134 OF THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 



and to find the way from a field in flower a great way 

 off to her hive ? Who taught the ant to bite every 

 grain of corn that she burieth in her hill, lest it should 

 take root and grow ? Add then the word extundere, 

 which importeth the extreme difficulty, and the word 

 paulatim, which importeth the extreme slowness, and 

 we are where we were, even amongst the Egyptians 

 gods ; there being little left to the faculty of reason, 

 and nothing to the duty of art, for matter of inven 

 tion. 



3. Secondly, the induction which the logicians speak 

 of, and which seemeth familiar with Plato, whereby the 

 principles of sciences may be pretended to be invented, 

 and so the middle propositions by derivation from the 

 principles ; their form of induction, I say, is utterly 

 vicious and incompetent : wherein their error is the 

 fouler, because it is the duty of art to perfect and exalt 

 nature ; but they contrariwise have wronged, abused, 

 and traduced nature. For he that shall attentively 

 observe how the mind doth gather this excellent dew 

 of knowledge, like unto that which the poet speaketh 

 of, Ae rei mellis caelestia dona, distilling and con 

 triving it out of particulars natural and artificial, as 

 the flowers of the field and garden, shall find that the 

 mind of herself by nature doth manage and act an 

 induction much better than they describe it. For to 

 conclude upon an enumeration of particulars, without 

 instance contradictory, is no conclusion, but a con 

 jecture ; for who can assure (in many subjects) upon 

 those particulars which appear of a side, that there 

 are not other on the contrary side which appear not ? 

 As if Samuel should have rested upon those sons of 

 Issay which were brought before him, and failed of 

 David which was in the field. And this form (to say 

 truth) is so gross, as it had not been possible for wits 

 so subtile as have managed these things to have offered 

 it to the world, but that they hasted to their theories 

 and dogmaticals, and were imperious and scornful 

 toward particulars ; which their manner was to use 

 but as lictores and viatores, for sergeants and whifflers, 



