according to Mr Boyle, has eight different significations; it being used, 1. For the author of nature, whom the schoolmen call Natura Naturans, being the same with God. 2. By the nature of a thing, we sometimes mean its essence; that is, the attributes which make it what it is, whether the thing be corporeal or not; as when we attempt to define the nature of a fluid, of a triangle, &c. 3. Sometimes we confound that which a man has by nature with what accrues to him by birth; as when we say, that such a man is noble by nature. 4. Sometimes we take nature for an internal principle of motion; as when we say, that a stone by nature falls to the earth. Sometimes we understand by nature, the established course of things.

6. Sometimes we take nature for an aggregate of powers belonging to a body, especially a living one; in which sense physicians say, that nature is strong, weak, or spent; or that, in such or such diseases, nature left to herself will perform the cure.

7. Sometimes we use the term nature for the universe, or whole system of the corporeal works of God; as when it is said of a phoenix, or chimera, that there is no such thing in nature.

8. Sometimes too, and that most commonly, we express by the word nature, a kind of semi-deity, or other strange kind of being.

If, says the same philosopher, I were to propose a notion of nature, less ambiguous than these already mentioned, and with regard to which many axioms relating to that word may be conveniently understood, I should first distinguish between the universal and the particular nature of things. Universal nature I would define to be the aggregate of the bodies that make up the world in its present state, considered as a principle, by virtue whereof they act and suffer, according to the laws of motion prescribed by the Author of all things. And this makes way for the other subordinate notion; since the particular nature of an individual consists in the general nature applied to a distinct portion of the universe; or, which is the same thing, it is a particular assemblage of the mechanical properties of matter, as figure, motion, &c.

Kingdoms of Nature. See Kingdoms.

Conduct or Operations of Nature. See Natural History.