The works of Francis Bacon, lord chancellor of England.

84 OF THE INTERPRETATION OF NATURE.
sciences unknown, having respect to those that saith, "iNihil aliud& quam bene ausus vana conare known, with this difference, that the ancient temnere:" in which sort of things it is the manregions of knowledge will seem as barbarous, ner of men first to wonder that any such thing
compared with the new; as the new regions of should be possible, and after it is found out, to
people seem barbarous, compared to many of the wonder again how the world should miss it so
old. long. Of this nature I take to be the invention
The dignity of this end, of endowment of man's and discovery of knowledge, &c.
life with new commodities, appeareth by the estimation that antiquity made of such as guided The impediments which have been in the times, and
thereunto; for whereas founders of states, law- in diversion of wits.
givers, extirpers of tyrants, fathers of the people,
were honoured but with the titles of worthies ing chapter
beginning of that chapter.
or demigods, inventors were ever consecrated
amongst the gods themselves. And if the ordi- THE encounters of the times have been nothing
nary ambitions of men lead them to seek the favourable and prosperous for the invention of
amplification of their own power in their coun- knowledge, so as it is not only the daintiness of
tries, and a better ambition than that hath moved the seed to take, and the ill mixture and unliking
men to seek the amplification of the power of of the ground to nourish or raise this plant, but
their own countries amongst other nations: better the ill season also of the weather, by which it
again and more worthy must that aspiring be, hath been checked and blasted. Especially in
which seeketh the amplification of the power and that the seasons have been proper to bring up and
kingdom of mankind over the world: the rather, set forward other more hasty and indifferent plants,
because the other two prosecutions are ever cul- whereby this of knowledge hath been starved and
pable of much perturbation and injustice; but this overgrown; for in the descent of times always
is a work truly divine, which cometh " in aura there hath been somewhat else in reign and repuleni," without noise or observation. tation, which hath generally aliened and diverted
The access also to this work hath been by that wits and labours from that employment.
port or passage, which the Divine Majesty, who For as for the uttermost antiquity, which is like
is unchangeable in his ways, doth infallibly con- fame that muffles her head, and tells tales, I cantinue and observe; that is, the felicity wherewith not presume much of it; for I would not willingly
he hath blessed an humility of mind, such as imitate the manner of those that describe maps,
rather laboureth to spell, and so by degrees to which when they come to some far countries,
read in the volumes of his creatures, than to solicit whereof they have no knowledge, set down how
and urge, and as it were to invocate a man's own there be great wastes and deserts there: so I am
spirit to divine, and give oracles unto him. For not apt to affirm that they knew little, because
as in the inquiry of divine truth, the pride of man what they knew is little known to us. But if you
hath ever inclined to leave the oracles of God's will judge of them by the last traces that remain
word, and to vanish in the mixture of their own to us, you will conclude, though not so scornfully
inventions; so in the selfsame manner, in inqui- as Aristotle doth, that saith our ancestors were
sition of nature, they have ever left the oracles of extreme gross, as those that came newly from
God's works, and adored the deceiving and de- being moulded out of the clay, or some earthly
formed imagery, which the unequal mirrors of substance; yet reasonably and probably thus,
their own minds have represented unto them. that it was with them in matter of knowledge,
Nay, it is a point fit and necessary in the front, but as the dawning or break of day. For at that
and beginning of this work, without hesitation or time the world was altogether home-bred, every
reservation to be professed, that it is no less true nation looked little beyond their own confines or
in this human kingdom of knowledge, than in territories, and the world had no thorough lights
God's kingdom of heaven, that no man shall enter then, as it hath had since by commerce and naviinto it, ", except he become first as a little child." gation, whereby there could neither be that contribution of wits one to help another, nor that
Of the impediments of knowledge. variety of particulars for the correcting the custoBeing the IVth chapter, the preface only of it. mary conceits.
And as there could be no great collection of wits
IN some things it is more hard to attempt than of several parts or nations, so neither could there
to achieve; which falleth out, when the difficulty be any succession of wits of several times, whereis not so much in the matter or subject, as it is in by one might refine the other, in regard they had
the crassness and indisposition of the mind of not history to any purpose. And the manner of
man to think of any such thing, to will or to re- their traditions was utterly unfit and unproper for
solve it; and therefore Titus Livius in his decla- amplification of knowledge. And again, the stumatory digression, wherein he doth depress and dies of those times, you shall find, besides wars.
extenuate the honour of Alexander's conquests incursions, and rapines, which woro'+hen almos+