7. (_Melancthon._)--It is not easy to point out with precision the connexion between the efforts at a Reform in Philosophy, and the great Reformation of Religion in the sixteenth century. The disposition to assert (practically at least) a freedom of thinking, and to reject the corruptions which tradition had introduced and authority maintained, naturally extended its influence from one subject to another; and especially in subjects so nearly connected as theology and philosophy. The Protestants, however, did not reject the Aristotelian system; they only reformed it, by going back to the original works of the author, and by reducing it to a conformity with Scripture. In this reform, Melancthon was the chief author, and wrote works on Logic, Physics, Morals, and Metaphysics, which were used among Protestants. On the subject of the origin of our knowledge, his views contained a very philosophical improvement of the Aristotelian doctrines. He recognized the importance of Ideas, as well as of Experience. "We could not," he says[127], "proceed to reason at all, except there were by nature innate in man certain fixed points, that is, principles of science;--as Number, the recognition of Order and Proportion, logical, geometrical, physical and moral Principles. Physical principles are such as these,--everything which exists proceeds from a cause,--a body cannot be in two places at once,--time is a continued series of things or of motions,--and the like." It is not difficult to see that such Principles partake of the nature of the Fundamental Ideas which we have attempted to arrange and enumerate in a previous part of this work. Before we proceed to the next chapter, which treats of the Practical Reformers of Scientific Method, let us for an instant look at the strong persuasion implied in the titles of the works of this period, that the time of a philosophical revolution was at hand. Telesius published _De Rerum Natura juxta propria principia_; Francis Helmont, _Philosophia vulgaris refutata_; Patricius, _Nova de Universis Philosophia_; Campanella, _Philosophia sensibus demonstrata, adversus errores Aristotelis_; Bruno professed himself the author of a _Nolan Philosophy_; and Ramus of a _New Logic_. The age announced itself pregnant; and the eyes of all who took an interest in the intellectual fortunes of the race, were looking eagerly for the expected offspring. FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 108: Bernardini Telesii Consentini _De Rerum Natura juxta propria Principia_.] [Footnote 109: I take this account from Tenneman: this Proem was omitted in subsequent editions of Telesius, and is not in the one which I have consulted. Tenneman, _Gesch. d. Phil._ ix. 280.] [Footnote 110: Proem.] [Footnote 111: "De Principiis atque Originibus secundum fabulas Cupidinis et Cœli: sive Parmenidis et Telesii et præcipuè Democriti Philosophia tractata in Fabula de Cupidine."]