So it is more probable that he that knoweth the nature
of arefaction, the nature of assimilation of nourishment to the
thing nourished, the manner of increase and clearing of spirits, the
manner of the depredations which spirits make upon the humours and
solid parts, shall by ambages of diets, bathings, anointings,
medicines, motions, and the like, prolong life, or restore some
degree of youth or vivacity, than that it can be done with the use
of a few drops or scruples of a liquor or receipt. To conclude,
therefore, the true natural magic, which is that great liberty and
latitude of operation which dependeth upon the knowledge of forms, I
may report deficient, as the relative thereof is. To which part, if
we be serious and incline not to vanities and plausible discourse,
besides the deriving and deducing the operations themselves from
metaphysic, there are pertinent two points of much purpose, the one
by way of preparation, the other by way of caution. The first is,
that there be made a calendar, resembling an inventory of the estate
of man, containing all the inventions (being the works or fruits of
Nature or art) which are now extant, and whereof man is already
possessed; out of which doth naturally result a note what things are
yet held impossible, or not invented, which calendar will be the
more artificial and serviceable if to every reputed impossibility
you add what thing is extant which cometh the nearest in degree to
that impossibility; to the end that by these optatives and
potentials man's inquiry may be the more awake in deducing direction
of works from the speculation of causes.
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