Thus Bacon speaks, for example, of certain bodies being in 'sympathy' with certain others, preferring these others as better, etc. Gold, he says again, and other metals in leaf do not 'like' the surrounding air. Paper, too, and cloth, and things of that kind, do not 'get on well' with the air, which is inserted into and mingled with their pores. So they 'gladly' suck in water or other liquid, and drive out the air.[1] Like Aristotle, Bacon believed it to be the 'nature' of light bodies to move upwards from the earth's surface, of heavy bodies to move downwards to the earth's surface. And all this notwithstanding Bacon's recognition that "what are called occult and specific properties, or sympathies and antipathies, are in great part corruptions of philosophy";[2] his assertion that "my logic aims to teach and instruct the understanding ... that it may in very truth dissect nature, and discover the virtues and actions of bodies, with their laws as determined in matter; so that this science flows not merely from the nature of the mind, but also from the nature of things";[3] and his theoretic avoidance of anthropomorphism in natural science.
Aristotle and Bacon are influenced not only by the common use of words but also by popular opinion.[4] Thus, for example, Bacon gives credence to the popular view that the moon has an influence on the weather. Again, both Aristotle and Bacon favoured the popular belief that the earth was the centre of the universe, the former rejecting in his time the true view of Pythagoras, the latter in his time the true view of Copernicus.
Aristotle[5] and Bacon both rely largely on second-hand information. In the case of the latter, this is specially evident in Sylva Sylvarum,[6] where Bacon "receives, with rare protests and doubts, the records of his authorities, reading and skimming, rather than digesting, Aristotle's 'Problems' and 'Meteorologies,'
- ↑ Nov. Org., II, 48, vi. For many more examples of natures and appetites regarded as absolute qualities, see, in particular, ibid., 48, viii, xvii, xviii.
- ↑ Ibid., II, 50, vi, init. cf. II, 50, vi (4).
- ↑ Ibid., II, 52 init. (italics mine).
- ↑ For Aristotle, see supra, p. 475.
- ↑ For Aristotle, see supra, p. 476.
- ↑ But see supra, for passage from Rawlcy.
