Page:Reflections upon ancient and modern learning (IA b3032449x).pdf/346

 Now as this Method of Philosophizing laid down above, is right, so it is easie to prove that it has been carefully followed by Modern Philosophers. My Lord Bacon was the first great Man who took much pains to convince the World that they had hitherto been in a wrong Path, and that Nature her self, rather than her Secretaries, was to be addressed to by those who were desirous to know very much of her Mind. Monsieur Des Cartes, who came soon after, did not perfectly tread in his Steps, since he was for doing most of his Work in his Closet, concluding too soon, before he had made Experiments enough; but then to a vast Genius he joined exquisite Skill in Geometry, and working upon intelligible Principles in an intelligible Manner; though he very often failed of one Part of his End, namely, a right Explication of the Phænomena of Nature, yet by marrying Geometry and Physicks together, he put the World in Hopes of a Masculine Off-spring in process of Time, though the first Productions should prove abortive. This was the State of Natural Philosophy, when those great Men who after King Charles II's Restoration joined in a Body, called by that Prince himself, the ROYAL SOCIETY, went on with the Design; they made it their Bu-