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FORE:IV.Of all testimonies to the restored supremacy of Aristotelianism, there is none so remarkable as that afforded by the thinker who, more than any other, has enjoyed the credit of its overthrow. To call Francis Bacon an Aristotelian will seem to most readers a paradox. Such an appellation would, however, be much nearer the truth than were the titles formerly bestowed on the author of the Novum Organum. The notion, indeed, that he was in any sense the father of modern science is rapidly disappearing from the creed of educated persons. Its long continuance was due to a coalition of literary men who knew nothing about physics and of physicists who knew nothing about philosophy or its history. It is certain that the great discoveries made both before and during Bacons lifetime were the starting-point of all future progress in the same direction. It is equally certain that Bacon himself had either not heard of those discoveries or that he persistently rejected them. But it might still be contended that he divined and formulated the only method by which these and all other great additions to human knowledge have been made, had not the delusion been dispelled by recent investigations, more especially those of his own editors, Messrs. Ellis and Spedding. Mr. Spedding has shown that Bacons method never was applied to physical science at all. Mr. Ellis has shown that it was incapable of application, being founded on a complete misconception of the problem to be solved. The facts could in truth, hardly have been other373 than what they are. Had Bacon succeeded in laying down the lines of future investigation, it would have been a telling argument against his own implied belief that all knowledge is derived from experience. For, granting the validity of that belief, a true theory of discovery can only be reached by an induction from the observed facts of scientific practice, and such facts did not, at that time, exist in sufficient numbers to warrant an induction. It would have been still more extraordinary had he furnished a clue to the labyrinth of Nature without ever having explored its mazes on his own account. Even as it is, from Bacons own point of view the contradiction remains. If ever any system was constructed priori the Instauratio Magna was. But there is really no such thing as priori speculation. Apart from observation, the keenest and boldest intellect can do no more than rearrange the materials supplied by tradition, or give a higher generalisation to the principles of other philosophers. This was precisely what Bacon did. The wealth of aphoristic wisdom and ingenious illustration scattered through his writings belongs entirely to himself; but his dream of using science as an instrument for acquiring unlimited power over Nature is inherited from the astrologers, alchemists, and magicians of the Middle Ages; and his philosophical system, with which alone we are here concerned, is partly a modification, partly an extension, of Aristotles. An examination of its leading features will at once make this clear.
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FORE:It is never enough to know that any piece of work is commonly constructed in some particular manner, or that a proposition is generally accepted as being correct; a reason should be sought for. Nothing is learned, in the true sense, until the reasons for it are understood, and it is by no means sufficient to know from observation alone that belts are best for high speeds, that gearing is the best means of forming angles in transmitting power, or that gearing consumes more power, and that belts produce less jar and noise; the principles which lie at the bottom must be reached before it can be assumed that the matter is fairly understood.
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FORE:Mr. Everdail proceeded at once to tie himself in his first knot.It took inexperienced Larry some time to open and inflate the tubular rubber device used for supporting survivors of any accident to the seaplane while afloat.
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FORE:She flashed along the hall. Directly she was gone Lawrence signalled to Maitrank, who stood in the background. The latter produced a letter which he handed to the foremost of the two intruders.Reasons have already been suggested for placing Anaxagoras last in order among the physical philosophers, notwithstanding his priority in point of age to more than one of them. He was born, according to the most credible accounts, 500 B.C., at Clazomenae, an Ionian city, and settled in Athens when twenty years of age. There he spent much the greater part of a long life, illustrating the type of character which Euripidesexpressly referring, as is supposed, to the Ionian sagehas described in the following choric lines:
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