^{page 373 note *} “Atqui Verulamius ille, qui Germanæ Philosophiæ Restitutor, quin etiam, si Superis placet, Parens a Brukero aliisque habetur, quid aliud in Anglia præstit, nisi, ut, qua ratione philosophari deberemus, eo tempore admoneret, quo Galilæus eadem ipsa ratione philosophari jam in Italia cœperat, ac cæteris, ut idem facerent, non modo verbis, verum et rebus ipsis gravissimus auctor esset?”—Fabroni, Vitœ Italorum doctrina excellentium qui sœculis xvii, et xviii, floruerunt, voi. i. p. 223.

——“C'est Galilee,” says a French Philosopher of the present day, “qui a montré l'art de l'interroger par l'expérience. On a souvent attribué cette gloire à Bacon; mais ceux qui lui en font honneur, ont été (à notre avis) un peu prodigues d'un bien qu'il ne leur appartenait peut-être pas de dispenser.”—Biographie Universelle, Tom. xvi. p. 329, Art; Galileo; written by M. Biot.

^{page 374 note *} There cannot be a stronger proof of the misapprehensions alluded to, than what is furnished in the following passage, of the interesting article above mentioned. “Si Bacon a eu tant de part aux découvertes qui se sont faites après lui dans les sciences, qu'on nous montre donc un seul fait, un seul résultat de son invention, qui soit de quelque utilité aujourd'hui: ou, si ses prin cipes généraux sont tellement feconds, qu'ils aient pu, comme on l'assure, lui faire pressentir un grand nombre de decouvertes modernes, il est présumable qu'on n'a pas encore épuisé tout ce que contient son Livre; et dans ce cas, ceux qui disent que nous lui devons tant de choses, devraient essayer d'en tirer d'avance quelques-unes des découvertes dont la methode de Galilee nous enrichit tous les jours.”—Biog. Universelle, in loc cit.

See Mr Stewart's Dissertation on the Progress of Metaphysical, Ethical, and Political Philosophy, prefixed to the Supplement to the Encyclopedia Britannica.

^{page 375 note †} See Professor Playfair's Dissertation on the Progress of Mathematical and Physical Science, prefixed to the same work.

^{page 376 note *} Quarterly Review, No. xxxiii, p. 50.—The writer of this article seems to have been anxious to find some great names to countenance what he has advanced in regard to the very inferior merits of Bacon's philosophical writings. What his success has been in this endeavour, the following extract will shew.

“I remember, said Sir Joshua Reynolds, that Mr Burke, speaking of Bacon's Essays, said, he thought them tlie best of his works. Dr Johnson was of opinion, that their excellence and their value consisted in their being observations of a strong mind operating upon life; and in consequence you find there what you seldom find in other works.”—Account of Sir Joshua Reynolds, prefixed to Malone's edition of his Discourses.

“We are glad,” the Reviewer adds, “to be able to defend our opinions concerning the inferior merite of Bacon's philosophical writings, Compared with his other works, from the charge of singularity or presumption, by sheltering ourselves under the authority of such names as Burke and Johnson.”

It is very observable, that, so far as Dr Johnson's authority is concerned, he does not appear, in the conversation referred to, to have made any comparison whatever between Bacon's Essays and his other works: he only made a remark descriptive of the Essays, in which every one who has perused them will readily concur; and besides, the Reviewer ought to have known, that Johnson has, in one of his papers in the Adventurer, represented Bacon as the only Modern worthy of being compared, in a philosophical point of view, with Newton; thereby showing, that he must have held the philosophical works of the former in the highest possible degree of estimation. Great as the excellence of the Essays undoubtedly is, it is difficult to believe, that such a man as Burke could deliberately rate them as of higher merit than the De Augmentis Scientiarum and Novum Organum. There is need of some better evidence, surely, that he had formed a deliberate opinion to that effect, than what is furnished by the scrap of conversation which forms the Reviewer's only document of proof.

^{page 378 note *} There is a curious letter upon this subject from Newton to Mr Oldenburg, Secretary of the Royal Society, printed in the account of Boyle, in the Historical Dictionary. His remarks apply wholly to a particular process of transmutation, and not to the impossibility of the thing itself. See General Historical and Critical Dictionary, vol. iii. p. 558.

^{page 378 note †} See Novum Organum, Lib. i. Aph. 85. 87.

^{page 378 note ‡} Novum Organum Lib. i. Aph. 70.

^{page 379 note *} Quarterly Review, No. xxxiii, p. 50.

^{page 381 note *} Quarterly Review, No. xxxiii, p. 52.

^{page 381 note †} Filum Labyrinthi, Works, vol. i, p. 400. 4to edit.

^{page 382 note *} Novum Organum, Lib. i. Aph 127.

^{page 384 note *} Hooke.—Posthumous Works, p. 6.

^{page 384 note †} See some admirable remarks on this subject, in the second volume of Mr Stewart's Philosophy of the Mind, Chap. 4. sect. 2.—On the induction of Aristotle compared with that of Bacon.

^{page 385 note *} Edinburgh Review, No. liii. p. 186.

^{page 385 note †} Novum Organ. Lib. i. Aph. 82. 95. 97. 125.

^{page 385 note ‡} Novum Organum. Lib. i. Aph. 98.

^{page 386 note *} Novum Organum, Lib. i. Aph. 63.

^{page 386 note †} Novum Organ. Lib. i. Aph. 117. Throughout the whole of the first book, the object of science is represented to be the discovery of Axioms; by which term Bacon evidently means those general laws or truths which form the basis of our physical reasonings. Newton, as Mr Stewart observes, has, after Bacon's example, applied the term Axiom to the laws of motion, and to the statement of certain general truths in Catoptrics and Dioptrics. See Philosophy of the Mind, vol. ii. Chap. 4. They who are engaged in the study of the Novum Organum, will derive much valuable information and assistance from the perusal of this part of Mr Stewart's work.

^{page 387 note *} Nov. Organ. Lib. i. Aph. 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105.

^{page 387 note †} Nov. Organ. Aph. 124. 129. He takes some pains bere and elsewhere to guard against the supposition that he valued science only as it was calculated to augment the outward accommodations of life.

^{page 388 note *} Of the Interpretation of Nature, Chap. i.—Works, vol. i. p. 376. 4to edit.

^{page 389 note *} Sir Thomas Bodley's Letter to Sir Francis Bacon about his cogitata et visa.-Bacon's Works, vol. iii. p. 242, 243, 244.

^{page 390 note *} Bailly.—Histoire de l'Astronomie Moderne, tom. ii. liv. 4. § 2.

^{page 390 note †} Lettres de M. Descartes, tom. iv. p. 201, Paris edit. 1724.

^{page 392 note *} Life of Bacon, prefixed to Rawley's Resuscitatio, or bringing to light several pieces of the Works of Lord Bacon.

^{page 392 note †} Ben Jonson's Discoveries.—Works, vol. vii. p. 100. Whalley's edition.

^{page 392 note ‡} Reliquiœ Wottonianœ, p. 299. 3d edition.

^{page 393 note *} Boyle's Works, vol. vi. p. 355.

^{page 393 note †} Bacon's Works, vol. iii. p. 584.

^{page 393 note ‡} Tennison's Baconiana, or certain Genuine Remains of Sir Francis Bacon, p. 206.

^{page 394 note *} Sprat's History of the Royal Society, p. 53; also p. 328.—This spirit appears to have made still greater progress at Cambridge. Glanvill, who became a student of Exeter College, Oxford, in 1652, “lamented,” says Anthony Wood, “that his friends did not send him to Cambridge; because, he used to say, that the new philosophy, and the art of philosophizing, were more cultivated there, than here at Oxford.”—Athen. Oxon. vol. ii. p. 662.—“After the way of free-thinking,” says Baker, “had been laid open by Lord Bacon, it was soon after greedily followed.” See his Reflections on Learning. This work was first published in 1699. The author, who was a Fellow of St John's College, Cambridge, was deeply read in the history of that University. His extensive collections upon that subject are deposited in the British Museum.

^{page 394 note †} Bacon's Letters to Sir Toby Matthew, in his Works, vol. iii. p. 247, 257.

^{page 394 note ‡} Introduction to Osborn's Miscellany of Essays, Paradoxes, and Discourses.

^{page 396 note *} Ross's Arcana Microcosmi, or the hid secrets of Man's body discovered; with a refutation of Lord Bacon's Natural History, p. 263, 264.

^{page 396 note †} Bacon's Works, vol. iii p. 584.

^{page 396 note ‡} See Boyle's Life, prefixed to his Works, p. 34. This Society was some-times called the Invisible College.—Works p. 40, 42.

^{page 397 note *} The Scepsis Scientifica is a republication, with some additions, of Glanvill's first philosophical work, The Vanity of Dogmatizing, published in 1661. The 20th chapter of this work contains a very distinct statement of the important doctrine so often ascribed to Mr Hume,—that we never perceive causation in the succession of physical events; a doctrine which fixes the object of physical science to be, not the investigation of the efficient causes of phenomena, but of the general laws by which they are regulated; and for which statement of its legitimate objects, it is always to be remembered, that physics is indebted to metaphysics. The Aristotelians were provoked by the free spirit of inquiry, and disregard of the authority of their Master, which this work disclosed; and an answer to it appeared in 1663, in a book entitled Sciri, sive Sceptices et Scepticorum à jure dispulationis exclusio. The author was Thomas Albius, (White), a secular priest of the Romish Church, and a noted Aristotelian. “Hobbes,” says A. Wood, “had a great respect for White, and when he lived in Westminster, he would often visit him, and he Hobbes; but they seldom parted in cool blood: for they would wrangle, squabble and scold about philosophical matters like young sophisters, though either of them was eighty years of age. Hobbes being obstinate, and not able to bear contradiction, those who were sometimes present at their wrangling disputes, held that the laurel was carried away by White.”—Athenœ Oxon. vol. ii. p 665. The Scepsis Scientifica has, appended to it, a reply to the animadversions contained in White's Sciri upon the Vanity of Dogmatizing.

History of the Royal Society, p. 144. Copies of this work were sent, by the Society, to foreign Princes, and other eminent persons abroad, in order to furnish them with an authentic account of its history. See Dr Birch's History of the Royal Society, vol. ii. p. 207.

^{page 398 note *} See his Account of his own Life, in a Letter published in the Appendix to Hearne's Preface to Langtoft's Chronicle, Number IX.

^{page 398 note †} See particularly p. 35. History of the Royal Society.

^{page 398 note ‡} Philosophical Transactions, No. 22. p. 391.—Mr Oldenburg frequently alludes to Bacon as the chief forwarder of experimental philosophy. “When our renowned Lord Bacon had demonstrated the methods for a perfect restoration of all parts of real knowledge, the success became on a sudden stupendous, and effective philosophy began to sparkle, and even to flow into beams of bright shining light all over the world.”—Pref. to Philosophical Transactions for 1672.—“Many of the chief Unversities in Christendom have formed themselves into philosophical societies, and have largely contributed their aids to advance Lord Bacon's design for the instauration of arts and sciences.”—Pref. to Philosophical, Transactions for 1677.

^{page 400 note *} Glanvills's Plus Ultra, p. 52.

^{page 400 note †} Plus Ultra p. 87, 88.—There are some who would fain persuade us, that the taste for experimental philosophy was introduced into England from the Continent, and that the first idea of the Royal Society was copied from similar associations abroad. This, certainly, was not the language of the founders and early historians of that Society. It is curious to remark, that while some of our own writers ascribe its origin, and the philosophical spirit which gave it birth, to foreign excitements, there are, on the other hand, foreign writers who trace the Academies of the Continent to the effects produced by the writings of Bacon. The following passage is extracted from a very learned History of one of the earliest of these Academies.—“Sed, quæ superest dicenda, Supremam, et, ut nobis videtur, proximam condendæ Academiæ enarrabimus occasionem. Scilicet postquam, ineunte circiter priori seculo, non inter Britannos solum, sed universi quoque orbis incolas, immortalitati commendatissimus, Franciscus Baco Verulamio, supremos regni Britannici Cancellarius, variis iisque ad sapientiæ normam elucubratissimis scriptis, utilissima emendandæ atque instaurandæ historiæ naturalis dedisset Consilia, et absolutissimis rationibus firmasset: non Angli modo haud incassum se moneri atque excitari passi sunt, sed exterœ quoque gentes, imprimis. Galli Italique, sanioris consilii patientes, tanta contentione cum qualibuscunque scientiis generatim, tum præcipue rerum naturalium studio animum intenderunt, adeo, ut ex ilio tempore visi sint homines nihil, vel remotissimis naturæ visceribus abstrusum, quod non captis ex Baconis mente experiments curiosius rimarentur, relicturi. Atque hic ardor hæc studia magnam quoque partem condiderunt Academiarum Societatumque hactenus memoratarum.” Buchneri, Academ. Naturœ Curiosor. Hist. cap. i. § 7.

^{page 402 note *} Power's Experimental Philosphy, p. 82.

^{page 402 note †} Philosophical Conferences, translated from the French, by G. Havers, in two volumes folio.

^{page 402 note ‡} Britannia Baconica, or the Natural Rarities of England, 1661, 8vo. “From this work,” says A. Wood, “Dr Plot took the hint of his Natural History of Oxfordshire.”

^{page 402 note ║} Athenœ Oxonienscs, vol. ii. p. 468.

^{page 403 note *} Evelyn's Numismata.

^{page 403 note †} See Glanvill's Plus Ultra, p. 57.

^{page 403 note ‡} Boyle's Works, vol. i. p. 305, 6.; vol. ii. p. 472.; vol. iii. p. 422.; vol. iv. p. 59, 246.; vol. v. p. 567.

^{page 404 note *} Boyle's Works, vol. vi. p 405.

^{page 404 note †} This letter is printed in the Life of Boyle, prefixed to his works, p. 63—“Dr Beale was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1662. Several of his papers are printed in the Transactions. He was a man of excellent parts, and great public spirit; and the character which his friend Mr Hartlib gave of him was, that there was no man in the island who could be made more universally useful,”—Birch's Hist. of the Royal Society, vol. iv. p. 235.

^{page 405 note *} Degerando—Histoire comparée des Systemes de Philosophie, tom. i. p. 396.—The introduction to Dr Pemberton's Account of Newton's Discoveries, a work, “the greater part of which was read and approved,” as we are told in the preface, by Newton himself, contains a summary of the doctrines of the Novum Organum; and its author is represented as the first who taught those rules of philosophizing which Newton followed, and which his discoveries so nobly confirmed.

^{page 405 note †} Maclaurin's Account of Newton's Discoveries, p. 59, 60.

^{page 406 note *} “I desire the reader to know, that after Mr Joseph Glanvill had written certain things against Aristotle, it was the desire of some scholars, that Robert Crosse, a noted philosopher after the ancient way, should be brought acquainted with him. In 1667, Glanvill was therefore conducted to his house, where Crosse did in a sufficient manner vindicate. Aristotle; and did plentifully declaim against the proceedings of the Royal Society. Glanvill being surprised, he did not then much oppose him; but afterwards he did, to the purpose; especially against this hypothesis of Crosse, that Aristotle had more advantages f or knowledge than the Royal Society, or all the present age had or could have, because he did totam peragrare Asiam.”—Athenœ Oxonienses, vol ii. p. 753. See the account which Glanvill himself gives of this conference, Plus Ultra, p. 4, 5.

^{page 406 note *} Athen. Oxon. vol. ii. p. 562, 563.

^{page 407 note *} Stubbe's Legends no Histories; or, a specimen of some animadversions upon the History of the Royal Society. Pref. 4to. Lond. 1670.

Stubbe's Epistolary Discourse concerning Phlebotomy, passim, 4to. Lond. 1671.

^{page 408 note †} Lord Bacon's Relation of the Sweating Sickness examined, p. 2. 4to. Lond. 1671.

^{page 408 note ‡} Legends no Histories, p. 29.

^{page 408 note ║} Lord Bacon's Relation of the Sweating Sickness examined, Pref. p. 5.

^{page 409 note *} Stubbe's Legends no Histories, p. 28.

^{page 410 note *} Dissertation on the Progress of Metaphysical, Ethical, and Political Philosophy, p. 58, 85.; prefixed to the Supplement to the Encyclopœdia Britannica.—These statements have been already questioned, in part, in the article of the Edinburgh Review before referred to. The able author ofthat article contends, that Bacon's fame was early and generally established throughout the Continent; but he admits, that it was late before any beneficial effects were produced by his philosophy.

^{page 411 note *} Epistle to Bishop Andrews, prefixed to An Advertisement touching an Holy War, written in 1622, and published by Dr Rawley in 1629, in a collection entitled, Certain Miscellany Works of Lord Bacon, 4to.

^{page 411 note †} Epistle to Bishop Andrews, prefixed to his Holy War.

^{page 411 note ‡} Bacon's Works, vol. iii. p. 677.

^{page 412 note *} Osborn's Miscellany of Essays, Paradoxes and Discourses, Preface.

^{page 412 note †} Dissertation, p. 158.

^{page 412 note ‡} Life, prefixed to Rawley's Resuscitatio, first published in 1657.

^{page 413 note *} Tennison's Baconiana, p. 229.—Dr Wats, in the Dedication prefixed to his translation of the De Augmentis Scientiarum, published in 1674, speaks of Bacon “as an author well known in the European world.”—Dr Shaw, in the Preface to his edition of Bacon's works, published in 1733, says, that “foreigners appear to have extolled him in a superlative manner.”

^{page 413 note †} Dissertation, p. 58.

^{page 414 note *} Chap. 9.—Troisième partie.—Bacon's Essays, and his Advancement of Learning; were translated into the French language a considerable time before his death. His Natural History, and New Atlantis, were translated into that language by Pierre D'Amboise in 1631. Bacon's works, says this writer, “deserve a place in all libraries, and to be ranked with the noblest literary monuments of antiquity.”

^{page 414 note †} La Vie de M. Descartes, par Baillet, tom. i. p. 147, 148. 4to.

^{page 415 note *} La Vie de M. Descartes, tom. i. p. 148.—Descartes was about thirty years of age at Bacon's death, and did not publish any of his principal works till several years after that period.

^{page 415 note †} La Vie de M. Descartes p. 149.

^{page 415 note ‡} Lettres de M. Descartes, tom. iv. p. 210. Paris edit. 1724.—It appears from the following passage in one of Sir Kenelm Digby's letters to Fermat, the rival of Descartes in mathematical science, that this eminent geometer was a great admirer of the works of Bacon: “Je ne sçaurois m'empécher de vous envoyer quelques vers que le plus grand genie de nôtre Isle pour les Muses écrivit au Chancelier Bacon, qui étoit son grand ami, et que vous témoignez étre fort le vôtre en le citant souvent.” 13. Fev. 1658.—Lettres de M. Fermat, p. 198. annexed to his Opera Mathematica.

^{page 416 note *} Lettre premiere à M. Descartes, prefixed to his Treatise on the Passions, Paris edit. 1726.

^{page 416 note †} Remarques sur la Methode de Descartes, p. 128, 129; annexed to his Discours de la Methode, Paris, 1724.

^{page 417 note *} Gassendi, Opera, tom. i.

^{page 417 note †} Gassendi's Life of Peiresc, Book vi. p. 207. of the English translation.

^{page 417 note ‡} Histoire de l'Astronomie Moderne, liv. iii. § 20.

^{page 418 note *} Birch's History of the Royal Society, vol. i. p. 27.

^{page 418 note †} Sorbierre, Relation d'un Voyage en Angleterre.

^{page 418 note ‡} “On peut dire que ce grand Chancelier est un de ceux qui ont les plus contribué à l'avancement des sciences.”—Journal des Savans, du 2. Mars, 1666.

^{page 418 note ║} Lib. i. cap. 3. § 7.; Lib. iii. cap. 6, 7, 8, 9.

^{page 418 note §} Fontenelle, Eloge de Du Hamel.

^{page 419 note *} D'Alembert, in his Preliminary Discourse, assumes, that Bacon's writings remained long unheeded, and then exerts his ingenuity to show how this result was to be expected. “La scholastique qui dominoit de son temps, ne pouvoit étre renversée que par des opinions hardies et nouvelles; et il n'y a pas apparence qu'un philosophe, qui se contente de dire,—Voilà le peu que vous avez appris, voici ce qu'il vous reste à chercher, soit destiné à faire beaucoup de bruit parmi ses contemporains.” But were not Bacon's opinions sufficiently bald, new, and animating, to attract the notice of an age already disposed to innovation? Did he not proclaim in the most energetic terms, that the whole of the antient systems and methods of philosophy must be abandoned as corrupt and incapable; that the true path to science had been delineated only by him; and that countless discoveries waited to reward those who should follow that path with free minds and regulated perseverance?

——“He try'd each art, reprov'd each dull delay,

Allur'd to brighter worlds, and led the way.”

^{page 419 note †} Tennison's Baconiana, p. 196, 197.

^{page 420 note *} “Elle est trop interessante,” says Niceron, who possessed the original letter, “et fait trop bien connoître la maniere de philosopher, qu'ils vouloient tous deux introduire, pour ne la point communiquer au publique.”—Memoires pour servir à l'histoire des Hommes Illustres, tom, iii. p. 43.

^{page 421 note *} Bacon's Works, vol. iii. p. 562.

^{page 421 note †} It was first published, I believe, by Isaac Gruter in 1653, in the collection entitled Fran. Baconi de Verulamio Scripta in Naturali et Universali Philosophia, 12mo, Amst. The pieces contained in this collection, were given to Gruter by Sir William Boswell, the English Ilesident in Holland, to whom Bacon had committed them by his will.

^{page 422 note *} See Bacon's Life, prefixed to Rawley's Rescuscitatio.

^{page 422 note †} Dissertation, p. 39.

^{page 422 note ‡} Realis Philosophiœ Epilogisticœ partes quatuor; hoc est, de rerum natura, heminum moribus, politica, et œconomica; cum adnot. Thob. Adami.

^{page 423 note *} “Ego quia in lumine Dei lumen videre visus sum, temperare mihi non potui, quin, advocato in auxilium Deo, novas naturalium hypotheses in novam methodum redigere, discipulisque Scholæ hujus dictare, tentarim. Non quod magni Veulamh Consilio (qui ab axiomatibus, antequam de omnibus et singulis pienæ per universam Naturam inductiones exstent, abstinendum esse censet) adversus ire vellem; sed ad capiendum interea experimentum, numnam ratione hac plus luminis, ad Naturæ arcana facilius observandum, inferri possit mentibus.”—Commenii, Physicœ ad lumen divinum reformatœ Synopsis, Præf.

In this work, also, Campanella is mentioned in conjunction with Bacon, for reasons which render the passage deserving of notice here. “Videat autem qui volet Campanellam et Verulamium (hos enim Hercules, qui debellandis monstris expurgandisque Augiæ stabulis, feliciter admoverunt manus commonstrasse; et illis, quos Aristotelicæ vanè turgidæ Philosophiæ dementatos tenet authoritas, opposuisse, sufficiat); et quam sæpè à vero aberrent Aristotelicæ assertiones, palpare poterit.”—Præf.

^{page 424 note *} Morhofi, Polyhistor, tom. ii. lib. 2. cap. 1.——Morhof gives the following notice of a work published in Hungary in 1663, in which an attempt was made to explain the principles of Bacon's philosophy. “Ex mente Verulamii quædam in sua universali methodo instituere voluit Johannes Bayerus, libro cui titulus: Filum Labyrinthi, sive Lux mentium universalis, cognoscendis, expendendis et communicandis universis rebus accensa. Verum obscurat potius Verulamii sensus omnemque philosophiam, quam ut lumen aliquod accendat.”—Polyhist. tom. i. lib. 2. cap. 7. The title of Bayer's work is, partly, that of one Bacon's philosophical fragments, (Filum Labyrinthi); and however imperfect his work may be as an exposition of Bacon's views, it shows that his philosophical writings had early engaged the attention of the learned, even in the more obscure parts of the Continent.

^{page 424 note †} Specimen. Controvers. Cap. i. sect. 5. apud Pope Blount—Censura Celeb. Author, p. 635.

^{page 424 note ‡} Buddei, Compendium Historiœ Philosophiœ p. 409, 410. Edit. 1731.