Micrographia: Some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies Made by Magnifying Glasses with Observations and Inquiries ThereuponHooke, Robert
History
Micrographia: Some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies Made by Magnifying Glasses with Observations and Inquiries Thereupon
Hooke, Robert
Magnifying glasses -- Early works to 1800; Microscopy -- Early works to 1800; Natural history -- Pre-Linnean works
And thirdly, if we enquire why Cork has such a springiness and swelling
nature when compress’d? and how it comes to suffer so great a compression,
or seeming penetration of dimensions, so as to be made a substance as
heavie again and more, bulk for bulk, as it was before compression, and yet
suffer’d to return, is found to extend it self again into the same space?
Our _Microscope_ will easily inform us, that the whole mass consists of an
infinite company of small Boxes or Bladders of Air, which is a substance of
a springy nature, and that will suffer a considerable condensation (as I
have several times found by divers trials, by which I have most evidently
condens’d it into less then a twentieth part of its usual dimensions neer
the Earth, and that with no other strength then that of my hands without
any kind of forcing Engine, such as Racks, Leavers, Wheels, Pullies, or the
like, but this onely by and by) and besides, it seems very probable that
those very films or sides of the pores, have in them a springing quality,
as almost all other kind of Vegetable substances have, so as to help to
restore themselves to their former position.
And could we so easily and certainly discover the _Schematisme_ and
_Texture_ even of these films, and of several other bodies, as we can these
of Cork; there seems no probable reason to the contrary, but that we might
as readily render the true reason of all their _Phænomena_; as namely, what
were the cause of the springiness, and toughness of some, both as to their
flexibility and restitution. What, of the friability or brittleness of some
others, and the like; but till such time as our _Microscope_, or some other
means, enable us to discover the true _Schematism_ and _Texture_ of all
kinds of bodies, we must grope, as it were, in the dark, and onely ghess at
the true reasons of things by similitudes and comparisons.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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