1 62 OF THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING. [XIV. 9. 



such thing is ; as they have feigned an element of fire, to 

 keep square with earth, water, and air, and the like. Nay, 

 it is not credible, till it be opened, what a number of 

 fictions and fantasies the similitude of human actions and 

 arts, together with the making of man communis mensura, 

 have brought into natural philosophy; not much better 

 than the heresy of the Anthropomorphites, bred in the 

 cells of gross and solitary monks, and the opinion of Epi 

 curus, answerable to the same in heathenism, who sup 

 posed the gods to be of human shape. And therefore 

 Velleius the Epicurean needed not to have asked, why 

 God should have adorned the heavens with stars, as if he 

 had been an cedilzs, one that should have set forth some 

 magnificent shows or plays. For if that great work- 

 master had been of an human disposition, he would have 

 cast the stars into some pleasant and beautiful works and 

 orders, like the frets in the roofs of houses ; whereas one 

 can scarce find a posture in square, or triangle, or straight 

 line, amongst such an infinite number; so differing an 

 harmony there is between the spirit of man and the spirit 

 of nature. 



10. Let us consider again the false appearances im 

 posed upon us by every man s own individual nature 

 and custom, in that feigned supposition that Plato maketh 

 of the cave : for certainly if a child were continued in a 

 grot or cave under the earth until maturity of age, and 

 came suddenly abroad, he would have strange and absurd 

 imaginations. So in like manner, although our persons 

 live in the view of heaven, yet our spirits are included in 

 the caves of our own complexions and customs, which 

 minister unto us infinite errors and vain opinions, if 

 they be not recalled to examination. But hereof we 

 have given many examples in one of the errors, or 



