Lect. IX.] QX^OTATIONS FROM BACON. 219 



adde:n^dum to lecture ix. 



Lord Bacon, in his Adrancement of L''ar7iing, is very severe 

 ripon the metaphysicians of the ^Middle Ages. I must be allowed to 

 give a few of his pithy sentences ; take the following : — 



" Surely, like as many substances in nature Avhich are solid do 

 putrefy and corrupt into worms ; so it is the property of good and 

 sound knowledge to putrefy and dissolve into a number of subtle, idle, 

 unwholesome, and, as I may term them, vermiciilate questions, which 

 have indeed a kind of quickness and life of spirit, but no soundness 

 of matter or goodness of quality. This kind of degenerate learning 

 ■did chiefly reign amongst the schoolmen, who, having sharp and strong 

 wits, and abundance of leisure, and small variety of reading, but their 

 wits being shut up in the cells of a few authors (chiefly Aristotle 

 their dictator), as their persons were shut up in the cells of monas- 

 teries and colleges, and knowing little history, either of nature or time, 

 did, out of no great quantity of matter and infinite agitation of wit, 

 spin out unto us those laborious webs of learning which are extant in 

 their books. For the wit and mind of man, if it work iqion matter, 

 which is the contemplation of the creatures of God, worketh accord- 

 ing to the stufi", and is limited thereby ; but if it work upon itself, as 

 the spider worketh his web, then it is endless, and brings forth indeed 

 •cobwebs of learning, admirable for the fulness of thread and work, 

 but of no si;bstance or profit." 



As to " second causes," and the Divinity who is enthroned above 

 and beyond the Cosmos, his remarks are so pertinent and so full of 

 •eloquence and wisdom, that I cannot refrain from further citation. 

 He had been quoting " One of Plato's School," as to the obscuration of 

 divine things by objects of " the sense," and then he goes on to say — 

 "And hence it is true that it hath proceeded, that divers great learned 

 men have been heretical, whilst they have sought to fly up to the 

 secrets of the Deity by the waxen wings of tlie senses. And so for 

 the conceit that too much knowledge should incline a man to atheism, 

 and that the ignorance of second causes should make a more 

 devout dependence upon God, which is the first cause ; first, it is 

 good to ask the question which Job asked of his friends, "Will you 



