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But I choose to give an Instance in the Stuff I have been speaking off, because the mixture being more Simple, the way whereby the Changeableness is produc'd, may be the more easily apprehended: and though Reason alone might readily enough lead a considering Man to guess at the Explication, in case he knew how Changeable Taffities are made: yet I thought it not impertinent to mention it, because both Scholars and Gentlemen are wont to look upon the Inquiry into Manufactures, as a Mechanick imployment, and consequently below Them; and because also with such a Microscope as I have been mentioning, the discovery is as well Pleasant as Satisfactory, and may afford Hints of the Solution of other Phænomena of Colours.
This, as I said, Pyrophilus, seems to be the Chymical reason of this Experiment, that is such a reason, as, supposing the truth of those Chymical Notions I have elsewhere I hope evinc'd, may give such an account of the Phænomena as Chymical Notions can supply us with; but I both here and elsewhere make use of this way of speaking, to intimate that I am sufficiently aware of the difference betwixt a Chymical Explication of a Phænomenon, and one that is truly Philosophical or Mechanical; as in our present case, I tell you something, when I tell you that the Yellowness of the Mercurial Solution and the Oyl of Tartar is produc'd by the Precipitation occasion'd by the affusion of the latter of those Liquors, and that the destruction of the Colour proceeds from the Dissipation of that Curdl'd matter, whose Texture is destroy'd, and which is dissolv'd into Minute and Invisible particles by the potently Acid Menstruum, which is the reason, why there remains no Sediment in the Bottom, because the infused Oyl takes it up, and resolves it into hidden or invisible Parts, as Water does Salt or Sugar.
And as for the Experiment with Red-rose Leaves, the same thing may be alleged, for we found that such Leaves by bare Infusion for a Night and Day in fair Water, did afford us a Tincture bordering at least upon Redness, and that Colour being conspicuous in the Leaves themselves, would not by some seem so much to be produc'd as to be extracted by the affusion of Oyl of Vitriol.
And you may remember, that we observ'd a Green to be produc'd, when in the same Darkn'd Room we look'd at the Hole at which alone the Light enter'd, through the Green and Yellow parts of a sheet of Marbl'd Paper laid over one another.
Nor is it, I imagine, from want of Knowledge of the Rules of Writing, nor of sufficient Genius, in which this Nation abounds, that so few Comedies, distinguish'd by these Perfections, have been produc'd: But this Defect arises partly from this, that the Comick Poets are often Men of loose Manners, and therefore unlikely Persons to undertake the Promotion and Encouragement of Vertue, of which they have no Taste, and to discountenance Imprudence and Immorality, when by doing so, they must expose their own Character to derision; tho sometimes it may happen, that a loose Poet as well as Preacher, merely from his just Manner of Thinking, and his Sense of Decency in forming Discourses becoming his Character, may entertain the Audience with laudable Performances.
I now advance to my second Particular, Criticism. This was the Case of the late Mr. Dryden, a Man for Learning and universal Writing in Poetry, perhaps the Greatest that England has produc'd; he was Persecuted by Envy, with the utmost Inveteracy for many Years in Succession: And is the Misfortune at this Juncture of Mr. Pope, a Person tho' Inferior to Mr.
But to return to what I was saying before I began to make mention of our Blind Organist, what we have deliver'd touching the causes of the several Forms or Asperity that may Diversifie the Surfaces of Colour'd Bodies, may perchance somewhat assist us to make some Conjectures in the general, at several of the ways whereby 'tis possible for the Experiments hereafter to be mention'd, to produce the suddain changes of Colours that are wont to be Consequent upon them; for most of these Phænomena being produc'd by the Intervention of Liquors, and these for the most part abounding with very Minute, Active, and Variously Figur'd Saline Corpuscles, Liquors so Qualify'd may well enough very Nimbly after the Texture of the Body they are imploy'd to Work upon, and so may change the form of Asperity, and thereby make them Remit to the Eye the Light that falls on them, after another manner than they did before, and by that means Vary the Colour, so farr forth as it depends upon the Texture or Disposition of the Seen Parts of the Object, which I say, Pyrophilus, that you may not think I would absolutely exclude all other ways of Modifying the Beams of Light between their Parting from the Lucid Body, and their Reception into the common Sensory.
Row, as great a Genius for Tragedy as any Nation in any Age has produc'd, yet still frequent and encoutage the loosest Comedies.
The Reader no doubt is before-hand with me, and concludes, that I mean the Tatler and Spectator, which for the greatest Part, have all the Perfection of Writing, and all the Advantages of Wit and Humour, that are requir'd to entertain and instruct the People: And it must chiefly be owing to the great Depravity of Manners in these loose and degenerate Times, that such worthy Performances have produc'd no better Effects.
But to insist on the Colours produc'd by the Operation of fire upon several Minerals would take up farr more time than I have now to spare.