Works III, 235-41]
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