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ness.

He stood sufficiently upon his state and great- | mitted none to his cabinet council, but those that For in great battles he would sit at home had their fortunes wholly depending upon him. He was moderately furnished with good literain the head-quarter, and manage all things by messages, which wrought him a double benefit. First, ture, and the arts; but in such sort as he applied that it secured his person more, and exposed him his skill therein to civil policy. For he was well the less to danger. Secondly, that if at any time read in history; and was expert in rhetoric, and his army was worsted, he could put new spirit the art of speaking. And because he attributed into them with his own presence, and the addition much to his good stars, he would pretend more of fresh forces, and turn the fortune of the day. than an ordinary knowledge in astronomy. As In the conducting of his wars, he would not only for eloquence, and a prompt elocution, that was follow former precedents, but he was able to de- natural to him and pure. vise and pursue new stratagems, according as the accidents and occasions required.

He was dissolute, and propense to voluptuousness and pleasures; which served well at first He was constant, and singularly kind, and in- for a cover to his ambition. For no man would dulgent in his friendships contracted. Notwith-imagine, that a man so loosely given could harstanding, he made choice of such friends, as a bour any ambitious and vast thoughts in his heart. man might easily see, that he chose them rather Notwithstanding, he so governed his pleasures, to be instruments to his ends, than for any good- that they were no hinderance either to his profit will towards them. And whereas, by nature, or his business; and they did rather whet than and out of a firm resolution, he adhered to this dull the vigour of his mind. He was temperate principle; not to be eminent amongst great and at his meals; free from niceness and curiosity in deserving men, but to be chief amongst the infe- | his lusts; pleasant and magnificent at public inriors and vassals; he chose only mean and active | terludes. men, and such as to whom himself might be all in all. And hereupon grew that saying, "So let Cæsar live, though I die;" and other speeches of that kind. As for the nobility, and those that were his peers, he contracted friendship with such of them as might be useful to him; and ad

Thus being accomplished, the same thing was the means of his downfall at last, which in his beginnings was a step to his rise; I mean, his affection of popularity; for nothing is more popular than to forgive our enemies; through which, either virtue or cunning, he lost his life.

A

CIVIL CHARACTER OF AUGUSTUS CÆSAR.

WRITTEN IN LATIN BY HIS LORDSHIP, AND ENGLISHED BY DR. RAWLEY,

AUGUSTUS CÆSAR, if ever any mortal man, was endued with a greatness of mind, undisturbed with passions, clear and well ordered; which is evidenced by the high achievements which he performed in his early youth. For those persons which are of a turbulent nature or appetite, do commonly pass their youth in many errors; and about their middle, and then and not before, they show forth their perfections: but those that are of a sedate and calm nature may be ripe for great and glorious actions in their youth. And whereas the faculties of the mind, no less than the parts and members of the body, do consist and flourish in a good temper of health, and beauty, and strength; so he was in the strength of the mind inferior to his uncle Julius; but the health and beauty of the mind superior. For Julius being of an unquiet and uncomposed spirit, as those who are troubled with the falling sickness for the most part are. Notwithstanding, he carried on

But Augustus, as a man

his own ends with much moderation and discre-
tion; but he did not order his ends well, pro-
posing to himself vast and high designs above the
reach of a mortal man.
sober and mindful of his mortality, seemed to
propound no other ends to himself than such as
were orderly and well-weighed and governed by
reason.

For first he was desirous indeed to have the rule and principality in his hands: then he sought to appear worthy of that power which he should acquire: next, to enjoy a high place he accounted but a transitory thing: lastly, he endeavoured to do such actions as might continue his memory and leave an impression of his good government to after ages. And, therefore, in the beginning of his age, he affected power; in the middle of his age, honour and dignity; in the decline of his years, ease and pleasure; and in the end of his life, he was wholly bent to memory posterity.

and

THE PRAISE OF

HENRY, PRINCE OF WALES,

BY FRANCIS BACON.

WRITTEN IN LATIN BY HIS LORDSHIP. AND TRANSLATED BY DR. BIRCH. *

men.

HENRY, Prince of Wales, eldest son of the King | highly valued by him; and he breathed himself of Great Britain, happy in the hopes conceived of something warlike. He was much devoted to him, and now happy in his memory, died on the the magnificence of buildings and works of all 6th of Nov. 1612, to the extreme concern and re-kinds, though in other respects rather frugal; and gret of the whole kingdom, being a youth who was a lover both of antiquity and arts. He showhad neither offended nor satiated the minds of ed his esteem of learning in general more by the He had by the excellence of his disposition countenance which he gave to it, than by the time excited high expectations among great numbers of which he spent in it. His conduct in respect of all ranks; nor had through the shortness of his morals did him the utmost honour; for he was life disappointed them. One capital circumstance thought exact in the knowledge and practice of added to these was, the esteem in which he was every duty. His obedience to the king his father commonly held, of being firm to the cause of re- was wonderfully strict and exemplary: towards ligion: and men of the best judgment were fully the queen he behaved with the highest reverence: persuaded, that his life was a great support and to his brother he was indulgent; and had an ensecurity to his father from the danger of conspira- tire affection for his sister, whom he resembled in cies; an evil, against which our age has scarce person as much as that of a young man could the found a remedy; so that the people's love of re- beauty of a virgin. The instructors of his younger ligion and the king overflowed to the prince: and | years (which rarely happens) continued high in this consideration deservedly heightened the sense his favour. In conversation he both expected a of the loss of him. His person was strong and proper decorum, and practised it. In the daily erect; his stature of a middle size; his limbs well business of life and the allotment of hours for the made; his gait and deportment majestic; his face several offices of it, he was more constant and relong and inclining to leanness: his habit of body gular than is usual at his age. His affections and full; his look grave, and the motion of his eyes passions were not strong, but rather equal than rather composed than spirited. In his counte- warm. With regard to that of love, there was a nance were some marks of severity, and in his air wonderful silence, considering his age, so that ne some appearance of haughtiness. But whoever passed that dangerous time of his youth, in the looked beyond these outward circumstances, and highest fortune, and in a vigorous state of health, addressed and softened him with a due respect and without any remarkable imputation of gallantry. seasonable discourse, found the prince to be gra- In his court no person was observed to have any cious and easy; so that he seemed wholly differ- ascendant over him, or strong interest with him · ent in conversation from what he was in appear- and even the studies, with which he was most deance, and in fact raised in others an opinion of him- | lighted, had rather proper times assigned them, self very unlike what his manner would at first than were indulged to excess, and were rather rehave suggested. He was unquestionably ambi-peated in their turns, than that any one kind of tious of commendation and glory, and was strong- them had the preference of and controlled the ly affected by every appearance of what is good and rest: whether this arose from the moderation of his honourable; which in a young man is to be con- temper, and that in a genius not very forward, but sidered as virtue. Arms and military men were ripening by slow degrees, it did not yet appear * He says, "The following translation is an attempt, for the what would be the prevailing object of his inclisake of the English reader, to give the sense of the original, nation. He had certainly strong parts, and was without pretending to reach the force and conciseness of ex-endued both with curiosity and capacity; but in pression peculiar to the great writer as well as to the Roman language."

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speech he was slow, and in some measure hesi

covered by the sagacity of any person, but by time only, which was denied him; but what appeared were excellent, which is sufficient for his fame.

tating. But whoever diligently observed what fel! | the prince some things obscure, and not to be disfrom him, either by way of question or remark, saw it to be full to the purpose, and expressive of no common genius. So that under that slowness and infrequency of discourse, his judgment had more the appearance of suspense and solicitude to determine rightly, than of weakness and want of apprehension. In the mean time he was wonderfully patient in hearing, even in business of the greatest length; and this with unwearied attention, so that his mind seldom wandered from the subject, or seemed fatigued, but he applied himself wholly to what was said or done: which (if his life had been lengthened) promised a very superior degree of prudence. There were indeed in

He died in the 19th year of his age of an obstinate fever, which during the summer, through the excessive heat and dryness of the season, unusual to islands, had been epidemical, though not fatal, but in autumn became more mortal. Fame which, as Tacitus says, is more tragical with respect to the deaths of princes, added a suspicion of poison: but as no signs of this appeared, especially in his stomach, which uses to be chiefly affected by poison, this report soon vanished.

MISCELLANEOUS TRACTS.

[TRANSLATED FROM THE LATIN.]

THOUGHTS ON THE NATURE OF THINGS.*

Of the Division of Bodies, of Continuity, and a
Vacuum.

THOUGHT I.

THE theory of Democritus relating to atoms is, if not true, at least applicable with excellent effect to the exposition of nature. For it is not easy, except on the hypothesis of atomic particles, either to grasp in thought, or express in words, the real exility of parts in nature, such as it is discoverable in objects themselves.

Now, the term atom is taken in two senses, not materially different from one another. It is taken either to signify the ultimate term, the minutest subdivision, in the section or breaking down of bodies; or a corpuscle containing in it no vacuum. As relates to the first, the two following principles may be safely and surely laid down. The first is, that there exists in objects an attenuation and minuteness of particles, far exceeding all that falls under ocular observation. The second is, that it is not carried to infinity, or endless divisibility. For if one heedfully attend, he will find that the corpuscles composing bodies which possess continuity, far transcend in subtility those which are found in broken and discontinuous Thus we see a little saffron, intermixed and stirred in water, (a cask of water for instance,) impart to it such a tincture, that even by the eye it is easy distinguishable from pure water. The particles of the saffron thus disseminated through the water, certainly exceed in fineness the most impalpable powder. This will become still clearer, if you mingle with the water a small portion of Brazilian-wood ground to a powder, or of pomegranate flowers, or of any other very high coloured substance, yet which wants the susceptibility of saffron to diffuse itself in liquids, and incorporate with them.

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powder, but an atom, as Democritus said himself, no one either has seen or can possibly see. But this dispersion of substance presents itself in a still more surprising light in odours. For if a little saffron can tinge and impregnate a whole cask of water, a little civet does so to a spacious chamber, and to a second, and a third successively. And let none imagine that odours can be propagated like light, or heat and cold, without a stream of effluvia from the substance, since we may observe that odours are tenacious of solids, of woods, of metallic substances, and for no inconsiderable time, and that they can be extracted and cleansed away from these, by the process of rubbing and washing. But that in these and similar cases, the subtilization is not carried to infinity, no man in his senses will dispute, since this sort of radiation or diffusion is confined to certain spaces, and local boundaries, and to certain quantities of substance, as is very conspicuous in the abovementioned instances.

As relates to atom in its second sense, which presupposes the existence of a vacuum, and builds its definition of atom on the absence of the vacuum; it was an excellent and valuable distinction which Hero so carefully drew, when he denied the existence of a vacuum coacervatum, (or. fully formed,) and affirmed a vacuum commistum (or interstitial vacuum.) For when he saw that there was one unbroken chain of bodies, and that no point of space would be discovered or instanced, which was not replenished with body; and much more, when he perceived that bodies weighty and massive tended upwards, and as it were repudiated and violated their natures rather than suffer complete disruption from the contiguous body; he came to the full determination that nature abhorred a vacuum of the larger description, or a vacuum coacervatum. On the other hand, when It was therefore absurd to take atoms to be those he observed the same quantity of matter composminute particles which are visible by the aid of ing a body in a state of contraction and coarctathe sun's light. For these are of the nature of a tion, and again in one of expansion and dilatation, * This is the translation of my friend Wm. G. Glen.—[B. M.] | occupying and filling unequal spaces, sometimes

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subtilty of nature. Let him reflect that things,
in their units and their aggregates, are equally
mastered by calculation. For, one expresses or
conceives with the same facility a thousand years
and a thousand moments, though years are com-
And, again,
posed of multitudes of moments.
let no one think that such studies are matter of
speculative curiosity, rather than connected with
practical effects and uses. For, it is ́observable,
that almost all the philosophers and others, who
have most intensely busied themselves, who have
probed nature to the quick, as it were, in the pro-
cess of experiment and practical detail; have
been led on to such investigations, though unfor-

smaller, sometimes greater, he did not see in what | in these and similar investigations, none be overmanner this going out and in of corpuscles, in re-powered or despair, because of the surpassing ference to their position in that body, could exist, except in consequence of an interspersed vacuum, contracting on the compression, and enlarging on the relaxation, of the body. For it was clear that this contraction of necessity was produced in one of three ways; either in that which we have specified, namely, the expulsion of a vacuum by means of pressure, or the extrusion of some other body previously incorporated, or the possession by bodies of some natural virtue (whatever it might be) of concentration and diffusion within themselves. As relates to the extrusion of the rarer | body, it is a mode of reasoning that involves us in an endless series of such expulsions. For true it is, that sponges and the like porous substances,tunate in the mode of conducting them. Nor contract by the ejection of the air. But with re- does there exist a more powerful and more certain spect to air itself, it is clear from manifold experi- cause of that utter barrenness of utility which ments that it can be condensed in a known space. distinguishes the philosophy of the day, than its Are we then to suppose that the finer part of air ambitious affectation of subtilty about mere words itself may be thus eliminated by compressure, or vulgar notions, while it has neither pursued and of the eliminated part another part, and so on nor planned a well supported investigation of the to infinity? For it is a fact most decidedly ad-subtilty of nature.

verse to such an opinion, that, the rarer bodies are,

Particles.
II.

The theories and maxims of Pythagoras were, for the most part, better adapted to found a peculiar order of religionists, than to open a new school in philosophy, as was verified by the event.

they are susceptible of the more contraction; when Of the equality or inequality of Atoms, or seminal the contrary ought to be the fact, if contraction was performed by expressing the rarer portion of the substance. As to that other mode of solution, namely, that the same bodies without farther alteration undergo various degrees of rarity and density, it is not worthy of elaborate attention. It seems to be an arbitrary dictum, depending on no For, that system of training prevailed cognisable reason, or intelligible principle, like the generality of the dogmas of Aristotle. There and flourished more under the sway of the Maniremains then the third way, the hypothesis of a chæan heresy and Mahomedan superstition, than vacuum. Should any one object to this, that it among philosophic individuals. Notwithstanding appears a difficult and even impossible supposi- this, his opinion that the world was composed of tion, that there should exist an interspersed vacu-numbers, may be taken in a sense in which it ity, where body is everywhere found; if he will goes deep into the elementary principles of naFor, there are (as indeed there may be) only reflect calmly and maturely on the instances ture. we have just adduced, of water imbued with saf-two doctrines with respect to atoms or seminal fron, or air with odours, he will readily discover particles; the one that of Democritus, which that no portion of the water can be pointed out ascribes to atoms inequality one to another, figure, where there is not the saffron, and yet it is mani- and, in virtue of figure, position; the other, that fest, by comparing the saffron and the water pre-of Pythagoras, perhaps, which affirms them to be vious to their intermixture, that the bulk of the all precisely equal and alike. Now, he who water exceeds by many times the bulk of the saf- ascribes to atoms equality, necessarily makes fron. Now, if so subtile an interspersion is found all things depend on numbers; while he who to take place in different bodies, much more is clothes them with other attributes, admits, in Such interspersion possible in the case of a body addition to mere numbers, or modes of assemblage, certain primitive properties inherent in and a vacuum. Yet the theory of Hero, a mere experimentalist, single atoms. Now, the practical question collafell short of that of the illustrious philosopher, teral to the theoretical one, and which ought to Democritus, in this particular point, namely, that determine its limits, is this, which Democritus Hero, not finding in this our globe a vacuum coa-proposes: whether all things can be made out of cervatum, denied it, therefore, absolutely. Now, all? To me, however, this question appears not there is nothing to hinder the existence of a complete vacuity in the tracts of air, where there are, undoubtedly, greater diffusions of substances.

And let me give this once the admonition, that,

to have been maturely weighed, if it be understood as referring to an immediate transmutation of bodies. It is, whether all things do not pass through an appointed circuit and succession of

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