XXXVIII

Now follow five classes of instances which under one general name I call Instances of the Lamp, or of First Information. They are those which aid the senses. For since all interpretation of nature commences with the senses and leads from the perceptions of the senses by a straight, regular, and guarded path to the perceptions of the understanding, which are true notions and axioms, it follows of necessity that the more copious and exact the representations of the senses, the more easily and prosperously will everything proceed.

Of these five instances of the lamp, the first strengthen, enlarge, and rectify the immediate actions of the senses; the second make manifest things which are not directly perceptible by means of others which are; the third indicate the continued processes or series of those things and motions which are for the most part unobserved except in their end or periods; the fourth provide the sense with some substitute when it utterly fails; the fifth excite the attention and notice of the sense, and at the same time set bounds to the subtlety of things. Of these I shall now speak in their order.