PHILOSOPHICAL WRITINGS OF LORD BACON. 407 
rous, and. all of them replete with misapplied learning, and ve- 
hement abuse. The course of his reasoning is not a little cu- 
rious. ‘ Ihave so small a regard,” says he, “ for deep and 
“ subtle inquiries into natural philosophy, that could physic 
“ be unconcerned, could religion remain unshaken, could edu- 
“ cation be carried on happily, I should not intermeddle; but if 
“ we look de facto upon those experimental philosophers, and 
“ judge how little they are fitted for trusts and managements. 
“ of business, by their so famed mechanical education, we must 
“ rise as high i in our resentments as the eoricams of the pre- 
“ sent age and of posterity can animate us.” ‘The grounds 
which oe more Pe assigns for entertaining these “ high 
«e resentments” against the experimentalists, are, first, their 
neglect and contempt of the Aristotelian logic; “ that art,” 
says she, “ by which the prudent are discriminated from fools ; 
“ which informs us of the validity of consequences, and the 
ct probability of arguments, and which forms statesmen, di- 
“ vines, physicians, and lawyers.” In the next place, he con- 
tends, that the innovating spirit of their ey eee. would lead 
to ‘dangerous revolutions. “Tn such times,” says he, “ as I 
= thought it our interest to subvert the monarchy of England, 
“and the repute of the clergy, I was passionately addicted to 
« ‘this new philosophy ; for 1 “did not question but the autho- 
« ‘rity of all antiquity in spiritual affairs would vanish, when it 
“ appeared how much churchmen were mistaken in the com- 
“ mon occurrences and histories of nature. How rational this 
“ opinion of mine was, and how it is verified in these days, let 
“ the Hierarchy and Universities judge *.” 
With 
s 
* Stupze’s Legends no Histories ; or, a specimen of some animadzersions upon the 
History of the Royal Society. Pref. 4to. Lond. 1670. 
