XVII. 7.] THE SECOND BOOK. 278 
agree with dispersed directions, And lastly, aphorisms, 
representing a knowledge broken, do invite men to in- 
quire further; whereas methods, carrying the show of 
a total, do secure men, as if they were at furthest. 
8. Another diversity of method, which is likewise of 
great weight, is the handling of knowledge by assertions 
and their proofs, or by questions and their deter- 
minations. The latter kind whereof, if it be immoderately 
followed, is as prejudicial to the proceeding of learning, 
as it is to the proceeding of an army to go about to 
besiege every little fort or hold. For if the field be kept, 
and the sum of the enterprise pursued, those smaller 
things will come in of themselves; indeed a man would 
not leave some important piece enemy at his back. In 
like manner, the use of confutation in the delivery of 
sciences ought to be very sparing; and to serve to re- 
move strong preoccupations and prejudgements, and not 
to minister and excite disputations and doubts. 
g. Another diversity of methods is, according to the 
subject or matter which is handled. For there is a great 
difference in delivery of the mathematics, which are the 
most abstracted of knowledges, and policy, which is the 
most immersed. And howsoever contention hath been 
moved, touching an uniformity of method in multiformity 
of matter, yet we see how that opinion, besides the weak- 
ness of it, hath been of ill desert towards learning, as 
that which taketh the way to reduce learning to cer- 
tain empty and barren generalities; being but the very 
husks and shells of sciences, all the kernel being forced 
out and expulsed with the torture and press of the method. 
And therefore as I did allow well of particular topics for 
invention, so I do allow likewise of particular methods of 
tradition. 
