Cclxxviii LIFE OF BACOX. 



ends of knowledge, and not to seek it for the gratification 

 of their minds, or for disputation, or that they may despise 

 others, or for emolument, or fame, or power, or such low 

 objects, but for its intrinsic merit and the purposes of 



Obstacles. The obstacles to the acquisition of knowledge are : 



f 1. Worldly occupation. 



1. Want of time, J 2 . Sickness. 



and U. Shortness of life. 



2. Want of means. 



r 



means. 



Want of Upon the obstacles from want of time, more imaginary 

 than real, if time is not wasted in frivolous pursuits, in 

 sensuality or in sleep, in misapplication of times of recre 

 ation, or in idle curiosity, the Novum Organum contains 

 but one casual, consolatory observation: &quot;We judge 

 also that mankind may conceive some hopes from our 

 example, which we offer, not by way of ostentation, but 

 because it may be useful.&quot; (b) 



Want of The obstacles to the acquisition of knowledge from want 

 of means he through life deeply felt, and he never omitted 

 an opportunity earnestly to express his hope that it would 

 be diminished or destroyed by such a collection of natural 

 history as would shew the world, not as man has made 

 it, not as it exists only in imagination, but as it really 

 exists, as God has made it. (c) 



() See vol. v. p. 12. (6) See ante, c. ix. 



(c) In the Advancement of Learning (see vol. ii. p. 95), published in 

 1605, he notes, as one of the defects of universities, &quot; the want of collec 

 tions of natural history, and of instruments to assist in experiments, 

 whether appertaining to Vulcan or Daedalus, furnace or engine, without 

 which there cannot be any main proficience in the disclosing of nature.&quot; 

 In his fable of Pan, in the Wisdom of the Ancients (vol. iii. p. 11), he 

 explains the exquisite description of nature by the ancients, under the 



