For Examples of this Head, I will only refer my Reader to those which Mr. Graunt has published on the Bills of Mortality; wherein the Author has shewn, that the meanest and most trivial Matters may be so cultivated, as to bear excellent Fruit, when they come under the Management of an accurate and prudent Observer: For, From those Papers, which went about so many Years, through every Tradesman's Hands, without any manner of Profit, except only to the Clerks that collected them, he has deduc'd many true Conclusions, concerning the gravest and most weighty Parts of Civil Government, and humane Nature.
§. XXXV. An Objection answered concerning the uncertainty of Experiments.As I am now passing away from their Experiments, and Observations, which have been their proper and principal Work; there comes before me an Objection, which is the more to be regarded, because it is rais'd by the Experiments themselves. For it is their common Complaint, that there is a great nicety, and contingency, in the making of many Experiments: that their Success is very often various and inconstant, not only in the Hands of different, but even of the same Triers. From hence they suggest their Fears, that this continuance of Experimenters, of which we talk so much, will not prove so advantageous, though they shall be all equally cautious in observing, and faithful in recording their Discoveries: because it is probable, that the Trials of future Ages will not agree with those of the present, but frequently thwart and contradict them.
The Objection is strong and material; and I am so far from diminishing the weight of it, that I am rather willing to add more to it. I confess many Experiments are obnoxious to failing; either by reason of