CHAP. tl.J DOCTRINE OP DISCOVERY. 183 



of the Israelites in the wilderness, who, weary of manna, as 

 a thin though celestial diet, would have gladly returned to 

 the fleshpots : thus generally those sciences relish best that 

 are subjective, and nearer related to flesh and blood ; as civil 

 history, morality, politics, whereon men s affections, praises, 

 and fortunes turn, and are employed, whilst the other dry 

 light offends, and dries up the soft and humid capacities of 

 most men. But if we would rate things according to their 

 real worth, the rational sciences are the keys to all the rest ; 

 lor as the hand is the instrument of instruments, and the 

 mind the form of forms, so the rational sciences a^e to Ve 

 esteemed the art of arts. Nor do they direct only, but also 

 strengthen and confirm ; as the use and habit of shooting 

 not only enables one to shoot nearer the mark, but likewise 

 to draw a stronger bow. 



The logical arts are four, being divided according to the 

 ends they lead to : for in rational knowledge man endea 

 vours, 1. either to find what he seeks ; 2. to judge of what 

 he finds ; 3. to retain what he has approved ; or 4. to de 

 liver what he has retained : whence there are as many 

 rational arts ; viz., 1. the art of inquiry or invention ; 2. the 

 art of examination or judging ; 3. the art of custody or 

 memory ; and 4. the art ot elocution or delivery. 



CHAPTER II. 



Division of Invention into the Invention o t Arts and Arguments. The 

 former, though the more important of them, is wanting. Division of 

 the Invention of Arts into Literate (Instructed) Experience and a 

 New Method (Novun. Organum). An Illustration of Literate Expe 

 rience. 



INVENTION is of two very different kinds : the one of arts 

 and sciences, the other of arguments and discourse. The 

 former I set down as absolutely deficient. And this defi 

 ciency appears like that, when, in taking the inventory of an 

 estate, there is set down, in cash, nothing : ior as ready 

 money will purchase all other commodities, so this art, if 

 extant, would procure all other arts. And as the immense 

 regions of the West Indies had never been discovered, if the 

 use of the compass had not first been known, it is no wonder 



