Roger Bacon : essays contributed by various writers on the occasion of the commemoration of the seventh centenary of his birth / collected and edited by A.G. Little.
- Date:
- 1914
Licence: In copyright
Credit: Roger Bacon : essays contributed by various writers on the occasion of the commemoration of the seventh centenary of his birth / collected and edited by A.G. Little. Source: Wellcome Collection.
416/442 page 404
![MSS. Brit. Museum : Sloane 2156, ff. 74-97 (sec. xv), ending in the second part of the first book. Bodl. : Digby 76, f. 48 (sec. xiii), containing the remainder of the first book(?), or another recension (?). Inc. ‘ Mathematica utitur tantum parte ’ : expl., f. 64h ‘ numerare conveniet.’ F. 65r : ‘ Expeditis hiis que exiguntur ad proportiones.’ F. 6qr [Pars II], ‘ Deter- minato de parte mathematice prima ’ : des., f. 76V similia trapezeis.’ Extracts printed in Charles, pp. 361-8. An edition of the Com. Math, is being prepared by Mr. Steele and Professor D. Eugene Smith. Libri ii-vi. An extant fragment of a commentary on the Elements of Euclid, probably by Bacon, may have belonged to this part. MS. Bodl. : Digby 76, ff. 77-8 (sec. xiii). Inc. 1 Titulus autem istius libri secundum auctores.’ Vol. III. Physics (or Natural Philosophy), four books : (i) ‘de communibus ad omnia naturalia ’ ; (ii) ‘de celestibus ’ ; (iii) ‘ de elementis et mixtis inanimatis ’ ; (iv) ‘ de vegetabilibus et animalibus ’ (Steele, Communia Naturalium, p. 1). Elsewhere (ibid. pp. 5-8), Bacon enumerates the seven ‘special sciences ’ which he includes in Physics : namely (1) Perspectiva (or Optics) ; (2) Astronomia judiciaria et operati va (or Astro- logy) ; (3) Scientia ponderum de gravibus et levibus ; (4) Alkimia, or Scientia de omnibus rebus inanimatis que fiunt primo ex elementis ; (5) Agricultura or Scientia de plantarum natura et animalium . . . scilicet de omnibus animatis preter- quam de homine; (6) Medicina (‘de animali rationali, scilicet de homine, et precipue de sanitate et infirmitate ejus,’ &c.) ; (7) Scientia experimentalis. Bacon adds that he may not be able to treat of the special sciences, except Perspectiva, on which he desires to compose a compendious treatise, but hopes that others may be induced by his labours to deal with them. It would appear, therefore, that the special sciences were not included in the four books comprising Vol. Ill ; all these would thus be devoted to general principles. Books i and ii are extant, and possibly a fragment of Book iii ; of Book iv there seems to be no trace. No treatises on the special sciences seem to have been written for the Compendium Philosophiae, except perhaps a version of the De Multiplicatione Specierum (see No. 11), treating of the science of Optics. The compendious treatise on Perspectiva was written for and included in Opus Majus (Part V), and the other sciences mentioned are treated more or less fully in various works of Bacon. »](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b28993949_0416.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
