Test Bank for Economics of Strategy 7th Edition by Dranove

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File: ch02, Chapter 2: The Horizontal Boundaries of the Firm

Multiple Choice

1. Which of the following is a characteristic of economies of scale?

a) The average cost declines as output increases
b) The average cost increases as output increases
c) The average cost remains constant as output increases
d) The average costs are cheaper when a firm produces a wider variety of goods
e) The average cost curve takes the form of a U-shape

Ans: a
Learning Objective: Define economies of scale and scope and the role of indivisibilities AASCB:
Analytical
AICPA: Measurement
IMA: Quantitative Methods

Heading: Economies of Scale and Scope – Definition of Economies of Scale Level:

Easy

2. What is the minimum efficient scale (MES) of production?

a) The point on an average cost curve where the cost per unit begins to decline more rapidly
b) The minimum point on a U-shaped average cost curve
c) The minimum level of production at a plant for it to be considered profitable
d) The level of production for a small sized plant
e) The threshold at which capacity is constraining for a firm’s production

Ans: b

Learning Objective: Describe the relationship between economies of scale and indivisibilities AASCB:
Analytical
AICPA: Measurement
IMA: Quantitative Methods

Heading: Economies of Scale and Scope – Definition of Economies of Scale

Level: Medium

3. Which of the following is generally a way that LBOs can help a firm realize its potential value?
a) The synergies created allow for cost savings
b) The transaction reduces the disparity between a firm’s actual and potential share price
c) The acquisition reduces the likelihood of competition in the industry
d) The transaction requires debt repayment with future free cash flow leaving management no discretion
over the investment of these funds
e) The buyout gives an opportunity to adjust the management structure and makeup

Ans: d
Learning Objective: Identify forces that keep managers focused on shareholder benefits
AASCB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA: Strategic/Critical Thinking
IMA: Strategic Planning

Heading: The Market for Corporate Control and Recent Changes in Corporate Governance Level:
Easy

4. Which of the following best describes economies of scope?

a) The average cost declines as output increases
b) The average cost increases as output increases
c) The average cost remains constant as output increases
d) Savings are achieved when a firm produces a wider variety of goods
e) Savings are achieved when a firm produces a decreased variety of goods

Ans: d
Learning Objective: Define economies of scale and scope and the role of indivisibilities AASCB:
Analytical
AICPA: Leverage Technology to Develop and Enhance Functional Compentencies IMA:
Business Applications

Heading: Economies of Scale and Scope – Definition of Economies of Scope

Level: Easy

5. What measure, that depends on how much of a firm’s revenues are attributable to product market
activities that have shared technological characteristics, production characteristics, or distribution
channels, is used to determine how diversified a firm is at a given time? a) Integration level
b) Rumelt score
c) Conglomerate level
d) Activity share
e) Relatedness

Ans: e

Learning Objective: Explain the value of complementarities and strategic fit

AASCB: Communication
AICPA: Communication
IMA: Strategic Planning

Heading: A Brief History

Level: Medium

6. Which of the following is not a product specific fixed cost?

a) The cost to manufacture a special die to make an aircraft fuselage
b) The cost of developing graphics software to facilitate video game development
c) The cost of a one-week training program preceding the implementation of a specific management
initiative
d) The time and expense required to set up a textbook before printing it
e) The cost of administrative expenses

Ans: e

Learning Objective: Identify sources of diseconomies of scale

AASCB: Analytical
AICPA: Resource Management
IMA: Cost Management

Heading: Where do Scale Economies Come From? – Indivisibilities and the Spreading of Fixed Costs
Level: Medium
7. What kind of economies come from reductions in cost due to adoption of technology that has high
fixed costs, but lower variable costs? a) Short-run economies of scale
b) Short-run economies of scope
c) Long-run economies of scale
d) Long-run economies of scope
e) Partially automated economies

Ans: c

Learning Objective: Identify six specific sources of economies of scale and scope
AASCB: Analytical
AICPA: Measurement
IMA: Quantitative Methods

Heading: Where do Scale Economies Come From? – Indivisibilities and the Spreading of Fixed Costs
Level: Hard

8. Examining which of the following is broadly considered one of the easiest ways to measure
diversifying activity? a) Joint Ventures
b) Mergers and acquisitions
c) Internal Business Development
d) Strategic Alliances
e) Collaborative agreements

Ans: b

Learning Objective: Define Diversification

AASCB: Reflective Thinking
AICPA: Industry/Sector Perspective
IMA: Investment Decisions

Heading: A Brief History

Level: Medium

9. What force does Manne indicate constrains the actions of managers so that they stay focused on the
goals of owners?
a) Market for corporate control
b) SEC
c) Corporate board
d) Corporate governance
e) CEO
Ans: a

Learning Objective: Identify forces that keep managers focused on shareholder benefits AASCB:
Ethics
AICPA: Leadership
IMA: Performance Measurement

Heading: Managerial Reasons for Diversification – The Market for Corporate Control and Recent
Changes in Corporate Governance
Level: Medium

10. What kind of economies come from reductions in average costs due to increases in capacity
utilization?
a) Short-run economies of scale
b) Short-run economies of scope
c) Long-run economies of scale
d) Long-run economies of scope
e) Fully automated economies

Ans: a

Learning Objective: Identify six specific sources of economies of scale and scope
AASCB: Analytical
AICPA: Resource Management
IMA: Business Economics

Heading: Where do Scale Economies Come From? – Indivisibilities and the Spreading of Fixed Costs
Level: Hard

11. What are economies of density as referred to in the airline industry?

a) Reducing the size of an aircraft used to increase load factor
b) Economies achieved by an airline flying from spoke to spoke in a hub-and-spoke network
c) Economies of scope along a given route
d) Economies of scale along a given route
e) Reductions in average cost as traffic volume decreases

Ans: d

Learning Objective: Identify six specific sources of economies of scale and scope
AASCB: Analytical
AICPA: Industry/Sector Perspective
IMA: Decision Analysis
Another document from Scribd.com that is
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with Aristotle), whether Plato did or did not believe in the rotation of the
earth on her axis. (See M. Cousin’s Note on the Timæus, and M. Henri
Martin’s Dissertation, Note xxxvii., in his Etudes sur le Timée.) The
result of this discussion seems to be that, in the Timæus, the Earth is
supposed to be at rest. It is however related by Plutarch (Platonic
Questions, viii. 1), that Plato in his old age repented of having given to
the Earth the place in the centre of the universe which did not belong to
it.

In describing the Prelude to the Epoch of Copernicus (Book v. Chap.

i.), I have spoken of Philolaus, one of the followers of Pythagoras, who
lived at the time of Socrates, as having held the doctrine that the earth
revolves about the sun. This has been a current 507 opinion;—so current,
indeed, that the Abbé Bouillaud, or Bullialdus, as we more commonly
call him, gave the title of Philolaus to the defence of Copernicus which
he published in 1639; and Chiaramonti, an Aristotelian, published his
answer under the title of Antiphilolaus. In 1645 Bullialdus published his
Astronomia Philolaica, which was another exposition of the heliocentric
doctrine.

Yet notwithstanding this general belief, it appears to be tolerably

certain that Philolaus did not hold the doctrine of the earth’s motion
round the sun. (M. H. Martin, Etudes sur le Timée, 1841, Note xxxvii.
Sect. i.; and Bœckh, De vera Indole Astronomiæ Philolaicæ, 1810.) In
the system of Philolaus, the earth revolved about the central fire; but this
central fire was not the sun. The Sun, along with the moon and planets,
revolved in circles external to the earth. The Earth had the Antichthon or
Counter-Earth between it and the centre; and revolving round this centre
in one day, the Antichthon, being always between it and the centre, was,
during a portion of the revolution, interposed between the Earth and the
Sun, and thus made night; while the Sun, by his proper motion, produced
the changes of the year.

When men were willing to suppose the earth to be in motion, in order

to account for the recurrence of day and night, it is curious that they did
not see that the revolution of a spherical earth about an axis passing
through its centre was a scheme both simple and quite satisfactory. Yet
the illumination of a globular earth by a distant sun, and the
circumstances and phenomena thence resulting, appear to have been
conceived in a very confused manner by many persons. Thus Tacitus
(Agric. xii.), after stating that he has heard that in the northern part of the
island of Britain, the night disappears in the height of summer, says, as
his account of this phenomenon, that “the extreme parts of the earth are
low and level, and do not throw their shadow upwards; so that the shade
of night falls below the sky and the stars.” But, as a little consideration
will show, it is the globular form of the earth, and not the level character
of the country, which produces this effect.

It is not in any degree probable that Pythagoras taught that the Earth
revolves round the Sun, or that it rotates on its own axis. Nor did Plato
hold either of these motions of the Earth. They got so far as to believe in
the Spherical Form of the Earth; and this was apparently such an effort
that the human mind made a pause before going any further. “It
required,” says M. H. Martin, “a great struggle for 508 men to free
themselves from the prejudices of the senses, and to interpret their
testimony in such a manner as to conceive the sphericity of the earth. It
is natural that they should have stopped at this point, before putting the
earth in motion in space.”

Some of the expressions which have been understood, as describing a

system in which the Sun is the centre of motion, do really imply merely
the Sun is the middle term of the series of heavenly bodies which revolve
round the earth: the series being Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars,
Jupiter, Saturn. This is the case, for instance, in a passage of Cicero’s
Vision of Scipio, which has been supposed to imply, (as I have stated in
the History,) that Mercury and Venus revolve about the Sun.

But though the doctrine of the diurnal rotation and annual revolution
of the earth is not the doctrine of Pythagoras, or of Philolaus, or of Plato,
it was nevertheless held by some of the philosophers of antiquity. The
testimony of Archimedes that this doctrine was held by his contemporary
Aristarchus of Samos, is unquestionable and there is no reason to doubt
Plutarch’s assertion that Seleucus further enforced it.

It is curious that Copernicus appears not to have known anything of

the opinions of Aristarchus and Seleucus, which were really anticipations
of his doctrine; and to have derived his notion from passages which, as I
have been showing, contain no such doctrine. He says, in his Dedication
to Pope Paul III., “I found in Cicero that Nicetas [or Hicetas] held that
the earth was in motion: and in Plutarch I found that some others had
been of that opinion: and his words I will transcribe that any one may
read them: ‘Philosophers in general hold that the earth is at rest. But
Philolaus the Pythagorean teaches that it moves round the central fire in
an oblique circle, in the same direction as the Sun and the Moon.
Heraclides of Pontus and Ecphantus the Pythagorean give the earth a
motion, but not a motion of translation; they make it revolve like a wheel
about its own centre from west to east.’” This last opinion was a correct
assertion of the diurnal motion.

The Eclipse of Thales.

“T Eclipse of Thales” is so remarkable a point in the history of

astronomy, and has been the subject of so much discussion among
astronomers, that it ought to be more especially noticed. The original 509
record is in the first Book of Herodotus’s History (chap. lxxiv.) He says
that there was a war between the Lydians and the Medes; and after
various turns of fortune, “in the sixth year a conflict took place; and on
the battle being joined, it happened that the day suddenly became night.
And this change, Thales of Miletus had predicted to them, definitely
naming this year, in which the event really took place. The Lydians and
the Medes, when they saw day turned into night, ceased from fighting;
and both sides were desirous of peace.” Probably this prediction was
founded upon the Chaldean period of eighteen years, of which I have
spoken in Section 11. It is probable, as I have already said, that this
period was discovered by noticing the recurrence of eclipses. It is to be
observed that Thales predicted only the year of the eclipse, not the day or
the month. In fact, the exact prediction of the circumstances of an eclipse
of the sun is a very difficult problem; much more difficult, it may be
remarked, than the prediction of the circumstance of an eclipse of the
moon.

Now that the Theory of the Moon is brought so far towards

completeness, astronomers are able to calculate backwards the eclipses
of the sun which have taken place in former times; and the question has
been much discussed in what year this Eclipse of Thales really occurred.
The Memoir of Mr. Airy, the Astronomer Royal, on this subject, in the
Phil. Trans. for 1853, gives an account of the modern examinations of
this subject. Mr. Airy starts from the assumption that the eclipse must
have been one decidedly total; the difference between such a one and an
eclipse only nearly total being very marked. A total eclipse alone was
likely to produce so strong an effect on the minds of the combatants. Mr.
Airy concludes from his calculations that the eclipse predicted by Thales
took place . . 585.

Ancient eclipses of the Moon and Sun, if they can be identified, are of
great value for modern astronomy; for in the long interval of between
two and three thousand years which separates them from our time, those
of the inequalities, that is, accelerations or retardations of the Moon’s
motion, which go on increasing constantly, 4 accumulate to a large
amount; so that the actual time and circumstances of the eclipse give
astronomers the means of determining what the rate of these
accelerations or retardations has been. Accordingly Mr. Airy has
discussed, as even more important than the eclipse of Thales, an eclipse
which Diodorus relates to have happened during an expedition of 510
Agathocles, the ruler of Sicily, and which is hence known as the Eclipse
of Agathocles. He determines it to have occurred . . 310.
4
Or at least for very long periods.
 M. H. Martin, in Note xxxvii. to his Etudes sur le Timée, discusses
among other astronomical matters, the Eclipse of Thales. He does not
appear to render a very cordial belief to the historical fact of Thales
having delivered the prediction before the event. He says that even if
Thales did make such a prediction of an eclipse of the sun, as he might
do, by means of the Chaldean period of 18 years, or 223 lunations, he
would have to take the chance of its being visible in Greece, about which
he could only guess:—that no author asserts that Thales, or his
successors Anaximander and Anaxagoras, ever tried their luck in the
same way again:—that “en revanche” we are told that Anaximander
predicted an earthquake, and Anaxagoras the fall of aërolites, which are
plainly fabulous stories, though as well attested as the Eclipse of Thales.
He adds that according to Aristotle, Thales and Anaximenes were so far
from having sound notions of cosmography, that they did not even
believe in the roundness of the earth.
 B O O K IV.

PHYSICAL SCIENCE IN THE MIDDLE AGES.

 GENERAL REMARKS.

I Nof theOpinions
twelfth Book of the Philosophy, in which I have given a Review
on the Nature of Knowledge and the method of seeking it,
I have given some account of several of the most important persons
belonging to the ages now under consideration. I have there (vol. ii. b.
xii. p. 146) spoken of the manner in which remarks made by Aristotle
came to be accepted as fundamental maxims in the schools of the middle
ages, and of the manner in which they were discussed by the greatest of
the schoolmen, as Thomas Aquinas, Albertus Magnus, and the like. I
have spoken also (p. 149) of a certain kind of recognition of the
derivation of our knowledge from experience; as shown in Richard of St.
Victor, in the twelfth century. I have considered (p. 152) the plea of the
admirers of those ages, that religious authority was not claimed for
physical science.

I have noticed that the rise of Experimental Philosophy exhibited two

features (chap. vii. p. 155), the Insurrection against Authority, and the
Appeal to Experience: and as exemplifying these features, I have spoken
of Raymond Lully and of Roger Bacon. I have further noticed the
opposition to the prevailing Aristotelian dogmatism manifested (chap.
viii.) by Nicolas of Cus, Marsilius Ficinus, Francis Patricius, Picus of
Mirandula, Cornelius Agrippa, Theophrastus Paracelsus, Robert Fludd. I
have gone on to notice the Theoretical Reformers of Science (chap. ix.),
Bernardinus Telesius, Thomas Campanella, Andreas Cæsalpinus, Peter
Ramus; and the Protestant Reformers, as Melancthon. After these come
the Practical Reformers of Science, who have their place in the
subsequent history of Inductive Philosophy; Leonardo da Vinci, and the
Heralds of the dawning light of real science, whom Francis Bacon
welcomes, as Heralds are accosted in Homer:

Χαίρετε Κήρυκες Διὸς ἄγγελοι ἠδὲ καὶ ἀνδρῶν.

Hail, Heralds, messengers of Gods and men!
 512 I have, in the part of the Philosophy referred to, discussed the
merits and defects of Francis Bacon’s Method, and I shall have occasion,
in the next Book, to speak of his mode of dealing with the positive
science of his time. There is room for much more reflexion on these
subjects, but the references now made may suffice at present.
 CHAPTER V.

P M A .

Thomas Aquinas.

A wrote (besides the Summa mentioned in the text) a

Commentary on the Physics of Aristotle: Commentaria in
Aristotelis Libros Physicorum, Venice, 1492. This work is of course of
no scientific value; and the commentary consists of empty permutations
of abstract terms, similar to those which constitute the main substance of
the text in Aristotle’s physical speculations. There is, however, an
attempt to give a more technical form to the propositions and their
demonstrations. As specimens of these, I may mention that in Book vi. c.
2, we have a demonstration that when bodies move, the time and the
magnitude (that is, the space described), are divided similarly; with many
like propositions. And in Book viii. we have such propositions as this (c.
10): “Demonstration that a finite mover (movens) cannot move anything
in an infinite time.” This is illustrated by a diagram in which two hands
are represented as engaged in moving a whole sphere, and one hand in
moving a hemisphere.

This mode of representing force, in diagrams illustrative of

mechanical reasonings, by human hands pushing, pulling, and the like, is
still employed in elementary books. Probably this is the first example of
such a mode of representation.

Roger Bacon.

T writer, a contemporary of Thomas Aquinas, exhibits to us a kind

of knowledge, speculation, and opinion, so different from that of any
known person near his time, that he deserves especial notice here; 513
and I shall transfer to this place the account which I have given of him in
the Philosophy. I do this the more willingly because I regard the
existence of such a work as the Opus Majus at that period as a problem
which has never yet been solved. Also I may add, that the scheme of the
Contents of this work which I have given, deserves, as I conceive, more
notice than it has yet received.

“Roger Bacon was born in 1214, near Ilchester, in Somersetshire, of

an old family. In his youth he was a student at Oxford, and made
extraordinary progress in all branches of learning. He then went to the
University of Paris, as was at that time the custom of learned
Englishmen, and there received the degree of Doctor of Theology. At the
persuasion of Robert Grostête, bishop of Lincoln, he entered the
brotherhood of Franciscans in Oxford, and gave himself up to study with
extraordinary fervor. He was termed by his brother monks Doctor
Mirabilis. We know from his own works, as well as from the traditions
concerning him, that he possessed an intimate acquaintance with all the
science of his time which could be acquired from books; and that he had
made many remarkable advances by means of his own experimental
labors. He was acquainted with Arabic, as well as with the other
languages common in his time. In the title of his works, we find the
whole range of science and philosophy, Mathematics and Mechanics,
Optics, Astronomy, Geography, Chronology, Chemistry, Magic, Music,
Medicine, Grammar, Logics, Metaphysics, Ethics, and Theology; and
judging from those which are published, these works are full of sound
and exact knowledge. He is, with good reason, supposed to have
discovered, or to have had some knowledge of, several of the most
remarkable inventions which were made generally known soon
afterwards; as gunpowder, lenses, burning specula, telescopes, clocks,
the correction of the calendar, and the explanation of the rainbow.

“Thus possessing, in the acquirements and habits of his own mind,

abundant examples of the nature of knowledge and of the process of
invention, Roger Bacon felt also a deep interest in the growth and
progress of science, a spirit of inquiry respecting the causes which
produced or prevented its advance, and a fervent hope and trust in its
future destinies; and these feelings impelled him to speculate worthily
and wisely respecting a Reform of the Method of Philosophizing. The
manuscripts of his works have existed for nearly six hundred years in
many of the libraries of Europe, and especially in those of England; and
for a long period the very imperfect portions of them which were 514
generally known, left the character and attainments of the author
shrouded in a kind of mysterious obscurity. About a century ago,
however, his Opus Majus was published 5 by Dr. S. Jebb, principally
from a manuscript in the library of Trinity College, Dublin; and this
contained most or all of the separate works which were previously
known to the public, along with others still more peculiar and
characteristic. We are thus able to judge of Roger Bacon’s knowledge
and of his views, and they are in every way well worthy our attention.
5
Fratris Rogeri Bacon Ordinis Minorum Opus Majus ad Clementem
Quartum, Pontificem Romanum, ex MS. Codice Dubliniensi cum aliis
quibusdam collato nunc primum edidit S. Jebb, M.D. Londini, 1733.

“The Opus Majus is addressed to Pope Clement the Fourth, whom

Bacon had known when he was legate in England as Cardinal-bishop of
Sabina, and who admired the talents of the monk, and pitied him for the
persecutions to which he was exposed. On his elevation to the papal
chair, this account of Bacon’s labours and views was sent, at the earnest
request of the pontiff. Besides the Opus Majus, he wrote two others, the
Opus Minus and Opus Tertium; which were also sent to the pope, as the
author says, 6 ‘on account of the danger of roads, and the possible loss of
the work.’ These works still exist unpublished, in the Cottonian and
other libraries.
6
Opus Majus, Præf.

“The Opus Majus is a work equally wonderful with regard to its

general scheme, and to the special treatises with which the outlines of the
plan are filled up. The professed object of the work is to urge the
necessity of a reform in the mode of philosophizing, to set forth the
reasons why knowledge had not made a greater progress, to draw back
attention to the sources of knowledge which had been unwisely
neglected, to discover other sources which were yet almost untouched,
and to animate men in the undertaking, by a prospect of the vast
advantages which it offered. In the developement of this plan, all the
leading portions of science are expounded in the most complete shape
which they had at that time assumed; and improvements of a very wide
and striking kind are proposed in some of the principal of these
departments. Even if the work had had no leading purpose, it would have
been highly valuable as a treasure of the most solid knowledge and
soundest speculations of the time; even if it had contained no such
details, it would have been a work most remarkable for its general views
and scope. It may be considered as, at the same time, the Encyclopedia
and the Novum Organon of the thirteenth century. 515

“Since this work is thus so important in the history of Inductive

Philosophy I shall give, in a Note, a view 7 of its divisions and contents.
But I must now endeavor to point out more especially the way in which
the various principles, which the reform of scientific method involved,
are here brought into view.
7
Contents of Roger Bacon’s Opus Majus:
Part I. On the four causes of human ignorance:—Authority,
Custom, Popular Opinion, and the Pride of supposed
Knowledge.
Part II. On the source of perfect wisdom in the Sacred Scripture.
Part III. On the Usefulness of Grammar.
Part IV. On the Usefulness of Mathematics.
(1.) The Necessity of Mathematics in Human Things
(published separately as the Specula
Mathematica).
(2.) The Necessity of Mathematics in Divine Things.—
1°. This study has occupied holy men: 2°.
Geography: 3°. Chronology: 4°. Cycles; the
Golden Number, &c.: 5°. Natural Phenomena, as
the Rainbow: 6°. Arithmetic: 7°. Music.
(3.) The Necessity of Mathematics in Ecclesiastical
 Things. 1°. The Certification of Faith: 2°. The
Correction of the Calendar.
(4.) The Necessity of Mathematics in the State.—1°.
Of Climates: 2°. Hydrography: 3°. Geography: 4°.
Astrology.
Part V. On Perspective (published separately as Perspectiva).
(1.) The organs of vision.
(2.) Vision in straight lines.
(3.) Vision reflected and refracted.
(4.) De multiplicatione specierum (on the propagation
of the impressions of light, heat, &c.)
Part VI. On Experimental Science.

“One of the first points to be noticed for this purpose, is the resistance
to authority; and at the stage of philosophical history with which we here
have to do, this means resistance to the authority of Aristotle, as adopted
and interpreted by the Doctors of the Schools. Bacon’s work 8 is divided
into Six Parts; and of these Parts, the First is, Of the four universal
Causes of all Human Ignorance. The causes thus enumerated 9 are:—the
force of unworthy authority;—traditionary habit;—the imperfection of
the undisciplined senses;—and the disposition to conceal our ignorance
and to make an ostentatious show of our knowledge. These influences
involve every man, occupy every condition. They prevent our obtaining
the most useful and large and fair doctrines of wisdom, the secrets of all
sciences and arts. He then proceeds to argue, from the testimony of
philosophers themselves, that the authority of antiquity, and especially of
Aristotle, is not infallible. ‘We find 10 their books full of doubts,
obscurities, and perplexities. They 516 scarce agree with each other in
one empty question or one worthless sophism, or one operation of
science, as one man agrees with another in the practical operations of
medicine, surgery, and the like arts of secular men. Indeed,’ he adds, 11
‘not only the philosophers, but the saints have fallen into errors which
they have afterwards retracted,’ and this he instances in Augustin,
Jerome, and others. He gives an admirable sketch of the progress of
philosophy from the Ionic School to Aristotle; of whom he speaks with
great applause. ‘Yet,’ he adds, ‘those who came after him corrected him
in some things, and added many things to his works, and shall go on
adding to the end of the world.’ Aristotle, he adds, is now called
peculiarly 12 the Philosopher, ‘yet there was a time when his philosophy
was silent and unregarded, either on account of the rarity of copies of his
works, or their difficulty, or from envy; till after the time of Mahomet,
when Avicenna and Averroes, and others, recalled this philosophy into
the full light of exposition. And although the Logic and some other
works were translated by Boethius from the Greek, yet the philosophy of
Aristotle first received a quick increase among the Latins at the time of
Michael Scot; who, in the year of our Lord 1230, appeared, bringing
with him portions of the books of Aristotle on Natural Philosophy and
Mathematics. And yet a small part only of the works of this author is
translated, and a still smaller part is in the hands of common students.’
He adds further 13 (in the Third Part of the Opus Majus, which is a
Dissertation on Language) that the translations which are current of these
writings, are very bad and imperfect. With these views, he is moved to
express himself somewhat impatiently 14 respecting these works: ‘If I
had,’ he says, ‘power over the works of Aristotle, I would have them all
burnt; for it is only a loss of time to study in them, and a course of error,
and a multiplication of ignorance beyond expression.’ ‘The common
herd of students,’ he says, ‘with their heads, have no principle by which
they can be excited to any worthy employment; and hence they mope
and make asses of themselves over their bad translations, and lose their
time, and trouble, and money.’
8
Op. Maj. p. 1.

9
Ib. p. 2.

10
Ib. p. 10.

11
Op. Maj. p. 36.

12
Autonomaticè.

13
Op. Maj. p. 46.
 14
See Pref. to Jebb’s edition. The passages there quoted, however, are not
extracts from the Opus Majus, but (apparently) from the Opus Minus (MS.
Cott. Tib. c. 5). “Si haberem potestatem supra libros Aristotelis, ego facerem
omnes cremari; quia non est nisi temporis amissio studere in illis, et causa
erroris, et multiplicatio ignorantiæ ultra id quod valeat explicari. . . . Vulgus
studentum cum capitibus suis non habet unde excitetur ad aliquid dignum, et
ideo languet et asininat circa male translata, et tempus et studium amittit in
omnibus et expensas.”

517 “The remedies which he recommends for these evils, are, in the
first place, the study of that only perfect wisdom which is to be found in
the Sacred Scripture; 15 in the next place, the study of mathematics and
the use of experiment. 16 By the aid of these methods, Bacon anticipates
the most splendid progress for human knowledge. He takes up the strain
of hope and confidence which we have noticed as so peculiar in the
Roman writers; and quotes some of the passages of Seneca which we
adduced in illustration of this:—that the attempts in science were at first
rude and imperfect, and were afterwards improved;—that the day will
come, when what is still unknown shall be brought to light by the
progress of time and the labors of a longer period;—that one age does
not suffice for inquiries so wide and various;—that the people of future
times shall know many things unknown to us;—and that the time shall
arrive when posterity will wonder that we overlooked what was so
obvious. Bacon himself adds anticipations more peculiarly in the spirit of
his own time. ‘We have seen,’ he says, at the end of the work, ‘how
Aristotle, by the ways which wisdom teaches, could give to Alexander
the empire of the world. And this the Church ought to take into
consideration against the infidels and rebels, that there may be a sparing
of Christian blood, and especially on account of the troubles that shall
come to pass in the days of Antichrist; which by the grace of God it
would be easy to obviate, if prelates and princes would encourage study,
and join in searching out the secrets of nature and art.’
15
Part ii.

16
Parts iv. v. and vi.
 “It may not be improper to observe here that this belief in the
appointed progress of knowledge, is not combined with any overweening
belief in the unbounded and independent power of the human intellect.
On the contrary, one of the lessons which Bacon draws from the state
and prospects of knowledge, is the duty of faith and humility. ‘To him,’
he says, 17 ‘who denies the truth of the faith because he is unable to
understand it, I will propose in reply the course of nature, and as we have
seen it in examples.’ And after giving some instances, he adds, ‘These,
and the like, ought to move men and to excite them to the reception of
divine truths. For if, in the vilest objects of creation, truths are found,
before which the inward pride of man must bow, and believe though it
cannot understand, how much more should man humble his mind before
the glorious truths of God!’ He had before said: 18 ‘Man is incapable of
perfect wisdom in this life; it is hard for 518 him to ascend towards
perfection, easy to glide downwards to falsehoods and vanities: let him
then not boast of his wisdom, or extol his knowledge. What he knows is
little and worthless, in respect of that which he believes without
knowing; and still less, in respect of that which he is ignorant of. He is
mad who thinks highly of his wisdom; he most mad, who exhibits it as
something to be wondered at.’ He adds, as another reason for humility,
that he has proved by trial, he could teach in one year, to a poor boy, the
marrow of all that the most diligent person could acquire in forty years’
laborious and expensive study.
17
Op. Maj. p. 476.

18
Ib. p. 15.

“To proceed somewhat more in detail with regard to Roger Bacon’s

views of a Reform in Scientific Inquiry, we may observe that by making
Mathematics and Experiment the two great points of his
recommendation, he directed his improvement to the two essential parts
of all knowledge, Ideas and Facts, and thus took the course which the
most enlightened philosophy would have suggested. He did not urge the
prosecution of experiment, to the comparative neglect of the existing
mathematical sciences and conceptions; a fault which there is some
ground for ascribing to his great namesake and successor Francis Bacon:
still less did he content himself with a mere protest against the authority
of the schools, and a vague demand for change, which was almost all
that was done by those who put themselves forward as reformers in the
intermediate time. Roger Bacon holds his way steadily between the two
poles of human knowledge; which, as we have seen, it is far from easy to
do. ‘There are two modes of knowing,’ says he; 19 ‘by argument, and by
experiment. Argument concludes a question; but it does not make us feel
certain, or acquiesce in the contemplation of truth, except the truth be
also found to be so by experience.’ It is not easy to express more
decidedly the clearly-seen union of exact conceptions with certain facts,
which, as we have explained, constitutes real knowledge.
19
Op. Maj. p. 445; see also p. 448. “Scientiæ aliæ sciunt sua principia
invenire per experimenta, sed conclusiones per argumenta facta ex principiis
inventis. Si vero debeant habere experientiam conclusionum suarum
particularem et completam, tunc oportet quod habeant per adjutorium istius
scientiæ nobilis (experimentalis).”

“One large division of the Opus Majus is ‘On the Usefulness of

Mathematics,’ which is shown by a copious enumeration of existing
branches of knowledge, as Chronology, Geography, the Calendar and (in
a separate Part) Optics. There is a chapter, 20 in which it is proved 519 by
reason, that all science requires mathematics. And the arguments which
are used to establish this doctrine, show a most just appreciation of the
office of mathematics in science. They are such as follows:—That other
sciences use examples taken from mathematics as the most evident:—
That mathematical knowledge is, as it were, innate to us, on which point
he refers to the well-known dialogue of Plato, as quoted by Cicero:—
That this science, being the easiest, offers the best introduction to the
more difficult:—That in mathematics, things as known to us are identical
with things as known to nature:—That we can here entirely avoid doubt
and error, and obtain certainty and truth:—That mathematics is prior to
other sciences in nature, because it takes cognizance of quantity, which is
apprehended by intuition (intuitu intellectus). ‘Moreover,’ he adds, 21
‘there have been found famous men, as Robert, bishop of Lincoln, and
Brother Adam Marshman (de Marisco), and many others, who by the
power of mathematics have been able to explain the causes of things; as
may be seen in the writings of these men, for instance, concerning the
Rainbow and Comets, and the generation of heat, and climates, and the
celestial bodies.’
20
Ib. p. 60.

21
Op. Maj. p. 64.

“But undoubtedly the most remarkable portion of the Opus Majus is

the Sixth and last Part, which is entitled ‘De Scientia experimentali.’ It is
indeed an extraordinary circumstance to find a writer of the thirteenth
century, not only recognizing experiment as one source of knowledge,
but urging its claims as something far more important than men had yet
been aware of, exemplifying its value by striking and just examples, and
speaking of its authority with a dignity of diction which sounds like a
foremurmur of the Baconian sentences uttered nearly four hundred years
later. Yet this is the character of what we here find. 22 ‘Experimental
science, the sole mistress of speculative sciences, has three great
Prerogatives among other parts of knowledge: First she tests by
experiment the noblest conclusions of all other sciences: Next she
discovers respecting the notions which other sciences deal with,
magnificent truths to which these sciences of themselves can by no
means attain: her Third dignity is, that she by her own power and without
respect of other sciences, investigates the secrets of nature.’
22
“Veritates magnificas in terminis aliarum scientiarum in quas per nullam
viam possunt illæ scientiæ, hæc sola scientiarum domina speculativarum,
potest dare.”—Op. Maj. p. 465.

520 “The examples which Bacon gives of these ‘Prerogatives’ are very
curious, exhibiting, among some error and credulity, sound and clear
views. His leading example of the First Prerogative is the Rainbow, of
which the cause, as given by Aristotle, is tested by reference to
experiment with a skill which is, even to us now, truly admirable. The
examples of the Second Prerogative are three—first, the art of making an
artificial sphere which shall move with the heavens by natural
influences, which Bacon trusts may be done, though astronomy herself
cannot do it—’et tunc,’ he says, ‘thesaurum unius regis valeret hoc
instrumentum;’—secondly, the art of prolonging life, which experiment
may teach, though medicine has no means of securing it except by
regimen; 23 —thirdly, the art of making gold finer than fine gold, which
goes beyond the power of alchemy. The Third Prerogative of
experimental science, arts independent of the received sciences, is
exemplified in many curious examples, many of them whimsical
traditions. Thus it is said that the character of a people may be altered by
altering the air. 24 Alexander, it seems, applied to Aristotle to know
whether he should exterminate certain nations which he had discovered,
as being irreclaimably barbarous; to which the philosopher replied, ‘If
you can alter their air, permit them to live; if not, put them to death.’ In
this part, we find the suggestion that the fire-works made by children, of
saltpetre, might lead to the invention of a formidable military weapon.
23
One of the ingredients of a preparation here mentioned, is the flesh of a
dragon, which, it appears, is used as food by the Ethiopians. The mode of
preparing this food cannot fail to amuse the reader. “Where there are good
flying dragons, by the art which they possess, they draw them out of their
dens, and have bridles and saddles in readiness, and they ride upon them, and
make them bound about in the air in a violent manner, that the hardness and
toughness of the flesh may be reduced, as boars are hunted and bulls are
baited before they are killed for eating.”—Op. Maj. p. 470.

24
Op. Maj. p. 472.

“It could not be expected that Roger Bacon, at a time when

experimental science hardly existed, could give any precepts for the
discovery of truth by experiment. But nothing can be a better example of
the method of such investigation, than his inquiry concerning the cause
of the Rainbow. Neither Aristotle, nor Avicenna, nor Seneca, he says,
have given us any clear knowledge of this matter, but experimental
science can do so. Let the experimenter (experimentator) consider the
cases in which he finds the same colors, as the hexagonal crystals from
Ireland and India; by looking into these he will see colors like those of
the rainbow. Many think that this arises from some 521 special virtue of
these stones and their hexagonal figure; let therefore the experimenter go
on, and he will find the same in other transparent stones, in dark ones as
well as in light-colored. He will find the same effect also in other forms
than the hexagon, if they be furrowed in the surface, as the Irish crystals
are. Let him consider too, that he sees the same colors in the drops which
are dashed from oars in the sunshine;—and in the spray thrown by a mill
wheel;—and in the dew drops which lie on the grass in a meadow on a
summer morning;—and if a man takes water in his mouth and projects it
on one side into a sunbeam;—and if in an oil lamp hanging in the air, the
rays fall in certain positions upon the surface of the oil;—and in many
other ways, are colors produced. We have here a collection of instances,
which are almost all examples of the same kind as the phenomenon
under consideration; and by the help of a principle collected by induction
from these facts, the colors of the rainbow were afterwards really
explained.

“With regard to the form and other circumstances of the bow he is still
more precise. He bids us measure the height of the bow and of the sun, to
show that the centre of the bow is exactly opposite to the sun. He
explains the circular form of the bow,—its being independent of the form
of the cloud, its moving when we move, its flying when we follow,—by
its consisting of the reflections from a vast number of minute drops. He
does not, indeed, trace the course of the rays through the drop, or account
for the precise magnitude which the bow assumes; but he approaches to
the verge of this part of the explanation; and must be considered as
having given a most happy example of experimental inquiry into nature,
at a time when such examples were exceedingly scanty. In this respect,
he was more fortunate than Francis Bacon, as we shall hereafter see.

“We know but little of the biography of Roger Bacon, but we have
every reason to believe that his influence upon his age was not great. He
was suspected of magic, and is said to have been put into close
confinement in consequence of this charge. In his work he speaks of
Astrology, as a science well worth cultivating. ‘But,’ says he,
‘Theologians and Decretists, not being learned in such matters, and
seeing that evil as well as good may be done, neglect and abhor such
things, and reckon them among Magic Arts.’ We have already seen, that
at the very time when Bacon was thus raising his voice against the habit
of blindly following authority, and seeking for all science in Aristotle,
Thomas Aquinas was employed in fashioning Aristotle’s tenets into that
fixed form in which they became the great impediment to the 522
progress of knowledge. It would seem, indeed, that something of a
struggle between the progressive and stationary powers of the human
mind was going on at this time. Bacon himself says, 25 ‘Never was there
so great an appearance of wisdom, nor so much exercise of study in so
many Faculties, in so many regions, as for this last forty years. Doctors
are dispersed everywhere, in every castle, in every burgh, and especially
by the students of two Orders, (he means the Franciscans and
Dominicans, who were almost the only religious orders that
distinguished themselves by an application to study, 26 ) which has not
happened except for about forty years. And yet there was never so much
ignorance, so much error.’ And in the part of his work which refers to
Mathematics, he says of that study, 27 that it is the door and the key of the
sciences; and that the neglect of it for thirty or forty years has entirely
ruined the studies of the Latins. According to these statements, some
change, disastrous to the fortunes of science, must have taken place
about 1230, soon after the foundation of the Dominican and Franciscan
Orders. 28 Nor can we doubt that the adoption of the Aristotelian
philosophy by these two Orders, in the form in which the Angelical
Doctor had systematized it, was one of the events which most tended to
defer, for three centuries, the reform which Roger Bacon urged as a
matter of crying necessity in his own time.”
25
Quoted by Jebb, Pref. to Op. Maj.

26
Mosheim, Hist. iii. 161.

27
Op. Maj. p. 57.
 28
Mosheim, iii. 161.

It is worthy of remark that in the Opus Majus of Roger Bacon, as

afterwards in the Novum Organon of Francis Bacon, we have certain
features of experimental research pointed out conspicuously as
Prærogativæ: although in the former, this term is employed to designate
the superiority of experimental science in general to the science of the
schools; in the latter work, the term is applied to certain classes of
experiments as superior to others.
 B O O K V.

F O R M A L A S T R O N O M Y.
 CHAPTER I.

P C .

Nicolas of Cus.

I WILL quote the passage, in the writings of this author, which bears
upon the subject in question. I translate it from the edition of his book
De Docta Ignorantia, from his works published at Basil in 1565. He
praises Learned Ignorance—that is, Acknowledged Ignorance—as the
source of knowledge. His ground for asserting the motions of the earth
is, that there is no such thing as perfect rest, or an exact centre, or a
perfect circle, nor perfect uniformity of motion. “Neque verus circulus
dabilis est, quinetiam verior dari possit, neque unquam uno tempore sicut
alio æqualiter præcisè, aut movetur, aut circulum veri similem, æqualem
describit, etiamsi nobis hoc non appareat. Et ubicumque quis fuerit, se in
centro esse credit.” (Lib. i. cap. xi. p. 39.) He adds, “The Ancients did
not attain to this knowledge, because they were wanting in Learned
Ignorance. Now it is manifest to us that the Earth is truly in motion,
although this do not appear to us; since we do not apprehend motion
except by comparison with something fixed. For if any one were in a
boat in the middle of a river, ignorant that the water was flowing, and not
seeing the banks, how could he apprehend that the boat was moving?
And thus since every one, whether he be in the Earth, or in the Sun, or in
any other star, thinks that he is in an immovable centre, and that
everything else is moving; he would assign different poles for himself,
others as being in the Sun, others in the Earth, and others in the Moon,
and so of the rest. Whence the machine of the world is as if it had its
centre everywhere and its circumference nowhere.” This train of thought
524 might be a preparation for the reception of the Copernican system;
but it is very different from the doctrine that the Sun is the centre of the
Planetary Motions.
 CHAPTER II.

T C T .

The Moon’s Rotation.

I HAVE said, in page 264, that a confusion of mind produced by the

double reference of motion to absolute space, and to a centre of
revolution, often leads persons to dispute whether the Moon, while she
revolves about the Earth, always turning to it the same face, revolves
about her axis or not.

This dispute has been revived very lately, and has been conducted in a
manner which shows that popular readers and writers have made little
progress in the clearness of their notions during the last two or three
centuries; and that they have accepted the Newtonian doctrines in words
with a very dim apprehension of their real import.

If the Moon were carried round the Earth by a rigid arm revolving
about the Earth as a centre, being rigidly fastened to this arm, as a mimic
Moon might be, in a machine constructed to represent her motions, this
contrivance, while it made her revolve round the Earth would make her
also turn the same face to the Earth: and if we were to make such a
machine the standard example of rotation, the Moon might be said not to
rotate on her axis.

But we are speedily led to endless confusion by taking this case as the
standard of rotation. For the selection of the centre of rotation in a
system which includes several bodies is arbitrary. The Moon turns all her
faces successively to the Sun, and therefore with regard to the Sun, she
does rotate on her axis; and yet she revolves round the Sun as truly as
she revolves round the Earth. And the only really simple and consistent