The following Paper having been but occasionally and hastily pen’d, long after what the Author had written (by way of Dialogue) about the Requisites of a good Hypothesis, it was intended, that if it came forth at all, it should do so as an Appendix to that Discourse; because though one part of it does little more than name some of the Heads treated of in the Dialogue, yet, according to the exigency of the Occasion, the other part contains several things, either pretermitted, or but more lightly touched on in the Discourse. But, although the Author’s design were to reserve these thoughts, as a kind of Paralipomena to his Dialogue; yet, since he is not willing to let that, at least quickly, come abroad, and these are fallen into my hands; I will make bold, with his good leave, to annex them to the fore-going Treatise, not onely to compleat the Bulk of the Book, but because of some affinity between them, since both aim at manifesting the Excellency of the Studies they would recommend. And perhaps ‘twill not be unwelcome to some of the Curious to find, that our Noble Author in the same Book, wherein he prefers the Study of Divine things to that of Natural ones, does himself prefer the Mechanical Principles before all other Hypotheses about Natural things; they being in their own Nature so accommodate to make considering men understand, rather than dispute of, the Effects of Nature.
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