Part of the Third Work (Opus Tertium)

xiv

(4) Also another chapter by the same brother Roger Bacon of the Order of Friars Minor concerning the power of the word. That chapter is extracted from the first part of the Great Work original: "Opus Majus" which he produced at the command of Pope Clement. "Then I compare the utility of languages to the Church of God . . . because nature is the instrument of divine operation. The chapter ends" (folios 8r—9r). [This is not actually from the Great Work, but from the Third Work original: "Opus Tertium", chapter 26; Brewer edition, pages 95-100.]

(5) Also another chapter by the same brother Roger concerning the same subject. "I respond diligently to your petition . . . they are set on fire and they shine" (folios 9r—11r) [This refers to the Letter on the Secret Works of Art and Nature original: "Epistola de secretis operibus artis et naturae", chapters 1 through 5, and the first lines of chapter 6; Brewer edition, pages 523-36]. This is the earliest manuscript version of the Letter yet discovered.

* (6) Also brother Roger Bacon says this in the Third Work: but what is written here up to the section on perspective is not in the Great Work, but nevertheless that same thing is contained more broadly and explained differently in the Second Work original: "Opus Minus". "After these things follows the application of mathematics to the public welfare . . . the Christians come" (folios 11r—13v) [This is the newly discovered fragment, with an additional paragraph not found in the Winchester manuscript, see pages 1-19 below].

(7) The Book of the Secret of Secrets of Aristotle to King Alexander. This book is entitled the Book of Ten Sciences with certain explanations by brother Roger Bacon of the Order of Friars Minor (folios 13v—65v). Trinity College, Cambridge, manuscript 1036 (15th century) contains an incomplete copy of the Tanner manuscript. Dr. James has just drawn my attention to manuscript 153 of the McClean collection in the Fitzwilliam Museum, which is fully described in his 1912 catalogue. This is from the late 15th century. Its contents are exactly the same as those of the Tanner manuscript, from which it is probably copied. I have not yet examined it myself.

III. Cambridge University Library, Ff. IV., 12 (folio 318).

This is a volume of treatises and extracts on alchemy. It was written by Robert Greene of Welbe in 1528 and 1529. Among these items is a fragment of the Third Work without a title (folio 318 and following). It contains the summary of the fifth part of the moral philosophy, the summary of the Lesser Work original: "Opus Minus", and the three chapters on alchemy (see pages 75-89 below). This manuscript appears to have been copied neither from the Paris manuscript nor