Advancement of Learning 141 



The latter whereof seemeth to be via deserta et inter clusa. 

 For as knowledges are now delivered, there is a kind of 

 contract of error between the deliverer and the receiver: 

 for he that delivereth knowledge, desireth to deliver it 

 in such form as may be best believed, and not as may be 

 best examined; and he that receiveth knowledge, desireth 

 rather present satisfaction, than expectant inquiry ; and so 

 rather not to doubt, than not to err: glory making the 

 author not to lay open his weakness, and sloth making 

 the disciple not to know his strength. 



But knowledge that is delivered as a thread to be spun 

 on, ought to be delivered and intimated, if it were possible, 

 in the same method wherein it was invented: and so is it 

 possible of knowledge induced. But in this same antici 

 pated and prevented knowledge, no man knoweth how 

 he came to the knowledge which he hath obtained. But 

 yet nevertheless, secundum majus et minus, a man may 

 revisit and descend unto the foundations of his knowledge 

 and consent ; and so transplant it into another, as it grew 

 in his own mind. For it is in knowledges as it is in plants: 

 if you mean to use the plant, it is no matter for the roots; 

 but it you mean to remove it to grow, then it is more assured 

 to rest upon roots than slips: so the delivery of know 

 ledges, as it is now used, is as of fair bodies of trees without 

 the roots ; good for the carpenter, but not for the planter. 

 But if you will have sciences grow, it is less matter for the 

 shaft or body of the tree, so you look well to the taking up 

 of the roots: of which kind of delivery the method of the 

 mathematics, in that subject, hath some shadow: but 

 generally I see it neither put in use x nor put in inquisition : 

 and therefore note it for deficient. 



Another diversity of Method there is, which hath some 

 affinity with the former, used in some cases by the discretion 

 of the ancients, but disgraced since by the impostures of 

 many vain persons, who have made it as a false light for 

 their counterfeit merchandises; and that is, enigmatical 

 and disclosed. 2 The pretence whereof is, to remove the 



1 1 have read use for ure. For the Latin is usus, and the word ure 

 is a rare one. Richardson s examples are all from Chaucer. The 

 meaning of both words is the same. 



2 Corresponds to the scholastic &quot; Methodus d/cpoa/xari/c?; et 

 ),&quot; Aldrich, Logic, vi. Bacon uses these terms in the Latin. 



