impetum restitutionis exstinguet. Itaque planum jam fecimus, istam virtutem spatiationis ex calore et frigore in parte notabili non pendere, cum tamen sit ipsa illa virtus, quæ plurimum authoritatis his principiis tribuerit. Sequuntur duæ virtutes quæ omnibus in ore sunt, atque longe et late patent, per quas scilicet corpora massas sive congregationes majores rerum connaturalium petunt; in quarum observatione, ut in reliquis, aut nugantur homines aut plane aberrant. Schola enim communis satis habet, si motum naturalem a violento distinguat; et gravia deorsum, levia sursum ferri ex motu naturali pronuntiet. Verum parum proficiunt ad philosophiam hujusmodi speculationes. Ista enim natura, ars, violentia, compendia verborum sunt et nugæ. Debuerunt autem hunc motum non tantum ad naturam referre, sed etiam affectum et appetitum particularem et proprium corporis naturalis in hoc ipso motu quærere. Sunt enim et alii motus complures naturales ex passionibus rerum longe diversis. Itaque res secundum differentias proponenda est. Quin et ipsi illi motus quos violentos appellant magis secundum naturam appellari possint, quam iste quem vocant naturalem; si sit illud magis secundum naturam quod est fortius, aut etiam quod est magis ex ratione universi. Nam motus iste adscensus et descensus non admodum imperiosus est, nec etiam universalis, sed tanquam provincialis et secundum regiones; quin et aliis motibus obsequens et subjectus. Quod vero gravia deorsum ferri aiunt, levia sursum, idem est ac si dicerent, gravia esse gravia, levia levia. Quod enim prædicatur, id ex vi ipsa termini in subjecto assumitur. Si vero per grave densum, per leve rarum intelligunt, promovent nonnihil; ita tamen ut ad adjunctum et concomitans, potius quam ad causam, rem deducant. Qui vero gravium appetitum ita explicant, ut ad centrum terræ illa ferri contendant, levia ut ad circumferentiam et ambitum cœli, tanquam ad loca propria; asserunt certe aliquid, atque etiam ad causam innuunt, sed omnino perperam. Loci enim nullæ sunt vires, neque corpus nisi a corpore patitur, atque omnis incitatio corporis, quæ videtur esse ad se collocandum, appetit atque molitur configurationem versus aliud corpus, non collocationem aut situm simplicem.

1

So in the original; but the ut ought probably to be omitted. — J. S.

NEW ATLANTIS.1

'The Thema Cali, had it stood by itself, would have followed here; for it belongs properly to this class, and was written before the New Atlantis. But being so closely connected with the Descriptio Globi Intellectualis, which belongs to the next, it was thought better not to separate them.-J. S.

PREFACE.

THE New Atlantis seems to have been written in 1624, and, though not finished, to have been intended for publication as it stands. It was published accordingly by Dr. Rawley in 1627 at the end of the volume containing the Sylva Sylvarum; for which place Bacon had himself designed it, the subjects of the two being so near akin; the one representing his idea of what should be the end of the work which in the other he supposed himself to be beginning. For the story of Solomon's House is nothing more than a vision of the practical results which he anticipated from the study of natural history diligently and systematically carried on through successive generations.

In this part of it, the work may probably be considered as complete. Of the state of Solomon's House he has told us all that he was as yet qualified to tell. His own attempts to "interpret nature" suggested the apparatus which was necessary for success: he had but to furnish Solomon's House with the instruments and preparations which he had himself felt the want of. The difficulties which had baffled his single efforts to provide that apparatus for himself suggested the constitution and regulations of a society formed to overcome them: he had but to furnish Solomon's House with the helps in head and hand which he had himself wished for. His own intellectual aspirations suggested the result: he had but to set down as known all that he himself most longed to know. But here he was obliged to stop. He could not describe the process of a perfect philosophical investigation; because it must of course have proceeded by the method of the Novum Organum, which was not yet expounded. Nor could he give a particular example of the result of such investigation, in the shape of a Form or an Axiom; for that presupposed the completion, not only of the Novum Organum, but (at least in some one subject)

of the Natural History also; and no portion of the Natural History complete enough for the purpose was as yet producible. Here therefore he stopped; and it would almost seem that the nature of the difficulty which stood in his way had reminded him of the course he ought to take; for just at this point (as we learn from Dr. Rawley) he did in fact leave his fable and return to his work. He had begun it with the intention of exhibiting a model political constitution, as well as a model college of natural philosophy; but "his desire of collecting the natural history diverted him, which he preferred many degrees before it." And in this, according to his own view of the matter, he was no doubt right; for though there are few people now who would not gladly give all the Sylva Sylvarum had there been ten times as much of it, in exchange for an account of the laws, institutions, and administrative arrangements of Bensalem, it was not so with Bacon; who being deeper read in the phenomena of the human heart than in those of the material world, probably thought the perfect knowledge of nature an easier thing than the perfect government of men, easier and not so far off; and therefore preferred to work where there was fairest hope of fruit.

To us, who can no longer hope for the fruits which Bacon expected, the New Atlantis is chiefly interesting as a record of his own feelings. Perhaps there is no single work of his which has so much of himself in it. The description of Solomon's House is the description of the vision in which he lived, the vision not of an ideal world released from the natural conditions to which ours is subject, but of our own world as it might be made if we did our duty by it; of a state of things which he believed would one day be actually seen upon this earth such as it is by men such as we are; and the coming of which he believed that his own labours were sensibly hastening. The account of the manners and customs of the people of Bensalem is an account of his own taste in humanity; for a man's ideal, though not necessarily a description of what he is, is almost always an indication of what he would be; and in the sober piety, the serious cheerfulness, the tender and gracious courtesy, the open-handed hospitality, the fidelity in public and chastity in private life, the grave and graceful manners, the order, decency, and earnest industry, which prevail among these people, we recognise an image of himself