Advancement of Learning 1 6 1 



to preserve with advancement is the greater. So in 

 man, 



Igneus est ollis vigor, et caelestis origo. 1 



His approach or assumption to divine or angelical nature 

 is the perfection of his form; the error or false imitation of 

 which good is that which is the tempest of human life ; while 

 man, upon the instinct of an advancement formal and 

 essential is carried to seek an advancement local. For 

 as those which are sick, and find no remedy, do tumble up 

 and down and change place, as if by a remove local they 

 could obtain a remove internal; so is it with men in am 

 bition, when failing of the means to exalt their nature, they 

 are in a perpetual estuation to exalt their place. So then 

 passive good is, as was said, either conservative or perfective. 



To resume the good of conservation or comfort, which 

 consisteth in the fruition of that which is agreeable to our 

 natures; it seemeth to be the most pure and natural of 

 pleasures, but yet the softest and the lowest. And this 

 also receiveth a difference, which hath neither been well 

 judged of, nor well inquired: for the good of fruition or 

 contentment is placed either in the sincereness of the fruition, 

 or in the quickness and vigour of it ; the one superinduced 

 by equality, the other by vicissitude; the one having less 

 mixture of evil, the other more impression of good. Which 

 of these is the greater good is a question controverted ; but 

 whether man s nature may not be capable of both, is a 

 question not inquired. 



The former question being debated between Socrates and 

 a sophist, Socrates placing felicity in an equal and constant 

 peace of mind, and the sophist in much desiring and much 

 enjoying, they fell from argument to ill words: the sophist 

 saying that Socrates felicity was the felicity of a block or 

 stone; and Socrates saying that the sophist s felicity was 

 the felicity of one that had the itch, who did nothing but 

 itch and scratch. 2 And both these opinions do not want 

 their supports. For the opinion of Socrates is much up 

 held by the general consent even of the Epicures themselves, 

 that virtue beareth a great part in felicity ; and if so, certain 

 it is, that virtue hath more use in clearing perturbations 

 than in compassing desires. The sophist s opinion is much 

 1 Virg. JEn. vi. 730. 2 Plat. Gorg. 492, 494. 



