62 OF THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING. 



and the great conquests of the spacious provinces in Asia, 

 when he received letters out of Greece, of some fights and 

 services there, which were commonly for a passage, or a 

 fort, or some walled town at the most, he said, It seemed to 

 him, that lie was advertised of the battles of the frogs and the mice, 

 that the old tales went of. So certainly, if a man meditate 

 much upon the universal frame of nature, the earth with 

 men upon it, (the divineness of souls except,) will not seem 

 much other than an ant-hill, whereas some ants carry corn, 

 10 and some carry their young, and some go empty, and all to- 

 and-fro a little heap of dust. It taketh away or mitigateth 

 fear of death, or adverse fortune ; which is one of the greatest 

 impediments of virtue, and imperfections of manners. For if 

 a man's mind be deeply seasoned with the consideration of 

 the mortality and corruptible nature of things, he will easily 

 concur with Epictetus, who went forth one day and saw a 

 woman weeping for her pitcher of earth that was broken ; 

 and went forth the next day and saw a woman weeping for 

 her son that was dead : and thereupon said, Heri vidifragilem 

 20 frangi, hodie vidi mortalem mori : [ Yesterday I saw a brittle 

 thing broken, to-day a mortal dead.] And therefore Virgil 

 did excellently and profoundly couple the knowledge of 

 causes and the conquest of all fears together, as Concomitantia: 

 [concomitants.] 



Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas, 

 Quique metus omnes, et inexorabile fatum 

 Subjecit pedibus, strepitumque Acherontis avari : 

 [Happy the man who doth the causes knoiv 

 Of all that is : serene he stands, above 

 30 All fears; above the inexorable fate, 



And that insatiate gulf that roars below.] 

 It were too long to go over the particular remedies 

 which learning doth minister to all the diseases of the mind ; 

 sometimes purging the ill humours, sometimes opening the 

 obstructions, sometimes helping digestion, sometimes increas 

 ing appetite, sometimes healing the wounds and exulcerations 



