38 THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEAftNINQ. 



given all things else a tincture according to them, utterly un 

 true and improper. So hath Plato intermingled his philosophy 

 with theology, and Aristotle with logic ; and the second school 

 of Plato, Proclus and the rest, with the mathematics ; for these 

 were the arts which had a kind of primogeniture with them 

 severally. So have the alchemists made a philosophy out of 

 a few experiments of the furnace ; and Gilbertus our country 

 man hath made a philosophy out of the observations of a load 

 stone. So Cicero, when reciting the several opinions of the 

 nature of the soul, he found a musician that held the soul was 

 but a harmony, saith pleasantly, Hie ab arte sua non recessit, 

 &c. But of these conceits Aristotle speaketh seriously and 

 wisely when he saith, Qui respiciunt ad pauca de facili pro- 

 nunciant. 



(8) Another error is an impatience of doubt, and haste to 

 assertion without due and mature suspension of judgment. 

 For the two ways of contemplation are not unlike the two ways 

 of action commonly spoken of by the ancients : the one plain 

 and smooth in the beginning, and in the end impassable ; the 

 other rough and troublesome in the entrance, but after a while 

 fair and even. So it is in contemplation : if a man will begin 

 with certainties, he shall end in doubts ; but if he will be 

 content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties. 



(9) Another error is in the manner of the tradition and 

 delivery of knowledge, which is for the most part magistral and 

 peremptory, and not ingenuous and faithful ; in a sort as may 

 be soonest believed, and not easiliest examined. It is true, 

 .that in compendious treatises for practice that form is not to 

 be disallowed ; but in the true handling of knowledge men 

 ought not to fall either on the one side into the vein of Velleius 

 the Epicurean, Nil tarn metuens quam ne dubitare aliqua de re 

 videretur : nor, on the other side, into Socrates, his ironical 

 doubting of all things ; but to propound things sincerely with 

 more or less asseveration, as they stand in a man s own judg 

 ment proved more or less. 



(10) Other errors there are in the scope that men propound 

 to themselves, whereunto they bend their endeavours ; for, 

 whereas the more constant and devote kind of professors of 

 any science ought to propound to themselves to make some 

 additions to their science, they convert their labours to aspire 

 to certain second prizes : as to be a profound interpreter or 

 commentor, to be a sharp champion or defender, to be a methodi 

 cal compounder or abridger, and so the patrimony of knowledge 

 cometh to be sometimes improved, but seldom augmented. 



(11) But the greatest error of all the rest is the mistaking or 



