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THE PRAISE OF KNOWLEDGE.

ILENCE were the best celebration of that which I mean to

SILEN

commend; for who would not use silence, where silence is not made? and what crier can make silence in such a noise and tumult of vain and popular opinions? My praise shall be dedicated to the mind itself. The mind is the man, and the knowledge of the mind. A man is but what he knoweth. The mind itself is but an accident to knowledge, for knowledge is a double of that which is. The truth of being, and the truth of knowing, is all one; and the pleasures of the affections greater than the pleasures of the senses. And are not the pleasures of the intellect greater than the pleasures of the affections? Is it not a true and only natural pleasure, whereof there is no satiety? Is it not knowledge that doth alone clear the mind of all perturbations? How many things are there which we imagine not! How many things do we esteem and value otherwise than they are! This ill-proportioned estimation, these vain imaginations, these be the clouds of error that turn into the storms of perturbation. Is there any such happiness as for a man's mind to be raised above the confusion of things, where he may have the prospect of the order of nature, and the error of men? Is this but a vein only of delight, and not of discovery?—of contentment and not of benefit? Shall we not as well discern the riches of nature's warehouse as the benefit of her shop? Is truth ever barren? Shall we not be able thereby to produce worthy effects, and to endow the life of man with infinite commodities? But shall I make this garland to be put upon a wrong head? Would anybody believe me if I should verify this, upon the knowledge that is now in use? Are we the richer by one poor invention, by reason of all the learning that hath been these many hundred years? The industry of artificers maketh some small improvement of things invented; and chance sometimes, in experimenting,' maketh us to stumble upon some

1 Experiment. To make experiments.

found that . . . .—Ray.

'Francisco Redi, by experimenting

what which is new; but all the disputation of the learned never brought to light one effect of nature before unknown. When things are known and found out, then they can descant upon them, they can knit them into certain causes, they can reduce them to their principles. If any instance of experience stand against them, they can range it in order by some distinctions. But all this is but a web of the wit;' it can work nothing. I do not doubt but that common notions, which we call reason, and the knitting of them together, which we call logic, are the art of reason and studies. But they rather cast obscurity, than gain light to the contemplation of nature.

All the philosophy of nature which is now received, is either the philosophy of the Grecians, or that of the alchemists. That of the Grecians hath the foundations in words, in ostentation, in confutation, in sects, in schools, in disputations. The Grecians were, as one of themselves saith, you Grecians, ever children.3 They knew little antiquity; they knew, except fables, not much above five hundred years before themselves. They knew but a small portion of the world. That of the alchemists hath the foundation in imposture, in auricular traditions and obscurity. It was catching hold of religion, but the principle of it is, Populus vult decipi. So that I know no great difference between these great philosophers, but that the one is a loud crying folly, and the other is a whispering folly. The one is gathered out of a few vulgar observations, and the other out of a few experiments of a furnace. The one never faileth to multiply words, and the other ever faileth to multiply gold. Who would not smile at Aristotle, when he admireth the eternity and invariableness of the heavens, as there were not the like in the bowels of the earth? Those be the confines and borders of these two kingdoms, where the continual alteration and incursion are. The superficies and upper parts of the earth are full of varieties. The superficies and lower parts of the heavens, which we call the middle region of the air, are full of variety. There is much spirit in the one part that cannot be brought into mass. There is much massy body in the other

1 Wit. Intellect. 'Will puts in practice what the wit deviseth.'—Davies. 2 To. For. See page 228.

3 Plato. See Advancement of Learning, book i.

The people wish to be deceived.

place that cannot be refined to spirit. The common air is as the waste ground between the borders. Who would not smile at the astronomers, I mean not these few carmen which drive the earth about,' but the ancient astronomers, which feign the moon to be the swiftest of the planets in motion, and the rest in order, the higher the slower; and so are compelled to imagine a double motion; whereas how evident is it, that that which they call a contrary motion, is but an abatement of motion? The fixed stars overgo2 Saturn, and so in them and the rest, all is but one motion, and the nearer the earth the slower-a motion also whereof air and water do participate, though much interrupted.

But why do I in a conference of pleasure enter into these great matters, in sorts that pretending to know much, I should forget what is seasonable? Pardon me, it was because all things may be endowed and adorned with speeches, but knowledge itself is more beautiful than any apparel of words that can be put upon it. And let not me seem arrogant without respect to these great reputed authors. Let me so give every man his due, as I give Time his due, which is to discover truth. Many of these men had greater wits, far above mine own, and so are many in the universities of Europe at this day. But, alas! they learn nothing there but to believe; first to believe that others know that which they know not; and after, themselves know that which they know not. But, indeed, facility to believe, impatience to doubt, temerity to answer, glory to know, doubt to contradict, end to gain, sloth to search, seeking things in words, resting in part of nature; these, and the like, have been the things which have forbidden the happy match between the mind of man and the nature of things, and in place thereof have married it to vain

1 Probably a sneer at Copernicus. His disparagement of him, I have alluded to in the Preface.

2 Overgo. To pass over.

3 In sort.

'How many weary steps

Of many weary miles you have o’ergone,

Are numbered in the travel of one mile.'-Shakespere.

In such a manner.

'Flowers worn in such sort can neither be seen

well, nor smelt by those that wear them.'-Hooker.

Let's on our way in silent sort.'-Shakespere.

notions and blind experiments; and what the posterity and issue of so honourable a match may be, it is not hard to consider.

Printing, a gross' invention; artillery, a thing that lay not far out of the way; the needle, a thing partly known before: what a change have these three made in the world in these times; the one in state of learning, the other in state of the war, the third in the state of treasure, commodities, and navigation! And those, I say, were but stumbled upon and lighted upon by chance. Therefore, no doubt, the sovereignty of Man lieth hid in knowledge; wherein many things are reserved, which kings with their treasure cannot buy, nor with their force command; their spials and intelligencers can give no news of them, their seamen and discoverers cannot sail where they grow; now we govern nature in opinions, but we are thrall3 unto her in necessity; but if we would be led by her in invention, we should command her in action.

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1 Gross. Probably palpably obvious; which it was (as has been above remarked) as soon as a cheap paper was invented.

2 Spials. Scouts.

'For he by faithful spials was assured

That Egypt's king was forward on his way.'—Fairfax.

3 Thrall. Slave.

'No thralls like them that inward bondage have.'

ANNOTATIONS.

No better annotation can be given than in Bacon's own words, "The mistaking or misplacing of the last or farthest end of knowledge, is the greatest error of all the rest: For, men have entered into a desire of learning and knowledge, sometimes upon a natural curiosity, and inquisitive appetite; sometimes to entertain their minds with variety and delight; sometimes for ornament and reputation; and sometimes to enable them to victory of wit and contradiction; and most times for lucre and profession;—but seldom sincerely to give a true account of their gift of reason, to the benefit and use of men: As if there were sought in knowledge, a couch whereupon to rest a searching and restless spirit; or a terras for a wandering and variable mind to walk up and down with a fair prospect; or a tower of state for a proud mind to raise itself upon; or a fort or commanding ground for strife and contention; or a shop for profit or sale ;—and not a rich store-house for the glory of the Creator, and the relief of man's estate."1

1 Advancement of Learning.

)tudies,

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