"I say much more; that fire, being of so subtile a nature, that it can hardly be called a body, is consequently almost stripped of all resistance; whence it follows, that the air, mounting up without impediment, would reach the skies, driving fire from its place, and compelling it to seek a lower station, to the injury of their own doctrine. To this I will add another inconvenience, namely, the perpetual and unprofitable strife, which would ensue between the heavy and the light elements, the latter pulling upwards, and the former downwards, with all their might; whence would arise, at the place of their contiguity, incomparably greater distress than the packthread experiences which is pulled in opposite directions by two strong hands, till at last it is broken by their efforts: far different from that knot of friendship, in which nature has been pleased to unite the neighbouring elements, planting in their bosoms similar qualities, whence they communicate and amicably sympathize with each other. It follows from all this, that levity is a term that signifies nothing absolute in nature, and must be rejected; or, if we retain it, it must only be to denote the relation of one substance having less weight to another which has more."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Imported from EN Wikiquote
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Rey
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
John Rey
1583 – 1645
John Rey (1583–1645) (or, in French) Jean Rey, was a physician of , France who in 1630 published a tract on , or of metals, after being notified by Brun, an apothecary of Bergerac, France, of Brun's experiments (as early as 1629) on the calcination of tin. Brun had melted 2 pounds six ounces of tin, and after 6 hours the resulting calx weighed seven ounces more than the original tin. More than one hundred and forty years before Antoine Lavoisier, John Rey recognized that in the calcination of le
66 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by John Rey →
Related Quotes
"God, creating the universe, neither made it perfectly like Himself, nor perfectly unlike, for He, being One, has made…"
"For this matter, every where filling the space closed in by the curvature of heaven, is continually pushed, by its ow…"
"The chemists furnish us with a pretty representation of this, by taking pulverized black enamel, liquor of tartar, br…"
"Almost all philosophers, ancient and modern, fearing an eternal confusion of the elements, were they all endowed with…"
"What shadows would be if there were no bodies, such natural motion in the upper regions will become, without levity. …"
"Now casting a look on all that moves, I see nothing that ascends by its own proper motion. Water, indeed, rises in a …"
"Thus, the motion of the orbits of the planets from east to west, having its cause in a higher heaven, is called by al…"
"Having thus vanished levity, and its upward motion, from all the boundaries of nature, we aver anew, that the element…"
"[N]othing gains weight but by the addition of matter, nor loses it but by its subtraction—so inseparably are matter a…"
"[T]wo ingots one... of gold, and the other of iron, which appear by the balance to be equal, are nevertheless not so—…"