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hope, that by continuing the air longer time, the | cular inquiry made of them. It is certain, that an effect will follow: for that artificial conversion of water into ice, is the work of a few hours; and this of air may be tried by a month's space or the like. Experiments in consort touching induration of bodies.

Induration, or lapidification of substances more soft, is likewise another degree of condensation; and is a great alteration in nature. The effecting and accelerating thereof is very worthy to be inquired. It is effected by three means. The first is by cold; whose property is to condense and constipate, as hath been said. The second is by heat; which is not proper but by consequence; for the heat doth attenuate; and by attenuation doth send forth the spirit and moister part of a body; and upon that, the more gross of the tangible parts do contract and serre themselves together; both to avoid vacuum, as they call it, and also to munite themselves against the force of the fire, which they have suffered. And the third is by assimilation; when a hard body assimilateth a soft, being contiguous to it.

The examples of induration, taking them promiscuously, are many as the generation of stones within the earth, which at the first are but rude earth or clay; and so of minerals, which come, no doubt, at first of juices concrete, which afterwards indurate: and so of porcellane, which is an artificial cement, buried in the earth a long time; and so the making of brick and tile: also the making of glass of a certain sand and brake-roots, and some other matters; also the exudations of rock-diamonds and crystal, which harden with time; also the induration of bead-amber, whch is a soft substance: as appeareth by the flies and spiders which are found in it; and many more but we will speak of them distinctly.

83. For indurations by cold, there be few trials of it; for we have no strong or intense cold here on the surface of the earth, so near the beams of the sun, and the heavens. The likeliest trial is by snow and ice; for as snow and ice, especially being holpen and their cold activated by nitre, or salt, will turn water into ice, and that in a few hours; so it may be, it will turn wood or stiff clay into stone, in longer time. Put therefore into a conserving pit of snow and ice, adding some quantity of salt and nitre, a piece of wood, or a piece of tough clay, and let it lie a month or more.

84. Another trial is by metalline waters, which have virtual cold in them. Put therefore wood or clay into smith's water, or other metalline water, and try whether it will not harden in some reasonable time. But I understand it of metalline waters that come by washing or quenching; and not of strong waters that come by dissolution; for they are too corrosive to consolidate..

85. It is already found that there are some natural spring waters, that will inlapidate wood; so that you shall see one piece of wood, whereof the part above the water shall continue wood; and the part under the water shall be turned into a kind of gravelly stone. It is likely those waters are of some metalline mixture; but there would be more parti

egg was found, having lain many years in the bottom of a moat, where the earth had somewhat overgrown it; and this egg was come to the hardness of a stone, and had the colours of the white and yolk perfect, and the shell shining in small grains like sugar or alabaster.

86. Another experience there is of induration by cold, which is already found; which is, that metals themselves are hardened by often heating and quenching in cold water for cold ever worketh most potently upon heat precedent.

87. For induration by heat, it must be considered that heat, by the exhaling of the moister parts, doth either harden the body, as in bricks, tiles, &c. or if the heat be more fierce, maketh the grosser part itself run and melt; as in the making of ordinary glass; and in the vitrification of earth, as we see in the inner parts of furnaces, and in the vitrification of brick, and of metals. And in the former of these, which is the hardening by baking without melting, the heat hath these degrees; first, it indurateth, and then maketh fragile; and lastly it doth incinerate and calcinate.

88. But if you desire to make an induration with toughness, and less fragility, a middle way would be taken; which is that which Aristotle hath well noted; but would be thoroughly verified. It is to decoct bodies in water for two or three days; but they must be such bodies into which the water will not enter; as stone and metal: for if they be bodies into which the water will enter, then long seething will rather soften than indurate them; as hath been tried in eggs, &c. therefore softer bodies must be put into bottles, and the bottles hung into water seething, with the mouths open above the water, that no water may get in; for by this means the virtual heat of the water will enter; and such a heat, as will not make the body adust or fragile; but the substance of the water will be shut out. This experiment we made and it sorted thus. It was tried with a piece of free-stone, and with pewter, put into the water at large. The free-stone we found received in some water; for it was softer and easier to scrape than a piece of the same stone kept dry. But the pewter, into which no water could enter, became more white, and liker to silver, and less flexible by much. There were also put into an earthen bottle, placed as before, a good pellet of clay, a piece of cheese, a piece of chalk, and a piece of free-stone. The clay came forth almost of the hardness of stone; the cheese likewise very hard, and not well to be cut; the chalk and the free-stone much harder than they were. The colour of the clay inclined not a whit to the colour of brick, but rather to white, as in ordinary drying by the sun. Note, that all the former trials were made by a boiling upon a good hot fire, renewing the water as it consumed, with other hot water; but the boiling was but for twelve hours only; and it is like that the experiment would have been more effectual, if the boiling had been for two or three days, as we prescribed before.

89. As touching assimilation, for there is a de

gree of assimilation even in inanimate bodies, we see examples of it in some stones in clay-grounds, lying near to the top of the earth, where pebble is; in which you may manifestly see divers pebbles gathered together, and a crust of cement or stone

between them, as hard as the pebbles themselves; and it were good to make a trial of purpose, by taking clay, and putting in it divers pebble stones, thick set, to see whether, in continuance of time, it will not be harder than other clay of the same lump, in which no pebbles are set. We see also in ruins of old walls, especially towards the bottom, the mortar will become as hard as the brick; we see also that the wood on the sides of vessels of wine, gathereth a crust of tartar harder than the wood itself; and scales likewise grow to the teeth, harder than the teeth themselves.

90. Most of all, induration by assimilation appeareth in the bodies of trees and living creatures: for no nourishment that the tree receiveth, or that the living creature receiveth, is so hard as wood, bone, or horn, &c. but is indurated after by assimilation.

Experiment solitary touching the version of water

into air.

91.(The eye of the understanding is like the eye of the sense for as you may see great objects through small crannies, or levels; so you may see great axioms of nature through small and contemptible instances. The speedy depredation of air upon watery moisture, and version of the same into air, appeareth in nothing more visible, than in the sudden discharge or vanishing of a little cloud of breath or vapour from glass, or the blade of a sword, or any such polished body, such as doth not at all detain or imbibe the moisture; for the mistiness scattereth and breaketh up suddenly. But the like cloud, if it were oily or fatty, will not discharge; not because it sticketh faster; but because air preyeth upon water; and flame and fire upon oil; and therefore to take out a spot of grease they use a coal upon brown paper; because fire worketh upon grease or oil, as air doth upon water. And we see paper oiled, or wood oiled, or the like, last long moist; but wet with water, dry or putrify sooner. The cause is, for that air meddleth little with the moisture of oil.

Experiment solitary touching the force of union.

92. There is an admirable demonstration in the same trifling instance of the little cloud upon glass, or gems, or blades of swords, of the force of union, even in the least quantities, and weakest bodies, how much it conduceth to preservation of the present form, and the resisting of a new. For mark well the discharge of that cloud; and you shall see it ever break up, first in the skirts, and last in the midst. We see likewise, that much water draweth forth the juice of the body infused; but little water is imbibed by the body: and this is a principal cause, why in operation upon bodies for their version or alteration, the trial in great quantities doth not answer the trial in small; and so deceiveth many :

for that, I say, the greater body resisteth more any alteration of form, and requireth far greater strength in the active body that should subdue it. Experiment solitary touching the producing of feathers and hairs of divers colours.

93. We have spoken before, in the fifth instance, of the cause of orient colours in birds; which is by the fineness of the strainer; we will now endeavour to reduce the same axiom to a work. For this writing of our "Sylva Sylvarum" is, to speak properly, not natural history, but a high kind of natural magic. For it is not a description only of nature, but a breaking of nature into great and strange works. Try therefore the anointing over of pigeons, or other birds, when they are but in their down; or of whelps, cutting their hair as short as may be; or of some other beast; with some ointment that is not hurtful to the flesh, and that will harden and stick very close; and see whether it will not alter the colours of the feathers or hair. It is received, that the pulling off the first feathers of birds clean, will make the new come forth white: and it is certain that white is a penurious colour, and where moisture is scant. So blue violets, and other flowers, if they be starved, turn pale and white; birds and horses, by age or scars, turn white; and the hoar hairs of men come by the same reason. And therefore in birds, it is very likely, that the feathers that come first will be many times of divers colours, according to the nature of the bird, for that the skin is more porous; but when the skin is more shut and close, the feathers will come white. This is a good experiment, not only for the producing of birds and beasts of strange colours; but also for the disclosure of the nature of colours themselves; which of them require a finer porosity, and which a grosser.

Experiment solitary touching the nourishment of living creatures before they be brought forth.

94. It is a work of Providence, that hath been truly observed by some, that the yolk of the egg conduceth little to the generation of the bird, but only to the nourishment of the same; for if a chicken be opened, when it is new hatched, you shall find much of the yolk remaining. And it is needful, that birds that are shaped without the female's womb have in the egg, as well matter of nourishment, as matter of generation for the body. For after the egg is laid, and severed from the body of the hen, it hath no more nourishment from the hen, but only a quickening heat when she sitteth. But beasts and men need not the matter of nourishment within themselves, because they are shaped within the womb of the female, and are nourished continually from her body.

Experiments in consort touching sympathy and

antipathy for medicinal use.

95. It is an inveterate and received opinion, that cantharides applied to any part of the body, touch the bladder, and exulcerate it, if they stay on long. It is likewise received that a kind of stone, which

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96. It is received, and confirmed by daily experience, that the soles of the feet have great affinity with the head and the mouth of the stomach; as we see going wet-shod, to those that use it not, affecteth both applications of hot powders to the feet attenuate first, and after dry the rheum: and therefore a physician that would be mystical, prescribeth, for the cure of the rheum, that a man should walk continually upon a camomile-alley; meaning, that he should put camomile within his socks. Likewise pigeons bleeding, applied to the soles of the feet, ease the head: and soporiferous medicines applied unto them, provoke sleep.

they bring out of the West Indies, hath a peculiar | one from the other, than the dense or tangible parts: force to move gravel, and to dissolve the stone: and they are in all tangible bodies whatsoever, more insomuch, as laid but to the wrist, it hath so forci- or less; and they are never almost at rest; and bly sent down gravel, as men have been glad to from them, and their motions, principally proceed remove it, it was so violent. arefaction, colliquation, concoction, maturation, putrefaction, vivification, and most of the effects of nature: for, as we have figured them in our "Sapientia Veterum," in the fable of Proserpina, you shall in the infernal regiment hear little doings of Pluto, but most of Proserpina: for tangible parts in bodies are stupid things; and the spirits do in effect all. As for the differences of tangible parts in bodies, the industry of the chemists hath given some light, in discerning by their separations the oily, crude, pure, impure, fine, gross parts of bodies, and the like. And the physicians are content to acknowledge, that herbs and drugs have divers parts; as that opium hath a stupefactive part, and a heating part; the one moving sleep, the other a sweat following; and that rhubarb hath purging parts, and astringent parts, &c. But this whole inquisition is weakly and negligently handled. And for the more subtle differences of the minute parts, and the posture of them in the body, which also hath great effects, they are not at all touched; as for the motions of the minute parts of bodies, which do so great effects, they have not been observed at all; because they are invisible, and incur not to the eye; but yet they are to be deprehended by experience: as Democritus said well, when they charged him to hold, Of these things we shall speak more, when we that the world was made of such little motes, as were handle the title of sympathy and antipathy in the seen in the sun: Atomus," ," saith he, "necessitate proper place. rationis et experientiæ esse convincitur; atomum Experiment solitary touching the secret processes of mult in the parts of solid bodies, when they are enim nemo unquam vidit." And therefore the tu

97. It seemeth, that as the feet have a sympathy with the head, so the wrists and hands have a sympathy with the heart; we see the affects and passions of the heart and spirits are notably disclosed by the pulse and it is often tried, that juices of stock-gilly-flowers, rose-campian, garlick, and other things, applied to the wrists, and renewed, have cured long agues. And I conceive, that washing with certain liquors the palms of the hands doth much good and they do well in heats of agues, to hold in the hands eggs of alabaster and balls of crystal.

nature.

98. The knowledge of man hitherto hath been determined by the view or sight; so that whatsoever is invisible, either in respect of the fineness of the body itself, or the smallness of the parts, or of the subtilty of the motion, is little inquired. And yet these be the things that govern nature principally; and without which you cannot make any true analysis and indications of the proceedings of nature. The spirits or pneumaticals, that are in all tangible bodies, are scarce known. Sometimes they take them for vacuum; whereas they are the most active of bodies. Sometimes they take them for air; from which they differ exceedingly, as much as wine from water; and as wood from earth. Sometimes they will have them to be natural heat, or a portion of the element of fire; whereas some of them are crude and cold. And sometimes they will have them to be the virtues and qualities of the tangible parts which they see; whereas they are things by themselves. And then, when they come to plants and living creatures, they call them souls. And such superficial speculations they have; like prospectives, that show things inward, when they are but paintings. Neither is this a question of words, but infinitely material in nature. For spirits are nothing else but a natural body, rarified to a proportion, and included in the tangible parts of bodies, as in an integument. And they be no less differing

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compressed, which is the cause of all flight of bodies through the air, and of other mechanical motions, as hath been partly touched before, and shall be throughly handled in due place, is not seen at all. But nevertheless, if you know it not, or inquire it not attentively and diligently, you shall never be able to discern, and much less to produce, a number of mechanical motions. Again, as to the motions corporal, within the enclosures of bodies, whereby the effects, which were mentioned before, pass between the spirits and the tangible parts, which are arefaction, colliquation, concoction, maturation, &c. they are not at all handled. But they are put off by the names of virtues, and natures, and actions, and passions, and such other logical words.

Experiment solitary touching the power of heat.

99. It is certain, that of all powers in nature heat is the chief; both in the frame of nature, and in the works of art. Certain it is likewise, that the effects

of heat are most advanced, when it worketh upon a body without loss or dissipation of the matter; for that ever betrayeth the account. And therefore it is true, that the power of heat is best perceived in distillations, which are performed in close vessels and receptacles. But yet there is a higher degree; for howsoever distillations do keep the body in cells and cloisters, without going abroad, yet they give space unto bodies to turn into vapour; to return

into liquor; and to separate one part from another. So as nature doth expatiate, although it hath not full liberty; whereby the true and ultimate operations of heat are not attained. But if bodies may be altered by heat, and yet no such reciprocation of rarefaction, and of condensation, and of separation, admitted; then it is like that this Proteus of matter, being held by the sleeves, will turn and change into many metamorphoses. Take therefore a square

vessel of iron, in form of a cube, and let it have good thick and strong sides. Put into it a cube of wood, that may fill it as close as may be; and let it have a cover of iron, as strong at least as the sides; and let it be well luted, after the manner of the chemists. Then place the vessel within burning coals, kept quick kindled for some few hours' space. Then take the vessel from the fire, and take off the cover, and see what is become of the wood. I conceive, that since all inflammation and evaporation are utterly prohibited, and the body still turned upon itself, that one of these two effects will follow: either that the body of the wood will be turned into a kind of amalgama, as the chemists call it; or that the finer part will be turned into air, and the grosser stick as it were baked, and incrustate upon the sides of the vessel, being become of a denser matter than the wood itself crude. And for another trial, take also water, and put it in the like vessel, stopped as before; but use a gentler heat, and remove the vessel sometimes from the fire; and again, after some small time, when it is cold, renew the heating of it; and repeat this alteration some few times and if you can once bring to pass, that the water, which is one of the simplest of bodies, be changed in colour, odour, or taste, after the manner of compound bodies, you may be sure that there is a great work wrought in nature, and a notable entrance made into strange changes of bodies and productions; and also a way made to do that by fire, in small time, which the sun

and age do in long time. But of the admirable effects of this distillation in close, for so we will call it, which is like the wombs and matrices of living creatures, where nothing expireth nor separateth, we will speak fully, in the due place; not that we aim at the making of Paracelsus's pygmies, or any such prodigious follies; but that we know the effects of heat will be such, as will scarce fall under the conceit of man, if the force of it be altogether kept in. Experiment solitary touching the impossibility of annihilation.

100. There is nothing more certain in nature than that it is impossible for any body to be utterly annihilated; but that as it was the work of the omnipotency of God to make somewhat of nothing, so it requireth the like omnipotency to turn somewhat into nothing. And therefore it is well said by an obscure writer of the sect of the chemists, that there is no such way to effect the strange transmutations of bodies, as to endeavour and urge by all means the reducing of them to nothing. And herein is contained also a great secret of preservation of bodies from change; for if you can prohibit, that they neither turn into air, because no air cometh to them; nor go into the bodies adjacent, because they are utterly heterogeneal; nor make a round and circulation within themselves; they will never change, though they be in their nature never so perishable or mutable. We see how flies, and spiders, and the like, get a sepulchre in amber, more durable than the monument and embalming of the body of any king. And I conceive the like will be of bodies put into quicksilver. But then they must be but thin, as a leaf, or a piece of paper or parchment; for if they have a great crassitude, they will alter in their own body, though they spend not. But of this we shall speak more when we handle the title of conservation of bodies.

CENTURY II.

Experiments in consort touching Music. MUSIC, in the practice, hath been well pursued, and in good variety; but in the theory, and especially in the yielding of the causes of the practice, very weakly; being reduced into certain mystical subtilties of no use and not much truth. We shall, therefore, after our manner, join the contemplative and active part together.

101. All sounds are either musical sounds, which we call tones; whereunto they may be an harmony; which sounds are ever equal; as singing, the sounds of stringed and wind instruments, the ringing of bells, &c.; or immusical sounds, which are ever unequal; such as are the voice in speaking, all whisperings, all voices of beasts and birds, except they be singing-birds, all percussions of stones, wood, parchment, skins, as in drums, and infinite others.

102. The sounds that produce tones, are ever from such bodies as are in their parts and pores equal; as well as the sounds themselves are equal; and such are the percussions of metal, as in bells; of glass, as in the fillipping of a drinking glass; of air, as in men's voices whilst they sing, in pipes, whistles, organs, stringed instruments, &c.; and of water, as in the nightingale pipes of regals, or organs, and other hydraulics; which the ancients had, and Nero did so much esteem, but are now lost. And if any man think, that the string of the bow and the string of the viol are neither of them equal bodies, and yet produce tones, he is in an error. For the sound is not created between the bow or plectrum and the string; but between the string and the air; no more than it is between the finger or quill and the string in other instruments. So there are, in effect, but three percussions that create tones;

percussions of metals, comprehending glass and the | the ancients esteemed, and so do myself and some like, percussions of air, and percussions of water.

103. The diapason or eight in music is the sweetest concord, insomuch as it is in effect an unison: as we see in lutes that are strung in the base strings with two strings, one an eight above another; which make but as one sound. And every eighth note in ascent, as from eight to fifteen, from fifteen to twentytwo, and so in infinitum, are but scales of diapason. The cause is dark, and hath not been rendered by any; and therefore would be better contemplated. It seemeth that air, which is the subject of sounds, in sounds that are not tones, which are all unequal, as hath been said, admitteth much variety; as we see in the voices of living creatures; and likewise in the voices of several men, for we are capable to discern several men by their voices; and in the conjugation of letters, whence articulate sounds proceed; which of all others are most various. But in the sounds which we call tones, that are ever equal, the air is not able to cast itself into any such variety; but is forced to recur into one and the same posture or figure, only differing in greatness and smallness. So we see figures may be made of lines, crooked and straight, in infinite variety, where there is inequality; but circles, or squares, or triangles equilateral, which are all figures of equal lines, can differ but in greater or lesser.

104. It is to be noted, the rather lest any man should think, that there is any thing in this number of eight, to create the diapason, that this computation of eight is a thing rather received, than any true computation. For a true computation ought ever to be by distribution into equal portions. Now there be intervenient in the rise of eight, in tones, two bemolls, or half-notes: so as if you divide the tones equally, the eight is but seven whole and equal notes; and if you subdivide that into halfnotes, as it is in the stops of a lute, it maketh the number of thirteen.

105. Yet this is true, that in the ordinary rises and falls of the voice of man, not measuring the tone by whole notes, and half-notes, which is the equal measure, there fall out to be two bemolls, as hath been said, between the unison and the diapason: | and this varying is natural. For if a man would endeavour to raise or fall his voice, still by half-notes, like the stops of a lute; or by whole notes alone without halfs, as far as an eight; he will not be able to frame his voice unto it. Which showeth, that after every three whole notes, nature requireth, for all harmonical use, one half-note to be interposed.

106. It is to be considered, that whatsoever virtue is in numbers, for conducing to concent of notes, is rather to be ascribed to the ante-number, than to the entire number; as namely, that the sound returneth after six or after twelve; so that the seventh or the thirteenth is not the matter, but the sixth or the twelfth; and the seventh and the thirteenth are but the limits and boundaries of the return.

107. The concords in music which are perfect or semi-perfect, between the unison and the diapason, are the fifth, which is the most perfect; the third next; and the sixth, which is more harsh: and, as

other yet, the fourth which they call diatessaron. As for the tenth, twelfth, thirteenth, and so in infinitum, they be but recurrences of the former, viz. of the third, the fifth, and the sixth; being an eight respectively from them.

108. For discords, the second and the seventh are of all others the most odious, in harmony, to the sense; whereof the one is next above the unison, the other next under the diapason: which may show, that harmony requireth a competent distance of notes.

109. In harmony, if there be not a discord to the base, it doth not disturb the harmony, though there be a discord to the higher parts; so the discord be not of the two that are odious; and therefore the ordinary concent of four parts consisteth of an eight, a fifth, and a third to the base; but that fifth is a fourth to the treble, and the third is a sixth. And the cause is, for that the base striking more air, doth overcome and drown the treble, unless the discord be very odious; and so hideth a small imperfection. For we see, that in one of the lower strings of a lute, there soundeth not the sound of the treble, nor any mixt sound, but only the sound of the base.

110. We have no music of quarter-notes; and it may be they are not capable of harmony: for we see the half-notes themselves do but interpose sometimes. Nevertheless we have some slides or relishes of the voice or strings, as it were continued without notes, from one tone to another, rising or falling, which are delightful.

111. The causes of that which is pleasing or ingrate to the hearing, may receive light by that which is pleasing or ingrate to the sight. There be two things pleasing to the sight, leaving pictures and shapes aside, which are but secondary objects; and please or displease but in memory; these two are colours and order. The pleasing of colour symbolizeth with the pleasing of any single tone to the ear; but the pleasing of order doth symbolize with harmony. And therefore we see in garden-knots, and the frets of houses, and all equal and well answering figures, as globes, pyramids, cones, cylinders, &c. how they please; whereas unequal figures are but deformities. And both these pleasures, that of the eye, and that of the ear, are but the effects of equality, good proportion, or correspondence: so that, out of question, equality and correspondence are the causes of harmony. But to find the proportion of that correspondence, is more abstruse; whereof notwithstanding we shall speak somewhat, when we handle tones, in the general inquiry of sounds.

112. Tones are not so apt altogether to procure sleep as some other sounds; as the wind, the purling of water, humming of bees, a sweet voice of one that readeth, &c. The cause whereof is, for that tones, because they are equal and slide not, do more strike and erect the sense than the other. And overmuch attention hindereth sleep.

113. There be in music certain figures or tropes, almost agreeing with the figures of rhetoric, and with the affections of the mind, and other senses. First, the division and quavering, which please so

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