TO THE READER.

...one copy alone had readings that were sufficiently clear and accurate, while the other had either very confused ones or was entirely lacking them. The sequence of chapters did not match in both, and there were chapters present in one—though very few—which you would have sought in the other in vain. In the midst of such confusion, I believed I was permitted some discretion, as I preferred the work to come forth enlarged rather than truncated.

In examining the Method Method: In the 17th century, this referred to the logical structure and organizational framework of a scientific treatise, I was far more lenient. I saw that a correction would have to be extended quite widely if I were to undertake a total reformation—which, though currently lacking a protector, needed to be done according to the standard of the art (which I found had been violated). That standard organizes individual points according to the clarity of nature, proceeding from more general to more specific things, and weaves the explanations of qualities and properties distinctly into their proper places. However, among Critics original: Arbitros, referring to scholarly judges or editors, such sweeping changes to another person's work are, quite rightly, not permitted.

Therefore, a Reader who is keenly fastidious and of a censorious brow will easily stumble upon small offenses against either the sense or a more exact elegance, which I suspect escaped my attention and will not be lacking in number. But let such a reader remember to acknowledge that these errors belong to men, knowing that they are a slippery thing original Greek: ὀλισθηρόν τι πρᾶγμα (olisthēron ti prāgma), a philosophical idiom suggesting that human nature is prone to error or instability.

Let him also know that this Physiology Physiology: Here, the term refers to "Natural Philosophy" or the study of the laws of nature, rather than the modern biological sense lacked the Author's final hand. He surely would have corrected his own work had he survived his first attempts—which are like so many bursts of meditation not yet severely examined. We preferred that it exist in this state, neither perfected by him nor fully polished and refined original: exasciatam, a woodworking metaphor meaning "hewn into shape with an axe" by us, rather than...