fh a te THE SECOND BOOK. 89 
irony. But the truth is, they be not the highest instances 
that give the securest information; as may be well ex- 
pressed in the tale so common ft the philosopher, that 
while he gazed upwards to the stars fell into the water; 
for if he had looked down he might have seen the stars 
in the water, but looking aloft he could not see the water 
in the stars. So it cometh often to pass, that mean and 
small things discover great, better than great can discover 
the small: and therefore Aristotle noteth well, Zhat the 
nature of everything ts best seen in his smallest portons. 
And for that cause he inquireth the nature of a common- 
wealth, first in a family, and the simple conjugations of 
man and wife, parent and child, master and servant, which 
are in every cottage. Even so likewise the nature of this 
great city of the world, and the policy thereof, must be 
first sought in mean concordances and small portions. 
So we see how that secret of nature, of the turning of 
iron touched with the loadstone towards the north, was 
found out in needles of iron, not in bars of iron. 
6. But if my judgement be of any weight, the use of 
history mechanical is of all others the most radical and 
fundamental towards natural philosophy; such natural 
philosophy as shall not vanish in the fume of subtile, 
sublime, or delectable speculation, but such as shall be 
operative to the endowment and benefit of man’s life. 
For it will not only minister and suggest for the present 
many ingenious practices in all trades, by a connexion 
and transferring of the observations of one art to the use 
of another, when the experiences of several mysteries 
shall fall under the consideration of one man’s mind; 
but further, it will give a more true and real illumination 
concerning causes and axioms than is hitherto attained. 
For like as a man’s disposition is never well known till 
