PREFACE TO THE HISTORIA SONI ET AUDITUS. THE following fragment was first published by Dr. Rawley in 1688, among the Opuscula Philosophica ; and as he does not mention it among the works composed by Bacon during the last five years of his life, we may conclude that it was written before the Sylva Sylvarum. It may have been the commencement of the "Tables de Sono" which, as we learn from the Commentarius Solutus, he was preparing in the summer of 1608. If so, it must have been meant for the second in the series, viz. Sylva, sive Carta Mater; whence its second title, "Sylva Soni et auditûs ;" and had it been proceeded with, the several tables-tabula essentiæ et præsentiæ, tabula absentiæ in proximo, tabula graduum, &c.-would have followed in order. As far as it goes however, it must be classed among the rough collections, not yet reduced to order for the use of the understanding, and appears to aim at precisely the same object as the investigation concerning Sound which occupies the greater part of the second and third centuries of the Sylva Sylvarum (101-290.); being itself in fact one of the Sylva of which the great Sylva was made up. By that investigation therefore it must be considered as superseded. I do not know that any inference of importance can be drawn from a comparison of the two; but to make the comparison easier, I have referred in the footnotes to the corre sponding passages of the Sylva Sylvarum. It will be seen that the order of the inquiry is entirely changed; so much so that I can hardly think Bacon had the Latin before him when he wrote the English; for in point of arrangement the Latin seems to be the more systematic of the two. J. S. HISTORIA ET INQUISITIO PRIMA DR SONO ET AUDITU, ET DE FORMA SONI ET LATENTE PROCESSU SONI; SIVE SYLVA SONI ET AUDITUS. De generatione soni, et prima percussione. De duratione soni, et de interitu et extinctione soni. De confusione et perturbatione soni. De adventitiis auxiliis et impedimentis soni. De hæsione soni, et varietate mediorum. De penetratione soni. De delatione soni, et directione seu fusione ejus, et de area quam occupat, simul, et separatim. De corporum diversitate quæ reddunt sonum, et instrumentis, et de speciebus soni quæ occurrunt. De multiplicatione, augmentatione, diminutione, et fractione sonorum. De repercussione soni, et echo. De conjugiis et dissidiis audibilium et visibilium, et aliarum, quas vocant, specierum spiritualium. De celeritate generationis et extinctionis soni, et tempore in quo fiunt. De affinitate, aut nulla affinitate, quam habet sonus cum motu aëris, in quo defertur, locali et manifesto. De communicatione aëris percussi et elisi cum aëre et corporibus vel spiritibus ipsorum ambientibus. De efformatione, sive articulatione soni. De ipsissima impressione soni ad sensum. De organo auditus, ejusque dispositione et indispositione, auxiliis et impedimentis. |