NATURAL HISTORY.

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 practic, 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 there may be an harmony; which sounds are ever equal; as singing, the sounds of stringed and wind instruments, the ringing of bells, etc. 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 mens voices whilst they sing, in pipes, whistles, organs, stringed instruments, etc. 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

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are, in effect, but three percussions that create tones; percussions of metals, comprehending glass and the like, percussions of air, and percussions of water.

103. THE diapason or eight in music is the sweetest concord, in so much 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 twenty-two, and so in infinitum, are but scales of diapason. The cause is dark, and hath not been rendred 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 beemolls, 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 half-notes, 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 beemolls, 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 sheweth, that after every three whole notes, nature requireth, for all harmonical use, one half-note to be interposed.

106. Ir 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 semiperfect, 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 the ancients esteemed, and so do myself and some 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 shew, 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, etc. 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 corre 'spondence, is more abstruse; whereof notwithstanding we shall speak somewhat, when we handle tones, in the general enquiry 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, etc. 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 much in music, have an agreement with the glittering of light; as the moon-beams playing upon a wave. Again, the falling from a discord to a concord, which maketh great sweetness in music, hath an agreement with the affections, which are reintegrated to the better, after some dislikes; it agreeth also with the taste, which is soon glutted with that which is sweet alone. The sliding from the close or cadence, hath an agreement with the figure in rhetoric, which they call præter expectatum; for there is a pleasure even in being deceived. The reports, and fuges, have an agree ment with the figures in rhetoric, of repetition and traduction. The triplas, and changing of times, have an agreement with the changes of motions; as when galliard time, and measure time, are in the medley of one dance.

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114. IT hath been anciently held and observed, that the sense of hearing, and the kinds of music, have most operation upon manners; as, to encourage men, and make them warlike; to make them soft and effeminate; to make them grave; to make them light; to make them gentle and inclined to pity, etc. The cause is, for that the sense of hearing striketh the spirits more immediately than the other senses; and more incorporeally than the smelling; for the sight, taste, and feeling, have their organs not of so present and immediate access to the spirits, as the hearing hath. And as for the smelling, which indeed worketh also immediately upon the spirits, and is forcible while the object remaineth, it is with a communication of the breath or vapour of the object odorate; but harmony entering easily, and mingling not at all, and coming with a manifest motion, doth by custom of often affecting the spirits, and putting them into one kind of posture, alter not a little the nature of the spirits, even when the object is removed. And therefore we see, that tunes and airs, even in their own nature, have in themselves some affinity