262 OF THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING. [XXV. 15. 



which is partly converted by nature, and partly converteth 

 nature ; and poison is that which worketh wholly upon 

 nature, without that, that nature can in any part work 

 upon it. So in the mind, whatsoever knowledge reason 

 cannot at all work upon and convert is a mere intoxica 

 tion, and endangereth a dissolution of the mind and 

 understanding. 



1 6. But for the latter, it hath been extremely set on 

 foot of late time by the school of Paracelsus, and some 

 others, that have pretended to find the truth of all natural 

 philosophy in the scriptures ; scandalizing and traducing 

 all other philosophy as heathenish and profane. But there 

 is no such enmity between God s word and his works; 

 neither do they give honour to the scriptures, as they 

 suppose, but much imbase them. For to seek heaven 

 and earth in the word of God, whereof it is said, Heaven 

 and earth shall pass, but my word shall not pass, is to seek 

 temporary things amongst eternal : and as to seek divi 

 nity in philosophy is to seek the living amongst the dead, 

 so to seek philosophy in divinity is to seek the dead 

 amongst the living : neither are the pots or lavers, whose 

 place was in the outward part of the temple, to be sought 

 in the holiest place of all, where the ark of the testimony 

 was seated. And again, the scope or purpose of the spirit 

 of God is not to express matters of nature in the scrip 

 tures, otherwise than in passage, and for application to 

 man s capacity and to matters moral or divine. And it 

 is a true rule, Auctoris aliud agentis parva aucioriias. For 

 it were a strange conclusion, if a man should use a simili 

 tude for ornament or illustration sake, borrowed from 

 nature or history according to vulgar conceit, as of a 

 basilisk, an unicorn, a centaur, a Briareus, an hydra, or 

 the like, that therefore he must needs be thought to affirm 



