SCALA INTELLECTUS.

INTRODUCTION.*

THEY who have not acquiesced in the doctrines and positions of the ancients, whether from a firmness of mind, as is sometimes the case; or from a levity of temper, which more frequently happens; generally defend their procedure with this argument; that though they relinquish antiquity, yet they produce such things of their own as are perfectly agreeable to sense and that if other men were not awed by authority, and durst trust to themselves, they would easily come over to this side. But for our own part, we neither offer violence to the senses by contradiction, nor destroy them by abstraction; but have supplied them with a much larger fund of

The following Introduction is collected from certain scattered fragments . the Scripta, published by Gruter.

matter than others. We would correct their errors by various administrations, enlarge their powers, improve their judgment, condemn their illusions, and by bringing reason into a due frame, confirm, strengthen, and guard them; thus endeavouring to perform what others only profess; and really defend, confirm and improve the senses: the tendency of our whole philosophy being little more than to free and restore them.*

Yet we promise ourselves no great influence upon the belief of men; because our method agrees with none of those that have gone before us; but proceeds quite contrary thereto. For they who before us, being sick of the doctrine of the ancients, applied to sense and experience, as to a thing almost entirely new; have, generally, at first made some enquiries with vigour and resolution, under the conduct of the senses; and seized upon those things which seemed to them of a more general nature: and from such detached parcels of experiments they immediately proceeded to form theories; and thus philoso phized by starts, with narrow views; and judged of all things by a few.

This imperfect method of philosophizing is, however, often successful, in gaining credit, from the narrowness of the mind, which is principally

* See the Novum Organum, Part II.

moved by such things as strike and enter it at once; and being desirous of acquiescing in some one thing, either neglects all the rest; or else, in a certain imperceptible manner, supposes that all things else are correspondent to those few which naturally fill and distend the imagination.

We, on the contrary, who desire to introduce not handfuls of experiments, or little detached systems of things; but the whole universe with its works, as formed by the great creator; and aim to pronounce according to the truth and result of things; scarce know which way to turn ourselves, or on what side to solicit our entrance into the mind, and gain a credit to what we are about. For the things we have to offer go deep er than notions; and spread wider than partial experiments. Whence it must necessarily hap→ pen, that the greatest part of what we deliver will not satisfy the over-hasty and quick apprehensions of sense; to which some of our doctrines will appear hard and incredible, almost like points of religion. For the senses certainly deceive us; though not when duly rectified and assisted. We therefore enter upon a new way of delivering ourselves, agreeable to the work we have in hand; and proceed, not by disputing, or by producing a few scattered experiments; both which ways might frustrate our end, as our determinations are neither founded upon notions,

nor upon maimed and divided experience: but we use experiments collectively; lead the mind, in a continued chain, to the fountain of things; and set to view the whole process of the understanding, with the advantages and uses to be derived therefrom. Those therefore, who either rest upon arguments, or depend upon a few experiments, or, through a narrowness of mind, submit to authorities, or for want of opportunity, cannot give our works their due perusal, and must not expect to comprehend our meaning.

It would be a difficult task to confute those who will have nothing to be knowable; even though we candidly interpret the expression. For if any one should maintain that true knowledge is the knowledge of causes; and that the knowledge of causes is continually rising and climbing, in a certain series, to things the best known in nature; so that a knowledge of particulars cannot be properly had without an exact comprehension of universal nature; it is not easy, on the footing of sound judgment, to maintain the contrary. For it seems improbable, that any true knowledge can be had, till the mind is perfectly versed in the explanation of causes: and to attribute a complete knowledge of the universe to the human mind, might seem rash and injudicious.

On the other hand, the patrons of this opinion, without explaining themselves in this way, have ventured to profane the oracles of the senses; which is bringing things to the utmost despair. But to say the truth, though they had not thus calumniated the senses, yet the dispute might seem to be contentious, and unseasonable; since without that precise truth they seem to mean, there is such a wide field left open to human industry, as makes it preposterous, and almost madness to be solicitous about securing the extremities of things; and at the same time overlooking, and disregarding things of such infinite use as lie in the middle. For how much soever they would seem to destroy the certainty, and yet retain the use of knowledge, by their distinction betwixt truth and probability; and with regard to the active part, leave a free choice of things; yet by taking away the hopes of discovering truth, they have doubtless cut the sinews of enquiry; and by a confused licentiousness in their own searches, turned the business of invention and discovery into disputes, and the exercise of the wit.

We cannot however deny, that if we have any fellowship with the ancients, it is principally in this their kind of philosophy; as we approve many of the things they have prudently observed, and delivered, upon the deceptions of the