1 I have seen you so passionately addicted, _Pyrophilus_ to the delightful
Art of Limning and Painting, that I cannot but think my self obliged to
acquaint you with some of those things that have occurred to mee concerning
the changes of Colours. And I may expect that I shall as well serve the
_Virtuosi_ in general, as gratifie you in particular, by furnishing a
person, who, I hope, will both improve my Communications, and communicate
his Improvements, with such Experiments and Observations as may both invite
you to enquire seriously into the Nature of Colours, and assist you in the
Investigation of it. This being the principal scope of the following Tract,
I should do that which might prevent my own design, if I should here
attempt to deliver you an accurate and particular Theory of Colours; for
that were to present you with what I desire to receive from you; and, as
farr as in mee lay, to make that study needless, to which I would engage
you.
2 Wherefore my present work shall be but to divert and recreate, as well as
excite you by the delivery of matters of fact, such as you may for the most
part try with much _ease_, and possibly not without some _delight_: And
lest you should expect any thing of Elaborate or Methodical in what you
will meet with here, I must confess to you before-hand, that the seasons I
was wont to chuse to devise and try Experiments about Colours, were those
daies, wherein having taken Physick, and finding my self as unfit to
speculate, as unwilling to be altogether idle, I chose this diversion, as a
kind of Mean betwixt the one and the other. And I have the less scrupled to
set down the following Experiments, as some of them came to my mind, and as
the Notes wherein I had set down the rest, occurr'd to my hands, that by
declining a Methodical way of delivering them, I might leave you and my
self the greater liberty and convenience to add to them, and transpose them
as shall appear expedient.
3 Yea, that you may not think mee too reserv'd, or look upon an Enquiry
made up of meer Narratives, as somewhat jejune, am content to _premise_ a
few considerations, that now offer themselves to my thoughts, which relate
in a more general way, either to the Nature of Colours, or to the study of
it. And I shall _insert_ an _Essay_, as well Speculative as Historical, of
the Nature of Whiteness and Blackness, that you may have a _Specimen_ of
the History of Colours, I have sometimes had thoughts of; and if you
dislike not the Method I have made use of, I hope, you, and some of the
_Virtuosi_, your friends, may be thereby invited to go thorow with _Red,
Blew, Yellow_, and the rest of the particular Colours, as I have done with
_White_ and _Black_, but with farr more sagacity and success. And if I can
invite Ingenious men to undertake such Tasks, I doubt not but the Curious
will quickly obtain a better Account of Colours, than as yet we have, since
in our Method the Theorical part of the Enquiry being attended, and as it
were interwoven with the Historical, whatever becomes of the disputable
Conjectures, the Philosophy of Colours will be promoted by the indisputable
Experiments.
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