Francis Bacon and his secret society - Grand Lodge of Colorado

23-1 FRANCIS BACON
the existence of the spiritus is to be established. In living bodies
he conceived that two kinds of spirits exist: a crude or mortuary
spirit, such as is present in other substances, and the
animal or vital spirit, to wnich the phenomena of life are to be
referred. To keep this vital spirit, the wine of life, from oozing
away ought to be the aim of the physician who attempts to increase
the number of our few and evil days." i
The writer is here treating chiefly of the body, but wherever
Bacon speaks of inorganic matter, or of organised forms of
plants, etc., he uses language which expresses that they are
more or less living and sentient, having vital spirits which act
somewhat as in the bodies of living creatures. Doubtless his
poetical nature led him always into metaphoric language ;
" nimbleness to perceive analogies, " his sense of beauty and of
the wonderful harmony in which the world was created tended
to make him speak and write thus; but a deeper feeling still
moved him continually to connect the " crude," " gross," and
" earthy " with the " rare, " " airy and flamy " of the sensitive soul.
He was forever mentally endeavouring to bring about a union or
marriage between things natural and things spiritual, to " mingle
earth with heaven. "
his
" I am labouring with all my might to
make the mind of man a match for the nature of things. " 2
It is, therefore, to be expected, as a single outcome of his
cogitations and philosophy, that we shall read of " Motion
which invites an excited body; " " Materials which refuse to be
heated; " Master spirits which, in any body, curb, tame, subdue,
and regulate other parts," etc. " Bodies which delight in motion
and enjoy their own nature, " and which, in spontaneous
rotation, "follow themselves, and court, so to speak, their own
embraces." Other " bodies abhor motion, and remain at rest.
Others " move by the shortest path, to consort with bodies of their
own nature." " By this appetite for motion all bodies of considerable
density abhor motion; indeed, the desire of not moving
is the only appetite they have ; and though, in countless ways,
they be enticed and challenged to motion, they yet, as far as they
l Pref. Hist. Vltce et Mortis, by Robert Leslie Ellis. Spedding, Bacon's Works,
ii. [ . 91.
f Do Aug. v. 2.