Reflections upon ancient and modern learning / By William Wotton, B. B.
- William Wotton
- Date:
- 1694
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Reflections upon ancient and modern learning / By William Wotton, B. B. Source: Wellcome Collection.
388/404 page 348
![]eBlons by Modern Philofophers. My Lord Bacon was the firfl Great Man who took much pains to convince the World that they had hitherto been in a wrong Path, and that Nature her felf, rather than her Secretaries, was to be addreiled to by thofe who were defirous to know much of her Mind. Monfieur Des Cartes, who came foon af¬ ter, did not perfectly tread in his Steps, fmce he w as for doing too great a part of his Work in his Clolet, concluding too foon, before he had made Experiments enough ,* but then to a vafl Genius he join¬ ed exquifite Skill in Geometry, and work¬ ing upon Intelligible Principles in an Intel¬ ligible Manner, though he very often fail¬ ed of one part of his End, namely, a right Explication of the Phaenomena of Nature ,• yet by marrying Geometry and PKyfics to¬ gether, he put the World in Hopes of a Maiculine Offspring in procels of Time, though the firfb Productions Ihould prove abortive. This was the Rate of Natural Philofophy, when thofe great Men who, after King Charles IId s Reftoration, joined in a Body, called by that Prince himfelf, the ROYAL SOCIETTf went on with the Defign ; they made it their Bufinefs to fet their Members awork to colled: a per¬ fect Hiflory of Nature, in order to eRa- blilh thereupon a Body of Phyfics. What has been done towards it by the Members ‘ -V J • of » mail](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b3032449x_0388.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
