6 BACON 



business, and leads to a love of retirement ; 5. That it introduces 

 a relaxation in government, as every man is more ready to argue 

 than obey; whence Cato the censor when Carneades came 

 ambassador to Rome, and the young Romans, allured with his 

 eloquence, flocked about him gave counsel in open senate, to 

 grant him his despatch immediately, lest he should infect the 

 minds of the youth, and insensibly occasion an alteration in the 

 state.' 



The same conceit is manifest in Virgil, who, preferring the 

 honor of his country to that of his profession, challenged the 

 arts of policy in the Romans, as something superior to letters, 

 the pre-eminence in which, he freely assigns to the Grecians. 



" Tu regere imperio populos, Romane memento : 

 Hae tibi erunt artes." yEneas.* 



And we also observe that Anytus, the accuser of Socrates, 

 charged him in his impeachment with destroying, in the minds 

 of young men, by his rhetorical arts, all authority and reverence 

 for the laws of the country .s 



1. But these and the like imputations have rather a show of 

 gravity, than any just ground ; for experience shows that learn- 

 ing and arms have flourished in the same persons and ages. As 

 to persons, there are no better instances than Alexander and 

 Caesar, the one Aristotle's scholar in philosophy, and the other 

 Cicero's rival in eloquence; and, again, Epaminondas and 

 Xenophon, the one whereof first abated the power of Sparta, 

 and the other first paved the way for subverting the Persian 

 monarchy. This concurrence of learning and arms, is yet more 

 visible in times than in persons, as an age exceeds a man. For 

 in Egypt, Assyria, Persia, Greece, and Rome, the times most 

 famous for arms are likewise most admired for learning ; so that 

 the greatest authors and philosophers, the greatest leaders and 

 governors, have lived in the same ages. Nor can it well be 

 otherwise ; for as the fulness of human strength, both in body 

 and mind, comes nearly at an age ; so arms and learning, one 

 whereof corresponds to the body, the other to the soul, have a 

 near concurrence in point of time. 



2. And that learning should rather prove detrimental than 

 serviceable in the art of government, seems very improbable. 

 It is wrong to trust the natural body to empirics, who commonly 

 have a few receipts whereon they rely, but who know neither 



