128 OF THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING. [PAGES 



Pages 47-61. Passing from the Bible and Ecclesiastical 

 history, Bacon now proceeds to give certain proofs of the value 

 of learning drawn from history. Innumerable proofs might be 

 given ; it is impossible here to do more than select a few of 

 them. 



Of all the honours which men have bestowed upon their more 

 famous fellow-men, the highest honour of all, that of deification, 

 has been conferred on those who by their labours and inventions 

 have added to the stock of human comforts. 



Learning, like an Orpheus' lute, tames the evil passions, and 

 renders social life possible. 



A\O societies hare been so prosperous as those which have been 

 directed by governors learned in the principles of morality and 

 true statesmanship. This fact is illustrated by the history of the 

 Roman people under the learned successors of Domitian Nerva, 

 who showed that the maintenance of the authority of the law ivas 

 not incompatible with the liberty of the subject % Trajan, who 

 combined patronage of learning with virtue and good govern 

 ment ; the inquiring Adrian, who gave peace to the Church, and 

 traversed the Empire, redressing wrongs and improving the 

 condition of his people ; the pure and studious Antoninus, who 

 was almost a Christian ; the philosophic Marcus Aurelius, that 

 perfect ruler in whom envy itself could detect no fault. In 

 modern times, to say nothing of James himself, Queen Elizabeth 

 was at the same time the most learned of women and the most 

 successful of sovereigns. 



Nor is learning less conducive to success in war, than to success 

 in the arts of peace. Alexander was equally great as a soldier 

 and as a philosopher. He understood the true value of worldly 

 goods, the weaknesses of man, the worthlessness of flattery, and 

 the uses and abuses of argument. He was skilled in the use of 

 rhetoric. He was a keen judge of character, and could truly 

 estimate the resources which ambition has to rely upon. Julius 

 Caesar was a great general, but he was. also a great scholar. He 

 ivas a good writer, and a master of style. He reformed the 

 Calendar. He was not afraid to enter the lists against the most 

 learned disputants. Though a sayer of wise things himself, he 

 was not above studying the wisdom of others. By a single word 

 he suppressed a mutiny ; he knew how to relieve himself from an 

 embarrassing situation by a happy speech, and in a pithy saying 

 he could give expression to the most opposite feelings. He was 

 conscious of his superiority, and knew how to turn this conscious 

 ness to his own advantage. Xenophon the philosopher also 

 performed one of the greatest military feats that history records. 



