have once fallen upon the fure trial of truth, they easily find her out in her most fecret receffes.

Thefe are the arguments Lucretius has brought to prove the two principles of Epicurus, body and void that the former is fenfe fufficiently declares; and the latter is here evidently proved by two arguments (for the other are easily eluded): the firft is drawn from motion; the fecond, from the parting of two flat smooth bodies.

corporis: nam cùm ex eo folo quòd corpus fit extenfum in longum, latum, et profundum, recte concludamus illud effe fubftantiam, quia omnino repugnat ut nihil fit aliqua extenfio: Ident etiam de fpatio, quod vacuum fupponitur, concludendum eft; quod nempe cum in eo fit extenfio, neceffario etiam in ipfo fit fubftantio:" It is manifeft, that a void, taken after the manner of philofophers, that is to fay, in which there is evidently no fubftance, cannot be granted: because an extenfion of space, does not differ from an ex tenfion of body; for fince we rightly conclude body to be a fubftance, for this reafon only, because it is extended into length, breadth, and depth, it being abfolutely contradictory to fenfe and rea fon that there fhould be an extenfion of nothing. We must likewife conclude the fame of space, which is fuppofed a void; that is to say, that fince there is an extenfion in it, there must be a subftance in it likewife. For void doth not exclude all fubftance, but only body; and fubftance and body, are not convertible in the full latitude of an univerfal propofition.

Secondly, It is evident, that when two smooth flat bodies are feparated by a perpendicular force, the ambient air cannot fill all the fpace at once; and therefore there muft neceffarily be a void, and this Mr. Hobbes, a great plenift, in the second of his Ten Dialogues, freely confeffes would follow, if the bodies were infinitely hard; but fince nature knows no fuch, any bodies, though perfectly smooth, may be separated by a force that overcomes their folidity, and yet no vacuum enfue. A pret ty invention, but extremely difagreeable to the phenomenon: for in the exhaufted receiver, where there is no prop of under air left to fuftain it, the lower marble falls by its own weight. Mr.

Plutarch, in his fecond book, de Placitis Philo fophorum, roundly tells us, οἱ ἀπὸ Θάλια φυσικοιπάνμες μεχρι Πλάτωνος τὸ κενὸν ἐπέγνωσαν. All the natural philofophers from Thales to Plato denied a vacuum. But Laertius, in the life of Diogenes Apolloniates, who lived in the time of Xerxes, declares that he pronounced τὸ κενὸν ἄπειρον. Void fpace is infinite. For the antiquity of that opinion I fhall not be folicitous, though the reasons are strong, and abvious enough to make it ancient; for what is more obvious than motion? And how neceffarily this infers a vacuum, is very easily discovered. Motion is change of place, which change is impoffible in a plenum; for whatever endeavours to change its place must thrust out other bodies; and fo if the full be infinite, the proturfion must be fo; if finite, the endeavour is in vain, and therefore all must be fixed in eternal reft, and Archimedes himself with his engine would not be able to move the leaft particle of matter. Cartes, in the second part of his Principles, proposes a folution, much applauded by his admirers; but a little attention will find it vain, and weak, and contradictory to his own fettled principles. For when a body moves in a straight line, it muft give the body that lies before it the fame determination with itfelf; and how this determination fhould alter, and the motion prove circular, neither Cartes nor his followers have condefcend-Hobbes adds another argument, which is of no ed to explain. But grant (though the former reafon has proved it impoffible), that there may be fuch an attending circle of ambient air, yet unlefs it be perfectly mathematical (a thing very hardly fuppofed), each particle will acquire another attending circle, and fo not the leaft fly ftir her wing, unless the whole universe is troubled. To this may be added, that it is inconceivable how the most folid matter (for fuch is his firft element) can fo foon altar its figure, or be fo eafily diffolved and fitted to the different fpaces that lie between the little globules. We fee gold and adamant refift the roughest stroke; it is pains and conftant labour that must diffolve them; how then can we imagine this element will yield? But indeed Cartes propofes his ambient attending circle, as the only way to folve the phenomenon of motion in a full, which he thought he had fuffi. ciently before evinced: but his arguments are weak and fophiftical. For, in the first of his Me ditations, he never takes notice of impenetrability, in which the very effence of matter confifts and in the fecond part of his Principles, he mistakes the notion of a void, and confounds fubftance and body. Take his own words: "Vacuum acem philofophico more fumptum, h. e. in quo nulla planè fit fubftantia, dari non poffe manifeftum eft ex eo quod extenfio fpatii non differt ab extenfione

force against the vacuift, but overthrows his own notion of a material deity: these are the words He that created natural bodies, is not a fancy, but the most real substance that is; who being infinite there can be no empty place were he is, nor full

where he is not.

Now the other reafon of Lucretius are infufficient; for that drawn from the different weight of bodies, would infer immenfe vacuities in the air, which is two thousand times lighter than gold, (fee Gliffon. de Subftantia, c. 26.) and that from rarefaction and condenfation is not cogent, though it is the most rational opinion, and more agreeable to the mind of Ariftotle, than that which is commonly propofed as his, in Categoria Qualitatum, Пuxvòv μiv xai a τὰ μόρια συνεγγὺς εἶναι ἀλλήλοις, μανὸν δὲ τῷ δεισάνων à' λanhar. That is denfe, between whofe parts there is a clofer; that rare between whofe particles there is a loofer connection.

Ver. 472. In these feven verfes he briefly reca pitulates what he has been proving in the former arguments: and, to confirm them, adds, that fenfe itfelf evinces the truth of them; and that nothing exifts of itself besides body and void. Thus, too, Epicurus in the epiftle to Herodotus, cải ứn

μèv oãμa, wñdi xévor the ALL is partly body partly void. And Cicero, in 2. de Nat. Deor.

«Omnia quæ fecundum Naturam Corpus & Inane docet Epicurus." Epicurus teaches that all things in nature are body and void. And this doctrine; of his, though particularly designed against those who take accidents into the number of real beings, yet has a farther reach, and endeavours to overthrow the belief of immaterial substances; for an Epicurean perception being nothing else but imagination, as arifing from the ftroke of a piece of matter, he had no way left to get a notice of any fuch being, but by fome deduction from thofe appearances, of which his fenfes had affured him: thus, from motion he infers that there is space ; and that being once fettled, he proceeds to the folidity of atoms. Now, though the very fame method, with lefs attention, had forced him to acknowledge fubftances immaterial, and to have made the univerfe more complete by another kind of beings; yet it was hard to thwart the genius of his master, to start new fears that might disturb his foft hours, and amaze himself with melancholy thoughts of a future ftate. And there

fore, to filence the clamours of his reafon (for he could not but fee fuch plain confequences), he fecures motion as a property of matter neceffarily refulting from weight; and this I take to be the bafis of the Epicurean atheism, which once removed that tower of Babel, which now rifes fo proudly as to brave Heaven, must be ruined and overthrown. For, if matter as fuch, is deftitute of that power, the inference is easy, that there must be fome other being to bestow it. This cannot be space: and, therefore, another kind of fubfrance is required; and hence follows all that train of confequences, of which the Epicureans are fo afraid. For he that first moves the matter, has no reafon to cease from his operation; and so must fill govern and direct it. And Providence is nothing else but an orderly prefervation of that frame which it first raised: and, if there is fuch a director, how easily it follows, that he would difcover his pleasure to man, and prescribe rules how he may be happy? And this makes a fair way for revealed religion; and that neceffarily infers a future ftate. This, methinks, is a confiderable advantage of natural philofophy, that it can proceed from fuch fenfible things, and plainly shows us the rì ñégalo rỡ ✪cũ, the invisible things of God, in thefe his visible operations. Now, that weight is not a property of atoms, will be afterwards demonftrated; and fo another fort of beings proved against the Epicureans.

fion. And that must be a body (for whatever acts or is acted on, touches, or is touched), or else it must be that in which things are contained, and in which they are made and moved; and that is the void. Therefore, there is no third kind of things that can be perceived by the sense, which teaches that body is, or comprehended by reason, which demonftrates that void is.

Ver. 493. But, forafmuch as many things are faid to be, befides body and void; as war is, peace is, heat is, &c. Left errors fhould fpring and get footing from this common way of speaking, he obferves, in thefe ten verses, that all fuch things are either conjuncts, or events of body and void. Conjun& (cúμax, or proper accident), is what cannot be abfent without the deftruction of the fubject: fuch is heat in fire, moilure in water, &c. But event (cuiénzòs, or common accident) is what may be abfent or prefent, without the ruin or deftruction of the fubject; as war, poverty, concord, &c.

He

Ver. 503. Some, who were not offended that poverty, war, peace, &c. fhould be ranked among the number of events, had a nobler idea of time. Pythagoras, Heraclitus, and others, taught that it is a body; but the Stoics believed it to be incorporeal. To all thefe Lucretius oppofes the opinion of Epicurus, in these fix verses, which Gaffendus thus explains: Time is an event attributed to things by the mind or thought only, according as they are conceived to perfevere in the state in which they are, or to cease from it, and to preferve a longer or shorter existence, and to have it, to have had it, or to be to have it. Now, Epicurus, because he saw that time is fomething befides body and void, afferted, that it does not exist of itself; nor as a conjunct or event, but as the chief event of events; as Laertius pofitively fays, lib. 10. taught, therefore, that time exifts not in reality, but only in the mind; and, therefore is, as I may call it, a being of the understanding. Hence Ariftotle, 7. Metaphyf. 1. defines time, “ Numerus, qui abfque ratione numerante, nullus eft," which is as much as to fay, that it has no existence but in the understanding. Now, the reason why Epicurus held time to be an event of events, or an accident of accidents, was, because it depends upon days, nights, hours, paffions, exemp tion from paflions, motions and reft: for, as Empiricus fays, adv. Phyf. lib. 22. a day, a night, an hour, paffions, exemption from paffions, motions and reft, are accidents to which time Ver. 480 In these fix verfes, he proves, that is adventitious only: for, day and night are accinothing exifts of itself besides body and void: be- dents of the ambient air; and day happens from caufe, whatever is, is endowed with fome quantithe illumination of the fun; but night from the ty, great or fmall. Now, if it can be touched, and hinders motion, it must be body; if it cannot be touched and does not obftruct motion, it must be void. Therefore, there is no third nature; and whatever is, is body or void.

Ver. 486. In thefe feven verfes, he again proves, that nothing exifts of itself but body and void: for, whatever is, either has a power of acting on another; or may fuffer from another, that is to fay, it must be subject either to action or to paf

privation or absence of the folar light. An hour, fince it is a part either of the day or of the night, is likewife an accident of the air, as day and nigh

are.

But time is coextended with each day, each night, and each hour. Paffions too, and impitbility or exemption from paflions, that is to tay, pains or pleatures, happen to us, and, therefore, are not fubitances, but accidents of those perfons who are affected with a fenfe of them, that is to fay, either with pleasure or pain. Now, even

its parts. Epicurus to Herodotus, defines an atom,, Πλήρη τίνα φύσιν, τὲ ἐκ ἔχεσαν ἐπὴ ἡ ὀπῶς διαλυθήσεται. Ver. 564. To prove the eternity of his feeds yet more fully, he brings another argument from that common principle of the Epicureans, that nothing is made of nothing, and that nothing is reduced into nothing. This argument, contained in ten verfes is to this effect: If the firft feeds of things were diffolved and perished, they would fall into nothing; for there are no principles prior to the firft, into which they can be refolved: and thus the things that are daily born would arife from nothing. It muft, therefore, of neceflity be grant-, ed, either that the feeds are eternal, or that things proceed from nothing: and this the philofophers held to be the greateft abfurdity that any man

could advance.

Ver. 592. In these two verfes, he concludes to this purpose: The first feeds of things are eternal, because they are folid, and are folid, because they are fimple; for, unless they were fimple, they would not be foild, because all compound bodies have a mixture of void: unless they were folid, they would not be eternal, because they might be diffolved; and unlefs they were eternal, all things must have been produced from nothing, and would return into nothing. The impoffibili, ty whereof he has already demonstrated.

Ver. 594. He proceeds, in thefe thirteen verfes, to fhow that there is a certain and definite time appointed for the growth of all things; and, therefore, that the feeds, by which things are

in

but that she makes use of principles, that are firm and confant, and therefore not obnoxious to dif folution or change; for whence can proceed this fo obftinate conftancy in feeds that are daily changed? And were they fo indeed, neither men, nor any other animals, would retain the fame u fual fhapes; and fome would enjoy a vast ftrength and length of days, while others of the fame kind, would be puny and fhort-lived; we fhould frequently fee white crows, and fometimes black fwans.

Ver. 630. In thefe fourteen verfes, he employs another argument; which is, indeed, fomething refined, and not understood by many. Seeds or atoms, according to Epicurus, are endowed with quantity; but all quantity has an extreme: now that extreme is the leaft thing that can be con. ceived; nor does it ever fubfift feparated, and dif joined from the other parts; and of these leafts the whole mafs of each atom is compofed: but fince the conftituent parts cannot fubfift when they are feparated from one another, they cannot be divided from one another; for whatever body can be disjoined from another, mult be able to preferve its being without the help and affift ance of the body, from which it is parted: every feed, therefore, is of neceffity fimple and indiffo luble; because it confits of parts, even the leaft that can be conceived; and which no art or ftrength can disjoin, becaufe no art or frength can reduce into nothing. For nothing goes into

creased, are of a certain fixed magnitude, and in nothing.

diffoluble, nor can be broken to pieces: for, otherwife, having been broken and wafted for fo vaft a tract of time as is already paft, they would have been reduced into parts fo extremely minute, that they could never in any length of years, and therefore not in a few, be reunited and made again into one mafs. And this any man will acknow. ledge, who reflects, that it is a much easier task to divide and diffolve things, than to renew and rejoin them together.

Ver. 607. He confirms the folidity of his atoms in these nine verses. Now, because it is manifeft, that there are in nature hard and foft bodies, he declares, that if the principles are allowed to be folid, not only hard things may be made of them, as it is most evident they may, but foft things likewife; because whatever is compounded of fuch feeds, may become foft by the intermixion of void but if the principles themfelves are allow ed to be foft, then, indeed, foft things may be made of them; but no reason can be given, how any thing should be hard, becaufe there would be no folidity in their compofition: and folidity alone is the foundation of all hardness.

Ver 616. In thefe fourteen verfes, Lucretius confirms the folidity of his atoms by another reafon, taken from the manifold and never failing conftancy of nature; as well in always carrying on of animals to certain bounds of ftrength, as in imprinting likewife always upon them the fame Hiflinguishing characters and marks of their refpective kinds: which, indeed, the could not do;

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be

To make this yet more eafy to be understood, we must know, that the Peripatetics and Epicu reans differed in many things, but chiefly in their opinions concerning these leafts. For the Peripa tetics held, that every compound body may divided into infinite parts, and that no part can be made fo fmall, but that it may fill be made fmaller. But the Epicureans believed, that no compound body can be divided into fuch minute parts as may always be made lefs; but may, indeed, be divided into parts fo fmail, as cannot be divided any more; and confequently no less parts can be made of them; so that they fix an end, and prefcribe bounds to the divifibility. Thus we fee, that the Epicureans held that every body may be leffened to a point that can neither be feen, ner divided any more; but that is invisible and void of parts: and this is what they call a leaft, which is the first and the last part in all things; that is to fay, is the first principle that nature referves for the creating and renewing of things, and likewife a fomething laft, into which they are refolved: Now, because the firft principles are these leafts, Lucretius argues, that the first principles are eternal, folid, and moft fimple.

Ver. 640. This must not be understood, that the atoms are compofed of leafts, as of parts, as if they were bodies compounded of an aggregation and connection of things, in like manner as all the other things of nature confift of a coalition of atoms; but only in fuch a wife, that they cannot by any means whatever be broken or diffoived. We muft, therefore, take care not to mistake our