Objects now do all that they
do because it is their Essence to do so, or by reason of an inherent
Virtue. Phaenomena are accounted for by supposed tendencies and
propensities of the abstraction Nature; which, though regarded as
impersonal, is figured as acting on a sort of motives, and in a manner
more or less analogous to that of conscious beings. Aristotle affirms a
tendency of nature towards the best, which helps him to a theory of many
natural phaenomena. The rise of water in a pump is attributed to
Nature's horror of a vacuum. The fall of heavy bodies, and the ascent of
flame and smoke, are construed as attempts of each to get to its
_natural_ place. Many important consequences are deduced from the
doctrine that Nature has no breaks (non habet saltum). In medicine the
curative force (vis medicatrix) of Nature furnishes the explanation of
the reparative processes which modern physiologists refer each to its
own particular agencies and laws.
Examples are not necessary to prove to those who are acquainted with the
past phases of human thought, how great a place both the theological and
the metaphysical interpretations of phaenomena have historically
occupied, as well in the speculations of thinkers as in the familiar
conceptions of the multitude.
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