Experiments and Considerations Touching Colours | Page 2

proper for the Building; And
if I did not well know how Ingenious the Curiosity and Civility of
Friends makes them, to perswade Men by specious allegations, to
gratifie their desires; I should have been made to believe by persons
very well qualify'd to judge of matters of this nature, that the following
Experiments will not need the addition of accurate Method and
speculative Notions to procure Acceptance for the Treatise that
contains them: For it hath been represented, That in most of them, as
the Novelty will make them surprizing, and the Quickness of
performance, keep them from being tedious; so the sensible changes,
that are effected by them, are so manifest, so great, and so sudden, that
scarce any will be displeased to see them, and those that are any thing
Curious will scarce be able to see them, without finding themselves
excited, to make Reflexions upon Them. But though with me, who love
to measure Physical things by their use, not their strangeness, or
prettiness, the partiality of others prevails not to make me over value

these, or look upon them in themselves as other than Trifles: Yet I
confess, that ever since I did divers years ago shew some of them to a
Learned Company of _Virtuosi_: so many persons of differing
Conditions, and ev'n Sexes, have been Curious to see them, and pleas'd
not to Dislike them, that I cannot Despair, but that by complying with
those that urge the Publication of them, I may both gratifie and excite
the Curious, and lay perhaps a Foundation whereon either others or my
self may in time superstruct a substantial theory of Colours. And if
Aristotle, after his Master Plato, have rightly observ'd Admiration to be
the Parent of Philosophy, the wonder, some of these Trifles have been
wont to produce in all sorts of Beholders, and the access they have
sometimes gain'd ev'n to the Closets of Ladies, seem to promise, that
since the subject is so pleasing, that the Speculation appears as
Delightful! as Difficult, such easie and recreative Experiments, which
require but little time, or charge, or trouble in the making, and when
made are sensible and surprizing enough, may contribute more than
others, (far more important but as much more difficult) to recommend
those parts of Learning (Chymistry and Corpuscular Philosophy) by
which they have been produc'd, and to which they give Testimony ev'n
to such kind of persons, as value a pretty Trick more than a true Notion,
and would scarce admit Philosophy, if it approach'd them in another
Dress: without the strangeness or endearments of pleasantness to
recommend it. I know that I do but ill consult my own Advantage in the
consenting to the Publication of the following Treatise: For those things,
which, whilst men knew not how they were perform'd, appear'd so
strange, will, when the way of making them, and the Grounds on which
I devis'd them, shall be Publick, quickly lose all that their being
Rarityes, and their being thought Mysteries, contributed to recommend
them. But 'tis fitter for Mountebancks than Naturalis to desire to have
their discoverys rather admir'd than understood, and for my part I had
much rather deserve the thanks of the Ingenious, than enjoy the
Applause of the Ignorant. And if I can so farr contribute to the
discovery of the nature of Colours, as to help the Curious to it, I shall
have reach'd my End, and sav'd my self some Labour which else I may
chance be tempted to undergo in prosecuting that subect, and Adding to
this Treatise, which I therefore call a History, because it chiefly
contains matters of fact, and which History the Title declares me to

look upon but as _Begun_: Because though that above a hundred, not
to say a hundred and fifty Experiments, (some loose, and others
interwoven amongst the discourses themselves) may suffice to give a
Beginning to a History not hitherto, that I know, begun, by any; yet the
subject is so fruitfull, and so worthy, that those that are Curious of
these Matters will be farr more wanting to themselves than I can
suspect, if what I now publish prove any more than a Beginning. For, as
I hope my Endeavours may afford them some assistance towards this
work, so those Endeavours are much too Vnfinish'd to give them any
discouragement, as if there were little left for others to do towards the
History of Colours.
For (first) I have been willing to leave unmention'd the most part of
those Phænomena of Colours, that Nature presents us of her own
accord, (that is, without being guided or over-ruld by man) such as the
different Colours that several sorts of Fruites pass through before they
are perfectly ripe, and those that appear upon the fading