Experimental philosophy, in three books containing new experiments microscopical, mercurial, magnetical : with some deductions, and probable hypotheses, raised from them, in avouchment and illustration of the now famous atomical hypothesis / by Henry Power ...

The Preface to the Ingenious READER.

DIoptrical Glasses (which are now wrought up to that height and curiosity we see) are but a Mo∣dern Invention: Antiquity gives us not the least hint thereof, neither do their Records furnish us with any thing that does Antedate our late discoveries of the Telescope, or Microscope. The want of which

incomparable Artifice made them not onely erre in their fond Coelestial Hy∣pothesis, and Crystalline wheel-work of the Heavens above us, but also in their nearer Observations of the mi∣nute Bodies and smallest sort of Crea∣tures about us, which have been by them but sleightly and perfunctori∣ly described, as being the disregard∣ed pieces and huslement of the Cre∣ation; when (alas!) those sons of Sense were not able to see how cu∣riously the minutest things of the world are wrought, and with what eminent signatures of Divine Provi∣dence they were inrich'd and embel∣lish'd,

without our Dioptrical assi∣stance. Neither do I think that the Aged world stands now in need of Spectacles, more than it did in its primitive Strength and Lustre: for howsoever though the faculties of the soul of our Primitive father Adam might be more quick & perspicacious in Apprehension, than those of our lapsed selves; yet certainly the Con∣stitution of Adam's Organs was not divers from ours, nor different from those of his Fallen Self, so that he could never discern those distant, or minute objects by Natural Vision, as we do by the Artificial advantages of

the Telescope and Microscope. So that certainly the secondary Pla∣nets of Saturn and Jupiter and his Ansulary appearances, the Ma∣culae Solis, and Lunations of the inferiour Planets, were as obscure to him as unknown to his Posterity; onely what he might ingeniously ghess at by the Analogie of things in Na∣ture, and some other advantageous Circumstances.

And as those remote objects were be∣yond the reach of his natural Opticks, so doubtless the Minute Atoms and Particles of matter, were as unknown to him, as they are yet unseen by us: for

certainly both his and our Eyes were framed by providence in Analogie to the rest of our senses, and as might best manage this particular Engine we call the Body, and best agree with the place of our habitation (the earth and elements we were to converse with) and not to be critical specta∣tors, surveyors, and adaequate judges of the immense Vniverse: and there∣fore it hath often seem'd to me beyond an ordinary probability, and somthing more than fancy (how paradoxical soever the conjecture may seem) to think, that the least Bodies we are able to see with our naked eyes, are

but middle proportionals (as it were) 'twixt the greatest and smallest Bo∣dies in nature, which two Extremes lye equally beyond the reach of hu∣mane sensation: For as on the one side they are but narrow souls, and not worthy the name of Philosophers, that think any Body can be too great or too too vast in its dimensions; so likewise, are they as inappre∣hensive, and of the same litter with the former, that on the other side think the particles of Matter may be too little, and that nature is stinted at an Atom, and must have a non ul∣tra of her subdivisions.

Such, I am sure, our Modern En∣gine (the Microscope) wil ocular∣ly evince and unlearn them their opi∣nions again: for herein you may see what a subtil divider of matter Na∣ture is; herein we can see what the illustrious wits of the Atomical and Corpuscularian Philosophers durst but imagine, even the very Atoms and their reputed Indivisibles and least realities of Matter, nay the cu∣rious Mechanism and organical Con∣trivance of those Minute Animals, with their distinct parts, colour, figure and motion, whose whole bulk were to them almost invisible: so that

were Aristotle now alive, he might write a new History of Animals; for the first Tome of Zoography is still wanting, the Naturalists hither∣to having onely described unto us the larger and more voluminous sort of Animals, as Bulls, Bears, Tygers, &c. whilst they have regardlesly pass'd by the Insectile Automata, (those Living-exiguities) with only a bare mention of their names, where∣as in these prety Engines (by an In∣comparable Stenography of Pro∣vidence) are lodged all the perfecti∣ons of the largest Animals; they have the same organs of body, multiplicity

of parts, variety of motions, diversity of figures, severality of functions with those of the largest size: and that which augments the miracle, is, that all these in so narrow a room neither interfere nor impede one another in their operations. Who therefore with the Learned * 1.1 Doctor, admires not Regiomontanus his Fly beyond his Eagle, and wonders not more at the operation of two souls in those mi∣nute bodies, than but one in the trunk of a Cedar? Ruder heads stand ama∣zed at those prodigious and Colossean pieces of Nature, as Whales, Ele∣phants, and Dromedaries; but in these

narrow Engines there is more curious Mathematicks, and the Archite∣cture of these little Fabricks more neatly set forth the wisdom of their Maker.

Now as Matter may be great or little, yet never shrink by subdivision into nothing; so, is it not probable, that Motion also may be indefinitely swift or slow, and yet never come to a qui∣escency? and so consequently there can be no rest in Nature, more than a Va∣cuity in Matter. The following Ob∣servations seem to make out, that the Minute particles of most (if not all) Bodies are constantly in some kind

of motion, and that motion may be both invisibly and unintelligibly slow, as well as swift, and probably is as unseparable an attribute to Bo∣dies, as well as Extension is.

And indeed, if the very nature of fluidity consist in the Intestine motion of the parts of that Body call'd fluid, as Des-Cartes happily supposed, and M^r. Boyle has more happily demonstrated, Why may we not be bold both to think and say, that there is no such thing in the World as an absolute quiescence? for 1. the great∣est part of the World (viz. the aethe∣rial Medium (wherein all the Stars

and Planets do swim) is now confess'd by all to be fluid, and so, consequently, in a Perpetual Motion. 2. All the fixed lights of Heaven are generally concluded to be pure Fire, and so con∣sequently fluid also, and then subcon∣sequentially in motion also; not to mention the dinetical Rotations of their whole Bodies, which every one is supposed to have, as wel as our Sun: and as for the Opace and Planetary Bodies of the Vniverse, they are all porous, and the aetherial Matter is continually streaming through them, their internal fire and heat constantly subliming Atoms out of them, the

Magnetical Atoms continually play∣ing about them: Not to mention also their dinetical Motions about their own Axes, and circumrevolutions a∣bout their central Suns: so that, Is it not, I say, more than probable, that rest and quiescency is a meer Peripateti∣cal Notion, and that the supreme Be∣ing (who is Activity it self) never made any thing inactive or utterly devoid of Motion?

Hence wil unavoidable follow some other Principles of the ever-to-be-ad∣mired Des-Cartes:

1. That as Matter is made greater or less, by addition or subduction of

parts, so is Motion made swifter or slower by addition given to the Mo∣vent, by other contiguous Bodies more swiftly moving, or by subduction of it by Bodies slowlier moved.

2. As the parts of Matter can be transfer'd from one Body to another, and as long as they remain united, would remain so for ever: so Motion may be translated from one Body to another; but when it is not transfer'd, it would remain in that Body for ever.

But these sublime Speculations I shall with more confidence treat of in another place; the Speculation of Motion, and its Origin, being, as I

conceive, one of the obscurest things in Nature.

And therfore at present we shal keep within the compass of the Micro∣scope, and look at nothing further than what we can discover therein: The knowledge of Man (saith the learn'd Verulam) hath hitherto been determin'd by the view or sight, so that whatsoever is invisible, either in respect of the fineness of the Body it self, or the smalness of the parts, or of the subtilty of its motion, is little enquired; and yet these be the things that govern Nature principally: How much therefore are we oblig'd to mo∣dern

Industry, that of late hath dis∣cover'd this advantageous Artifice of Glasses, and furnish'd our necessities with such artificial Eys, that now nei∣ther the fineness of the Body, nor the smalness of the parts, nor the subtilty of its motion, can secure them from our discovery? And indeed, if the Diop∣tricks further prevail, and that dar∣ling Art could but perform what the Theorists in Conical sections demon∣strate, we might hope, ere long, to see the Magnetical Effluviums of the Loadstone, the Solary Atoms of light (or globuli aetherei of the renown∣ed Des-Cartes) the springy parti∣cles

of Air, the constant and tumultu∣ary motion of the Atoms of all fluid Bodies, and those infinite, insensible Corpuscles (which daily produce those prodigious (though common) effects amongst us:) And though these hopes be vastly hyperbolical, yet who can tel how far Mechanical Industry may prevail; for the process of Art is inde∣finite, and who can set a non-ultra to her endevours? I am sure, if we look backwards at what the Diop∣triks hath already perform'd, we can∣not but conclude such Prognosticks to be within the circle of possibilities, and perhaps not out of the reach of

futurity to exhibit: however this I am sure of, That without some such Me∣chanical assistance, our best Philoso∣phers will but prove empty Conjectu∣ralists, and their profoundest Specu∣lations herein, but gloss'd outside Fal∣lacies; like our Stage-scenes, or Per∣spectives, that shew things inwards, when they are but superficial pain∣tings.

For, to conclude with that doubly Honourable (both for his parts and parentage) M^r. Boyle, When a Writer,* 1.2 saith he, acquaints me onely with his own thoughts or conjectures, without inriching his discourse with

any real Experiment or Observation, if he be mistaken in his Ratiotinati∣on, I am in some danger of erring with him, and at least am like to lose my time, without receiving any valuable compensation for so great a loss: But if a Writer endevours, by delivering new and real Observations or Expe∣riments, to credit his Opinions, the Case is much otherwayes; for, let his Opinions be never so false (his Ex∣periments being true) I am not ob∣lig'd to believe the former, and am left at my liberty to benefit my self by the latter: And though he have er∣roneously superstructed upon his Ex∣periments,

yet the Foundation being solid, a more wary Builder may be very much further'd by it, in the ere∣ction of a more judicious and consi∣stent Fabrick.

HENRY POWER.

From New-Hall, near Hallifax, 1. Aug. 1661.

Notes

• * 1.1

  D^r. Brown, Relig. Med.
• * 1.2

  Boyle his Es∣says, pag. 10.