Viewing page 436 of 504

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

243)
Since this is not the natural state of the Matter, it must undergo various degrees of motion before it arrives at the swiftest, and as it passes from one degree of motion to another it will have different qualities, which are so many different degrees of [[insert]] ^ what hath hitherto been understood by [[/insert]] [[underlined]] elementary Fire [[/underlined]]. And the prism discovers this to be a fact in nature by separating these different qualities or sorts of fire from each other. It shows that the least degree of motion to obtain the quality of fire will produce a violet colour; the 2.[[superscript]] nd [[/superscript]] indico; the 3.[[superscript]] rd [[/superscript]] blue; the 4.[[superscript]] th [[/superscript]] green; the 5.[[superscript]] th [[/superscript]] yellow; the 6.[[superscript]] th [[superscript]] orange; [[strikethrough]] and [[/strikethrough]] the 7.[[superscript]] th [[/superscript]] and last red. Likewise a bright iron sufficiently heated in a smith's fire will assume all the colours of the prism, and in the regular order above; [[underlined]] vis [[/underlined]] [[ strikethrough]] the first, whilst the heat motion [[/strikethrough]] the first degree of motion acquired by the matter to produce the least degree of fire will shew itself upon the iron to be of a violet colour, or it will first communicate[[strikethrough]] d [[/strikethrough]] that colour to the iron, and then an indico, and so on to a red; and since they are here all blended together in the same Substance, the last or greatest degree of fire will be of a white colour.
These different colours also appear in a burning lamp or candle; at the bottom where there is the least degree of motion and heat, there will be the violet; [[strikethrough]] a [[/strikethrough]] about the wick or metch where there is a much greater degree of motion and heat, there [[strikethrough]] w [[/strikethrough]] the red appears, and so the intermediate [[strikethrough]] degrees [[/strikethrough]] colours ensue from the intermediate degrees of motion, [[underlined]] mutatis mutandis. [[/underlined]]

II. Just before this matter hath acquired the motion which gives it the property [[strikethrough]] or [[/strikethrough]] of [[strikethrough]] consuming [[/strikethrough]] [[insert]] ^ dissipating. [[/insert]] some bodies, [[insert]] ^ and converting them [[/insert]] into ashes; [[strikethrough]] and liquifying others [[/strikethrough]] [[insert]] ^ liquifying some and calcining others [[/insert]] called above [[underlined]] Fire in Orb [[/underlined]], it hath the [[strikethrough]] propert [[/strikethrough]] quality or property of heating and shining [[insert]] ^ jointly [[/insert]] down from thence to certain degrees of less motion; and this I would call [[underlined]] Fire disseminated [[/underlined]].